The blessed martyr and fool-for-Christ Nicholas was a very peculiar "wanderer." He was born (circa 1075) in Stiri, a village located near the Monastery of Hosios Lukas, between Itea and Livadia. [1]
His parents were poor farmers, and his mother sent him to pasture the sheep. This work did not last long because one day, all of a sudden, he began to cry out in a loud voice: *"Kyrie, eleison!"* Taking the initiative to pray unceasingly both in his heart and aloud—as Christ had taught him when He visibly appeared to him—he merited to reach great spiritual heights.
However, his mother was deeply troubled by this and began to resort to threats and lashings in an attempt to force her son to abandon what she considered a great foolishness. When she realized she could not dissuade him from the path he had chosen, she cast him out of the house.
Nicholas was twelve years old when he left the village and climbed a very high mountain not far from the inhabited area. He found a cave where a female bear lived; upon seeing her, the saint armed himself with a cross and said: *"In the name of Christ, do not enter here again!"* Obediently, the bear left the cave and vanished from the entire region. He then settled in that place, nourishing himself only on raw herbs, and day and night—lifting his eyes and hands to heaven—he cried out, *"Kyrie eleison."*
While he was living this way, a venerable-looking monk with a long beard, naked and with white hair, appeared to him one day, greeting him and calling him by name. He urged Nicholas to love virtue and exhorted him to many things. Having thus instructed him on everything, the monk took his leave and quickly disappeared into the wilderness.
His mother, suspecting that Nicholas was possessed by a demon, brought him to the monks of the Monastery of Saint Luke; there, for a long time, he was subjected to harsh mistreatment under the guise of treatment. They cast him out of the temple: he stood before the doors, crying out *"Kyrie eleison."* They locked him in a tower: toward midnight, while he continued to cry out *"Kyrie eleison,"* the door of the tower opened prodigiously. The monks bound him: the chain fell to the ground like a cobweb. They threw him out: the Divine Power lifted him up and placed him on the dome of the church, and they were forced to make him come down by beating him with sticks. They threw him into the sea: a dolphin carried him safely to land. [2]
Taking an axe and a knife from home, Nicholas then went up the mountain. He cut wood from cedar trees and, shaping it into crosses, went to plant them at crossroads and in inaccessible, rugged places.
Once, the angel of the Lord transported him to Langobardia [in Apulia], to Trani, and said to him: *"Thanks to you, Nicholas, this place will be glorified until the end of the world."*
On the first of July, in the Metochion of Faro, called Stirisca, by the sea, preparations were being made for the feast of the holy unmercenaries Cosmas and Damian. The hegumen (abbot) of Stiri and his monks used to participate every year, and among the many who flocked there, our saint was also present. At the moment of communion, he approached to receive the most sacred body and blood of Christ. But the hegumen addressed him with insulting words, ordering him to be driven out of the church. Saddened and in tears, he decided to leave. He went to Naupactus and boarded a ship.
On the ship, Nicholas continuously cried out *"Kyrie eleison."* The sailors then threw him into the sea, but, protected by divine power, he reached the port of Otranto.
In Otranto, everyone soon began to recognize the divine virtue that filled this boy. And they pleaded with him, saying: *"Have mercy on us and intercede for us with the Lord, so that through your prayers we may be delivered from the slavery of the barbarians and our relatives who are in captivity may gain their freedom."* [3]
It was the custom of the citizens of Otranto to carry the icon of the glorious Theotokos from one church to another. One day, therefore, while the sacred Litany was being celebrated, the saint, who followed and sang *"Kyrie eleison,"* met an elderly man and, revering him, said: *"Hail, my brother and lord. You and I were fashioned by the unique Creator."* And he embraced him.
But the Christians murmured: *"Look! He reveres and greets a Jew!"* And placing the icon before him, they said: *"Adore the Theotokos!"* He replied: *"I do not want to adore her!"* but suddenly he rose from the ground and began to elevate hymns, thanksgivings, and praises in her honor. He then departed from Otranto and arrived in Sogliano, where for many days he performed numerous miracles.
Then he went to Nardò, Racale, and Lecce. In the Monastery of Saint Lawrence in Vernole, there was a man agitated by a demon. The saint said to him: *"Open your mouth!"* The man immediately opened his mouth and, after the saint touched him three times with a cross, he was delivered from the demon.
When the saint reached the city of Lecce, before entering it, he stopped in the temple of Saint Zachariah. Then, early in the morning, crying out *"Kyrie eleison,"* he entered the city. He headed to the cathedral, still crying out *"Kyrie eleison."* The [Uniate] Bishop Theodore had him seized and flogged. Enduring the lashes without moving at all, he was then driven away from the church.
Going elsewhere, he cried out *"Kyrie eleison"* as usual. Two Franks, Jean and Rumtibert, seized the saint and imprisoned him, bound hand and foot. But a great light shone, the ropes binding him were undone, the doors opened, and he, crying out *"Kyrie eleison,"* prodigiously went out.
One day, in the same city, near the city gate, he met Count Gottfried, who was riding on horseback accompanied by his men. Raising his hands to heaven, the saint cried out *"Kyrie eleison."* At that sudden cry and the gesture of his hands, the horses panicked and unseated the riders, throwing them to the ground. One of them approached the saint and slapped him. But, as the other riders set off again, the one who had slapped the saint suddenly fell from his horse, breaking his legs; the hand that had struck the saint remained paralyzed.
Some people took him and led him to the church of Saint Demetrius, leaving him there bound hand and foot. He never stopped praying and magnifying the Lord. And behold, toward midnight, the angel of the Lord appeared, and an intense light filled the church. His bonds being undone, while he cried out *"Kyrie eleison,"* he was drawn out of the church.
Entering the bell tower, he began to ring the bells; then, hanging his cloak before the icon of Saint Demetrius, he said: *"May the Lord not cease to perform wonders and miracles for the benefit of the sick until the end of the world."* This holds true to this day: all those who touch the cloak with faith are delivered from whatever illness they have been afflicted with.
Departing from there, Nicholas—still crying out *"Kyrie eleison"*—arrived in Veglie. There, staying in the house of a poor widow, he provided her with necessities: he loaded firewood onto his shoulders and carried it to that house. In this city, as indeed everywhere else, he cried out *"Kyrie eleison"* incessantly. And while always invoking *"Kyrie eleison,"* this saint would shout: *"Repent!"*, in the same way the Precursor of Christ had shouted it to the Jews. Following these events, some who despised him took the saint of the Lord and cut his hair in the shape of a cross out of mockery.
He then came to Taranto, still crying out *"Kyrie eleison"* and *"Repent!"* At the clamor this caused, Bishop Albert gave orders to give him many lashes. And indeed, they whipped him so inhumanly and savagely that the surrounding ground was stained with his blood. Leaving that place, he came to the city of Trani; however, due to the many and unbearable wounds that had lacerated his body, upon reaching the gates of the church of the Theotokos, he collapsed to the ground. An indescribable light surrounded him, while a voice foretold his final pilgrimage, the one that would bring him to the Lord.
The *Life* that I have summarized was compiled—in a Latin environment—based on the recollections of a monk who had followed Nicholas ever since Naupactus; a subsequent *Life* somewhat conceals the responsibility of the Latin bishop of Taranto in the martyr's death. The entire body of Saint Nicholas is preserved in Trani.
---
### Notes
1. G. CIOFFARI, *San Nicola pellegrino*, Bari 1994.
2. The founder of Taranto, Taras (son of the sea god Poseidon and Satyria, daughter of King Minos of Crete), reached the shores of Salento riding a dolphin, as did Phalantus and Icadius. Arion, on the other hand, made the journey from Sicily to Corinth on the back of a dolphin.
3. The Norman Crusaders, having conquered Apulia in 1073, immediately began persecutions.
> • Antonio Monaco, *Ombre della Storia. Santi dell' Italia Ortodossa* (Shadows of History. Saints of Orthodox Italy).