Development Hagiography constituted an important
literary genre in the
early Christian church, providing some informational history along with the more inspirational stories and
legends. A hagiographic account of an individual saint could consist of a biography (''''), a description of the saint's deeds or miracles, an account of the saint's martyrdom (''''), or be a combination of these. The genre of lives of the saints first came into being in the
Roman Empire as legends about
Christian martyrs were recorded. The dates of their deaths formed the basis of
martyrologies. In the 4th century, there were three main types of catalogs of lives of the saints: • annual calendar catalogue, or
menaion (in
Greek, , means "monthly" (
adj,
neut), lit. "lunar"), biographies of the saints to be read at
sermons; •
synaxarion ("something that collects"; Greek , from , i.e. "gathering", "collection", "compilation"), or a short version of lives of the saints, arranged by dates; •
paterikon ("that of the Fathers"; Greek ; in Greek and Latin, means "father"), or biography of the specific saints, chosen by the catalog compiler. The earliest lives of saints focused on
desert fathers who lived as ascetics from the 4th century onwards. The life of
Anthony of Egypt is usually considered the first example of this new genre of Christian biography. In
Western Europe, hagiography was one of the more important vehicles for the study of inspirational history during the
Middle Ages. The
Golden Legend of
Jacobus de Voragine compiled a great deal of medieval hagiographic material, with a strong emphasis on miracle tales. Lives were often written to promote the cult of local or national states, and in particular to develop pilgrimages to visit
relics. The bronze
Gniezno Doors of
Gniezno Cathedral in Poland are the only
Romanesque doors in Europe to feature the life of a saint. The life of Saint
Adalbert of Prague, who is buried in the cathedral, is shown in 18 scenes, probably based on a lost illuminated copy of one of his Lives. The
Bollandist Society continues the study, academic assembly, appraisal and publication of materials relating to the lives of Christian saints (see
Acta Sanctorum).
Medieval England Many of the important hagiographical texts composed in medieval England were written in the vernacular dialect
Anglo-Norman. With the introduction of
Latin literature into England in the 7th and 8th centuries the genre of the life of the saint grew increasingly popular. When one contrasts it to the popular heroic poem, such as
Beowulf, one finds that they share certain common features. In
Beowulf, the titular character battles against
Grendel and
his mother, while the saint, such as
Athanasius'
Anthony (one of the original sources for the hagiographic motif) or the character of
Guthlac, battles against figures no less substantial in a spiritual sense. Both genres then focus on the hero-warrior figure, but with the distinction that the saint is of a spiritual sort. Imitation of the life of Christ was then the benchmark against which saints were measured, and imitation of the lives of saints was the benchmark against which the general population measured itself. In
Anglo-Saxon and
medieval England, hagiography became a literary genre par excellence for the teaching of a largely illiterate audience. Hagiography provided priests and theologians with classical handbooks in a form that allowed them the rhetorical tools necessary to present their faith through the example of the saints' lives. Of all the English hagiographers no one was more prolific nor so aware of the importance of the genre as Abbot
Ælfric of Eynsham. His work
Lives of the Saints contains set of sermons on saints' days, formerly observed by the English Church. The text comprises two prefaces, one in Latin and one in
Old English, and 39 lives beginning on 25 December with the nativity of
Christ and ending with three texts to which no saints' days are attached. The text spans the entire year and describes the lives of many saints, both English and continental, and harks back to some of the earliest saints of the early church. There are two known instances where saint's lives were adapted into vernacular
plays in Britain. These are the
Cornish-language works
Beunans Meriasek and
Beunans Ke, about the lives of Saints
Meriasek and
Kea, respectively. Other examples of hagiographies from England include: • the
Chronicle by
Hugh Candidus • the
Secgan Manuscript • the list of
John Leyland • possibly the book
Life by
Saint Cadog •
Vita Sancti Ricardi Episcopi et Confessoris Cycestrensis/ Life of
Richard of Chichester by
Ralph Bocking. • The
Book of Margery Kempe is an example of autohagiography, in which the subject dictates her life using the hagiographic form.
Medieval Ireland Ireland is notable in its rich hagiographical tradition, and for the large amount of material which was produced during the Middle Ages. Irish hagiographers wrote primarily in Latin while some of the later saint's lives were written in the hagiographer's native vernacular
Irish. Of particular note are the lives of
St. Patrick,
St. Columba (Latin)/Colum Cille (Irish) and
St. Brigit/Brigid—Ireland's three patron saints. The earliest extant Life was written by
Cogitosus. Additionally, several Irish calendars relating to the
feastdays of
Christian saints (sometimes called
martyrologies or
feastologies) contained abbreviated synopses of saint's lives, which were compiled from many different sources. Notable examples include the
Martyrology of Tallaght and the
Félire Óengusso. Such hagiographical calendars were important in establishing lists of native Irish saints, in imitation of continental calendars.
Eastern Orthodoxy (
Patriarchate of Peć, 1719–20) –
Christ Pantocrator flanked by the
Virgin Mary and
John the Baptist made in the 12th century. In the 10th century, a
Byzantine monk Simeon Metaphrastes was the first one to change the genre of lives of the saints into something different, giving it a moralizing and
panegyrical character. His catalog of lives of the saints became the standard for all of the
Western and
Eastern hagiographers, who would create relative biographies and images of the ideal saints by gradually departing from the real facts of their lives. Over the years, the genre of lives of the saints had absorbed a number of narrative plots and poetic images (often, of pre-Christian origin, such as
dragon fighting etc.), mediaeval
parables, short stories and
anecdotes. The genre of lives of the saints was introduced in the Slavic world in the
Bulgarian Empire in the late 9th and early 10th century, where the first original hagiographies were produced on
Cyril and Methodius,
Clement of Ohrid and
Naum of Preslav. Eventually the Bulgarians brought this genre to
Kievan Rus' together with
writing and also in
translations from the Greek language. In the 11th century, they began to compile the original life stories of their first saints, e.g.
Boris and Gleb,
Theodosius Pechersky etc. In the 16th century,
Metropolitan Macarius expanded the list of the Russian saints and supervised the compiling process of their life stories. They would all be compiled in the so-called ''Velikiye chet'yi-minei'' catalog (Великие Четьи-Минеи, or
Great Menaion Reader), consisting of 12
volumes in accordance with each month of the year. They were revised and expanded by St.
Dimitry of Rostov in 1684–1705. The
Life of Alexander Nevsky was a particularly notable hagiographic work of the era. Today, the works in the genre of lives of the saints represent a valuable historical source and reflection of different social ideas, world outlook and
aesthetic concepts of the past.
Oriental Orthodoxy The
Oriental Orthodox Churches also have their own hagiographic traditions. For instance,
Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church hagiographies in the
Ge'ez language are known as
gadl (Saint's Life). There are some 200 hagiographies about indigenous saints. They are among the most important
Medieval Ethiopian written sources, and some have accurate historical information. They are written by the disciples of the saints. Some were written a long time after the death of a saint, but others were written not long after the saint's demise. Fragments from an
Old Nubian hagiography of Saint Michael are extant. == Judaism ==