Ipomoni of Loutraki

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Life

Saint Hipomoni is translated in English to Saint Patience. The holy and right believing Empress Augusta Helen - Dragasi Palaiologos was also known by her monastic name of Ipomoni. She was the daughter of the emperor of Slavs Constantine Dragasis. She became empress of Byzantium as the wife of Emmanuel Palaiologos. She had six children.

As empress she was noted for her pious works. She was pious and honored God, and related with people in a godly manner. The philosopher Georgios Plethon writes that as an empress she was well known for her wisdom and justice.

Her husband (as a former emperor) became a monk with the name Mathieu. After his death she became a nun at the Monastery of Kira–Martha, taking the name Ipomoni (or Hipomoni).Although she was the former Empress, she helped in all the jobs in the monastery as the rest nuns. She helped to establish a home for old people, with the name "The Hope of the Despaired". The home was located at the Monastery of St. John of the Stone where the relics of St. Patapius of Thebes are also kept.

The siege of Constantinople occurred when St Hipomoni and her husband were exiled (1390-1392). She died on March 13, 1450, 3 years before Constantinople was conquered by the Ottoman. Her son, Emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos, died in the final charge [1] during the fall of Constantinople on May 29, 1453, while many other Christians were slaughtered by the Ottoman Turk forces of Sultan Mehmet II throughout the city as well as inside the famous church.

St. Hipomoni was buried in the monastery of the Pantocratoras in Constantinople, where were her husband and 3 of their children (2 of them were monks as well) were buried too.

Angelis Notaras, a nephew of St. Hipomoni, after the conquest of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453 transferred at Geraneia mountain (at the city Loutraki, near Athens) in a cage the relic of Saint Patapius of Thebes. That cave was a place where hermit monks inhabited since the 11th century A.D. In that cage a Byzantine icon of St. Patapios and St. Hipomoni and also the skull of St. Hipomoni where found later. In 1952 father Nektarios Marmarinos established the monastery of St Patapios where they still keep the holly skull of St Hipomoni.

Her memory is celebrated in March 13, the day she fell asleep, and May 29, the day that Constantinople fell to the Ottomans and her son Constantine XI Palaiologos died.

Sources

  • O Μέγας Συναξαριστής της Ορθοδόξου εκκλησίας (μ. Βίκτωρος Ματθαίου), τρίτη έκδοση, Μονή Μεταμόρφωσης Σωτήρος, Αθήνα, 1968.
  • Τσολακίδης Χρήστος, Αγιολόγιο της Ορθοδοξίας, Αθήνα, Ελλάδα, έκδοση 2001.
  • Δρ Χαράλαμπος Μπούσιας, Kανών Παρακλητικός και Χαιρετιστήριοι Οίκοι εις την Οσία Μητέρα Ημών Υπομονή, έκδοση Ιεράς Μονής Αγίου Παταπίου, Λουτράκι, Ελλάδα, έκδοση 2007.
  • Dr Haralambos Bousias, Saint Patapios and his miracles, nunnery of Saint Patapios, Loutraki, Greece, edition 2004.

External links

  • Some saying on the altar table of Hagia Sophia
  • Retrieved from "https://en.orthodoxwiki.org/index.php?title=Ipomoni_of_Loutraki&oldid=99984"