Romanos of Karpenisi
The Holy New Venerable-Martyr Romanos of Karpenisi
New Martyr · Venerable Martyr · Venerable · b. 17th century, at Karpenisi in central Greece — d. 1694, at Constantinople
Commemorated 16 February — Martyrdom at Constantinople
Romanos (died 1694) was a new venerable-martyr of the Ottoman period, born at Karpenisi in the mountains of central Greece, who took up the monastic life on Mount Athos and, burning to confess Christ before the Turks, went to Constantinople, openly professed the faith, and after imprisonment and suffering was put to death there in the year 1694. He is honoured among the neomartyrs of the Holy Mountain and is commemorated on February 16.
Romanos was born in the seventeenth century at Karpenisi, in the region of Evrytania in the mountains of Roumeli. Drawn to the monastic life, he came to the Holy Mountain of Athos and was tonsured there, formed in ascetic discipline by its elders in an age when Athos was the nursery of many who longed for martyrdom under the Ottoman yoke. Filled with that same zeal — to seal the confession of Christ with his blood in the manner of the ancient martyrs — he left the Mountain and went to Constantinople. There he confessed Christ openly before the Turks, refusing every inducement to deny his faith or embrace Islam; and after imprisonment and torments he was put to death in the imperial city in 1694, receiving the crown of a new venerable-martyr (νέος ὁσιομάρτυς). His memory was kept at once on Athos and among the Greeks under the Turks, and a service was composed in his honour.
The transmitted accounts of his passion are brief and vary in their particulars — the exact circumstances and the manner of his death are given differently in different synaxaria, and some reckonings keep his memory on January 5 rather than February 16. What is constant is the outline: a monk of Athos from Karpenisi who sought and won martyrdom at Constantinople toward the end of the seventeenth century. (The details above are recorded from the Greek Synaxaristes and the Menaion notice for February 16; fuller verification against a critical life is owed, several of the readily available sources being unreachable at the time of writing.)
Feast and commemoration
Romanos is kept on February 16 (church date; Old Calendar civil March 1) in the Greek calendars, which style him "Romanos the New Venerable-Martyr" (Ῥωμανὸς ὁ νέος Ὁσιομάρτυς); some sources give January 5. His commemoration is chiefly Greek and Athonite, among the great company of the neomartyrs of the Turkish period.
Hymns
Troparion — Tone 4
Thy Martyr, O Lord, in his contest received the crown of incorruption from thee our God; for possessed of thy might, he cast down the tyrants and broke also the feeble insolence of demons. By his prayers, O Christ our God, save our souls.
Original translation from the Greek
Iconography
Romanos is depicted in the manner of the Athonite neomartyrs — a young monk in the black rasson and koukoulion, holding the cross of martyrdom and sometimes the palm, his martyrdom shown by the instrument of his death. No public-domain (pre-modern) icon of him has been identified for storage; the entry is noted as wanting an image.