ON SAINT SABAS
BISHOP OF DAPHNUSIA IN THE ARCHIPELAGO.
CommentarySabas, Bishop of Daphnusia in the Archipelago (St.)
G. H.
Ptolemy book 5 describes the Geography of Asia, and chapter 1 deduces the situation of Pontus and Bithynia, and toward the end relates the adjacent islands, and among these is Thynias, which is also the island Daphnusia. But Pliny book 5 chapter 32 there places Thallusa, which others, he says, write Daphnusa. The Bishop of this place the Greeks celebrate in the very ancient Synaxary of the Church of Constantinople, which belongs to the Clermont College of the Society of Jesus at Paris: in which these things are read, On the same day the second of May, the memory of our holy Father Sabas, Bishop of Daphnusia. Which almost the same we noted from the MS. Menaea of the Ambrosian library marked with the letter o and number 148, likewise from the Turin MSS. of the Duke of Savoy, but they seemed to be noted on the very Kalends of May toward the end. But at what time this Bishop Sabas lived, we know not to divine. There were in the VIII and IX centuries Abbots of the Studites called Sabas. He could have flourished then too, and have championed the Church against the Iconoclasts, which I would not without further knowledge asseverate.