ON ST. HILARION OF MOGLENA OR MEGLIN, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, IN MACEDONIA,
BEFORE THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY.
COLLECTION.
Hilarion, bishop of Meglena, at Tărnovo in Bulgaria. (S.)
BY V. D. B.
§ single. The place of his see, his praises, translations, age.
The name of the bishop St. Hilarion first, unless I am mistaken, became known to Westerners through the illustrated, or pictured, Graeco-Muscovite Ephemerides, Errors and doubts put forward concerning St. Hilarion. which Papebroch had published in the year 1680 at the threshold of volume I of the Acts of the Saints of May, and in which at October 21 Hilarion the bishop is read and represented. At which place our most excellent predecessor added that he had been informed by Fr. Ohilewicz that he was bishop of Mehla and that this bishopric is situated in Muscovy. Papebroch let himself be persuaded of the latter with difficulty, so that he immediately added Acta SS. vol. I of May, page XLVIII and following.: It remains that someone teach us his age and the history of his life. It also torments me that I find hitherto no trace of a bishopric of Mehla in Russia, nor any city whose name comes near to it. Lequien seemed to himself more sharp-sighted Oriens Christianus, vol. I, col. 1287. and laid down that St. Hilarion was bishop at Mohilow, the capital of White or Little Russia, situated on the right bank of the Borysthenes or Dnieper. Lequien was recently followed by the distinguished Mr. Moroni Moroni, Dizionario di erudizione ecclesiastica, vol. XLVI, page 8.; who, since he states that the episcopal see of Mohilow arose in the thirteenth century, by this very fact makes St. Hilarion later than that age. Kulczynski Specimen ecclesiae Ruthenicae, page 55. was much more cautious, and wrote: Whether this holy bishop was a Ruthenian, or a Serb or Bulgarian, I have nothing here and now from which to say; nor did Joseph Simonius Assemani Kalendria ecclesiae universae, vol. V, page 312 and 313. dare anything else than to report the words of Papebroch and Kulczynski, adding that three other Hilarions are celebrated by the Greeks; but that these are monks, and none can be confused with St. Hilarion the bishop. But truly Ohilewicz erred when he suggested to Papebroch that St. Hilarion was bishop of Mehla; he ought to have said of Meglena or Moglena; nor was this bishopric to be sought in Muscovy, but in Macedonia: which things will become more than sufficiently manifest from what is to be said.
[2] What is found about him in the Ruthenian calendars. It will be helpful at the beginning to report what is found about this man in the martyrologies or other books of that kind. First of all, St. Hilarion the bishop is noted in none of the Greek synaxaria or calendars, which we possess in quite great number. His name is also omitted in the Sobornik of the twelve months, or common Synaxarion of the whole Ruthenian church, which Fr. Georg David, missionary S.J., sent from Moscow to our predecessors in the year 1688, attesting that he had copied it from the appendix of the Euchologion and that it is found printed here and there in prayer books. Nor is it to be found in the Capponi tables, which the monks of the Holy Mountain of Athos seem to have painted for the use of the Ruthenians somewhat after the year 1250 Ibid. vol. I, page 7.. Nor does it appear in the calendar of the Ruthenians made public by Possevino Apparatus sacer, vol. II, page 365., which indeed seems to be the common Synaxarion. But on the other hand, as we saw above, his name is written and his image painted in the pictured Calendar of Moscow, which Papebroch published and which was elaborated in the year 1628 Assemani, Kalendaria ecclesiae universae, vol. I, page 6.. Similarly in the Sobornik, or particular Synaxarion of the Ruthenians of the diocese of Kiev, in which, besides the saints received from the Greeks, the saints of the Pechersk, or Pieczary, and those proper to the Ruthenians are also contained. This, found likewise at the end of the Euchologion, Fr. Georg David translated and sent to Papebroch in the year 1688, attesting that it was used also by the Muscovites. In it, then, after the memory of St. Hilarion Velik, or the Great, of whom we treated above, is added: And the translation of the venerable bones of our holy father Hilarion, bishop of Meglen. These things are explained somewhat more fully in another Ruthenian Calendar, whose months of July, August, September and October Baron Sparwenfeld, a name not undistinguished in Slavonic letters, put into Latin and sent to our predecessors in the year 1712; and there likewise, after the praises of St. Hilarion the Great, there follow: Likewise the bringing of the relics of our holy father Hilarion, bishop of Meglin, in the year 6672, under the Greek emperor Emanuel.
[3] The memory of Moglena, also Meglina and Meglena, among the ancients In the monuments adduced so far, from which St. Hilarion's cult among the Ruthenians is sufficiently established, the name of his episcopal see is given in three ways, Mehlensis, or, as it is in Lequien Oriens Christianus, vol. I, col. 1287., Mohelensis, then Meglenscensis and Meglinicus: but by all these forms Meglena, Meglina or Moglena is indicated. And that the difficulty which might seem to lie in the first two may disappear, let the reader learn, to use the words of Kulczynski Specimen ecclesiae Ruthenicae, part II, page 84., that although the Ruthenians write the letter gamma after the manner of the Greeks, they nevertheless pronounce it as the letter H, as Gabriel, Havryl, Georgius, Heorhiy; so that Ohilewicz, and he who suggested the other reading to Lequien, followed the manner of pronouncing rather than of writing. For my part I do not know that the town of Moglena is spoken of before the year of Christ 1030; in whose spring the emperor Basil, surnamed the Bulgar-slayer from the most atrocious Bulgarian war, after the recapture of the fortress of Bodena, sent Xiphias and Constantine Diogenes with an army into the region of the Moglenians (των Μογλενων); and while, having laid it waste, they were besieging the city, he himself came upon them; and, the river (Karadjova) which washed the city having been turned out of its bed, and the foundations of the walls having been undermined and wood and other material capable of fire put into the cavities, he overthrew the walls by burning. Seeing which, the townspeople, made wretchedly suppliant, surrendered themselves and the fortification. There was captured there… Elitzes, prince of the Moglenians, and many others of the nobles and no small band of soldiers. Those fit to bear arms the emperor deports to Aspracania: the rest of the rabble he orders to be plundered, and the fortress named Notia, near Moglena, to be burned. So says George Cedrenus Historiarum compendium, page 461, Bonn ed.. Anna Comnena too mentions the same town, narrating what fortunes awaited Bohemond III, prince of Antioch, in Macedonia at the end of the twelfth century: Through Bodena, she says Alexiados, book V, chap. 5, page 243, Bonn ed., he came to Moglena and there restored a fortress formerly destroyed. Then, having left there a count surnamed Saracen with a fairly large band of soldiers, he betook himself to the Bardares, to the place which is called the White Churches… Bohemond set out from the White Churches to Castoria: which being learned, the grand domestic hastened to Moglena, and having taken it, killed the Saracen and at once utterly destroyed the fortress. From many other circumstances which Cedrenus and Anna set before and after, it is manifest that the town of Moglena was situated neither far from Thessalonica nor far from Bodena: so that it is wonderful that there have been learned men who confused Bodena and Moglena, and others who thought that the latter should be placed in Phrygia. Stritter doubted Memoriae, Bulgarica ex Byzantinis, vol. II, part II, page 702. whether the land of the Smolenians, of which mention is made in the writings of Philip the hermit (he flourished at the end of the eleventh century) and in the history of the wars waged in Macedonia by the emperors of Constantinople at the end of the following century, is the same as the seat of the Moglenians: which the distinguished Mr. Von Spruner thought should be affirmed Atlas des Mittelatters, table 61, first ed.. But that the Smolenians lay more toward the East, and were placed on the borders of Thrace and Macedonia on the river Mesta (Msta), seems certain from what the distinguished Mr. Šafařík has collected Slawische Alterthümer, German by Mosig von Aehrenfeld, vol. II, page 221..
[4] and site. It is the same city as Macedonian Edessa, For the rest, the site of this town is now well enough known. Namely, it is distant from Thessalonica about nine geographical leagues, from Bodena about four, and almost three from the river Bardares, whose bed lies to the East. Its site is well marked in tables 61 and 62 of Spruner's historical-geographical Atlas; in the map of Greece inserted in volume IV of Pouqueville's travels; in that also which accompanies the books of Ami Boué on European Turkey, published eighteen years ago, etc.: but there is an error in Spruner's table 59, in which Moglena is placed on the eastern bank of the river Bardares, Edessa occupying its place. Yet that error is not what it appears at first sight. For in the Exposition of the emperor Andronicus Palaeologus the elder (he reigned from the year 1282 to 1332) of what place the metropolises subject to the throne of Constantinople now hold, there is read among the cities which have lately changed their name Ἐδεσσα τανυν Μογλαινα, Edessa now Moglaena In Schelstraete, Antiquitatis ecclesiae opus geographicum, page 782.: so that Spruner has doubled that town, yet assigning its true site to Edessa: only Moglena, then, is to be struck out or written next to Edessa. Lequien Oriens Christianus, vol. II, col. 283 and 284. seemed to himself to have found that Moglena and Edessa are different cities, since Cantacuzenus calls Niphon τον ὲπισκοπον Μογλαινων Cantacuzenus, Historiarum book I, chap. 44, vol. I, page 215, Bonn ed. and further on very often names Edessa Ibid. chap. 54 and following, page 273 and following.; and because he let himself be persuaded by Chrysanthus, Greek patriarch of Jerusalem
Ecclesiae Orientalis notitia, in Lequien, vol. II, col. 283 and 284., that Bodena is the same city as Edessa. But the author of the Oriens Christianus is by no means to be heeded. For Chrysanthus is a more recent writer, of no greater weight than Sophianus, who thought that Bodena and Moglena were the same city Ibid. col. 317 and 318.; and as regards Cantacuzenus, he designated the bishop by the vulgar name and the city by the learned one. In the last century Moglena still had a bishop, subject to the archbishop of Ochrid [Ibid. loc. cit.; cf. Pouqueville, Voyage de la Grèce, book VII, chap. 6, vol. III, page 51, ed. 1826.]: nor do I know that this order of things was changed afterward. Ami Boué, however, omits him.
[5] The name of this city, whose form varies, has a Slavonic origin. In the things we have brought together so far, the reader will doubtless have noticed that this city, or town, was constantly called by the Greeks Moglena or Moglaena, in the neuter plural. But it is certain that formerly the name Meglina and Meglena was used by the Slavs, as will appear below from the Slavonic Prologue; and recent travellers and other learned men are witnesses that it is still in use now. Lequien states that at the beginning of the eighteenth century it was called Moclanta [Ami Boué, La Turquie d'Europe, vol. I, page 185, and Visquenel, in the same, vol. I. page 190; Šafařík, Slawische Alterthümer, vol. II, page 226.]; but I want a better authority. Further, Meglena and Vodena are Slavonic words, of which the former signifies a dark, gloomy village (for Mgla is darkness or obscurity), and the other a watery village: both, moreover, were given by the Slavs from the natural condition of the places, when they penetrated into Macedonia and occupied those seats. The distinguished Mr. Šafařík discourses at length on these things for his purpose Slawische Alterthümer, vol. II, page 162 and following.. We, however, shall note this one thing, that their coming is most obscure; yet that it seems that already in the seventh and eighth centuries some colonies of Slavs had sought new dwellings for themselves in Macedonia, and at length at some time had prevailed, especially in the inland parts. And these things concerning the episcopal see of St. Hilarion had to be unfolded somewhat more broadly, because the books in which it has hitherto been treated are full of darkness and errors.
[6] St. Hilarion's praises from the Slavonic ecclesiastical books. As the Rev. Fr. Gagarin, my guide here and there, has informed me, in the Slavonic Menaea which contain the Lives of the saints a very brief commemoration is made of St. Hilarion, bishop of Meglin or Meglina; on the other hand, in other Menaea, in which the Offices of the saints are contained, a long office of the same saint is read, consisting, however, of common praises rather than of certain and historical notices. He is said there to have lived from boyhood with holy morals, to have adorned the episcopal dignity with virtues, to have promoted religious houses, to have sharply attacked heresies by his teaching, to have shone with miracles, and other things of that kind. All of which are almost comprised in the following Troparion, which is likewise read there and which has already been published by Kulczynski Specimen ecclesiae Ruthenicae, page 55. and Assemani Kalendaria ecclesiae universae, vol. V, page 312.: Illustrious for great virtues, thou didst rule the assemblies of monks, thou didst purge the pontifical see, thou didst repress the onsets of heretics, thou didst raise houses dedicated to Christ, O holy Hilarion! And after thy death thy body remained whole and incorrupt, and it pours forth cures for the sick and drives out demons. Do thou then obtain from God eternal salvation for our souls. In the Kontakion, which you likewise have there, the celebration of his feast is praised and his care for the monks. Take the words: As the light-bearing commemoration of the pontiff has appeared, at once it has driven away the darkness of drowsiness and brought the light of heavenly gifts, calling all to the feast. Thou, O Hilarion, hast found grace with God, since thou wast the best instructor of monks. In these, as is plain, there is nothing by which the age of St. Hilarion seems to be able to be fixed, since in these parts the church was almost never not afflicted with heresies, and the monastic life was always in honour.
[7] [He is translated from Moglena to Tărnovo, where he is laid in the church of the Forty Martyrs.] Nor can anything certain and definite be drawn out of the Slavonic Prologue, in which the translation of his sacred bones is narrated, except that he was already venerated before the year 1205, in which they were carried from Moglena to Tărnovo. Here, then, is what is read in that book at October 21: Kaloyan, king of the Bulgarians and brother of King Asen, made himself master by arms of Greece, Thrace, Neada and Hellas, and set out as far as the town of the Meglinians, which he also obtained. He found in it the bier of Blessed Hilarion. Kindled therefore with holy ardour, he resolved to translate the relics of the most blessed man to Tărnovo, the capital of his kingdom, and ordered the chest to be taken up by his men: and they took the relics with the casket and translated the saint. Further, when the patriarch of Tărnovo with the whole region of the Bulgarians had heard of the saint's coming, he went forth to meet him with the bishops and all his clergy, with the magnates and the people, with candles, thuribles and odours of every kind, and they laid his body on October 21 in the city of Tărnovo, which God preserve. But a long time and many years afterward a new king, called John Asen, son of Asen the elder, obtained the sceptre and ruled over the Bulgarians, Greeks, Franks, Serbs, Albanians and all the towns of both seas. Now this king John Asen resolved to erect a church in honour of the Forty Martyrs. When, then, it had been built and magnificently adorned, the body of the thrice-blessed pontiff Hilarion was brought thither and honourably laid. Those who approach it with faith, cures are wrought in their favour. Through the prayers of the saint may God deign to admit us into His kingdom. And these things must now be explained and more closely determined.
[8] [The time of this translation is to be defined from the chronology of the kings of Bulgaria.] Three names occur here: Asen the Elder, Kaloyan and John Asen. Now Asen the Elder is the one who with his brother Peter was the author of the Bulgarians' revolt from the Byzantine empire about the year 1185; whence the second series of the kings of Bulgaria was begun from him. Asen having been killed in the year 1195, and Peter too soon removed from their midst, their brother John, or Joannicius, also called Kaloyan, took the kingdom. Him Boril, his sister's son, succeeded in the year 1207, John, son of Asen, being still under age and staying meanwhile among the Russians: who, having returned after some time to his homeland with troops, surrounded Tărnovo with a seven-year siege, and, having taken it in the year 1215 or 1216, shut up his maternal uncle in prison and undertook his own reign; which he held until the year 1241 [Stritter, Memoriae, Bulgarica ex Byzantinis, vol. II. part II, page 672 and following; Assemani, Kalendaria ecclesiae universae, vol. V, page 98 and following; cf. Acta SS., Auctarium vol. VI of Oct. page 67 and 68; Art de vérifier les dates, vol. I, page 446.]. Whence it is plain that the first translation was made between the years 1196 and 1207, the second between the years 1216 and 1241. But it seems that more accurate things are to be sought.
[9] It was made in the year 1205, when Kaloyan undertook the Macedonian expedition I would not, for my part, recount all the wars which Kaloyan waged against the Greeks and against the Latins, who had stormed Constantinople in the year 1204: for you have these narrated here and there in the common historians. Let it be enough to know a few things about the Macedonian expedition; which it is sufficiently established was made partly in the year 1105, partly in the year 1106 [Cf. Stritter, vol. II, part II, page 719; Art de vérifier les dates, vol. I, page 446.]. The Latins, having made themselves masters of Constantinople, had occupied almost the whole of Thrace and Macedonia. Some cities, however, resisted, among them Adrianople; and Kaloyan, seeing the empire of the Greeks dragging toward ruin, had seized Philippopolis in advance. When, therefore, Baldwin, who had girt his head with the diadem of Constantinople, was urging the people of Adrianople to surrender of their own accord, they sent envoys to Kaloyan to rouse him to subdue the Latins, Adrianople being offered as a reward. The Bulgarian let himself easily be persuaded of this; and, having summoned most savage forces of Cumans, or Huns, fought so successfully against the Latins that he captured the emperor Baldwin: whom he is said also to have put to a cruel death at Tărnovo. Then he went on to Adrianople to receive the city into his dominion; but, the faith of the promises being spurned, he was shut out of the gates. Kaloyan would have wished to surround it with a siege; but, as he was ignorant of this art, he departed from there, and since no one, as George Acropolites says Annales, page 25. Bonn ed., opposed him, the Italians having been utterly vanquished by him, he overran the whole of Macedonia, enriched with enormous booty, despoiling the cities together with their inhabitants and overthrowing them from their foundations, with this intention, that if ever the Romans, their misfortune abating, should recover breath, they should not be able to recover their own towns. George then recounts several captured cities; but omits very many others, which it is not worth while to enumerate: among which do not doubt that Moglena, or Meglena, is to be understood; since Kaloyan came down to the south of this town, coming as far as Thessalonica: which the same Acropolites testifies Ibid. page 26., having Nicetas Choniates and Nicephorus agreeing with him In Stritter, vol. II, part II, page 710 and 711.. But since this slaughter and war ceased about the paschal days of the 9th indiction, in the year of the world 6714 Nicetas Choniates, in Stritter, page 719., or of Christ 1206, and the body of St. Hilarion was brought to Tărnovo on October 21, it is manifest that this was done in the year 1205. And indeed from the order which Nicetas Choniates follows in narrating events it is clear that Kaloyan came into the parts of Thessalonica at the beginning of the war; nor is he read to have been present at the pious procession when the sacred pledge arrived at Tărnovo, as being one who was continuing to push the war forward. Hence gather that an error lies in Sparwenfeld's Synaxarion, where this translation is referred to the year of the world 6672, or of Christ 1164, and to the reign of Manuel Comnenus, who wore the purple from the year 1145 to 1180. There should have been written the year of the world 6713, Theodore Lascaris I being emperor of the Greeks, and Baldwin I of the Latins a captive.
[10] [The Bulgarians were then Catholics, who certainly would not have venerated St. Hilarion if he had been schismatic.] And from this is also resolved the question which spontaneously arises whenever eastern saints, about whose age there is less certainty, are to be illustrated; namely whether, since the deeds of St. Hilarion are almost hidden, to demonstrate this by arguments and reasons drawn from the life of the blessed man himself; but one must trust the judgment of the prelate of Tărnovo, who received his relics with honour, since he was thoroughly Catholic. Namely, Kaloyan from the year 1197 had asked for himself and his nation the communion and protection of the Roman church, and at length from
he had earnestly requested it from Innocent III. Namely, from the year 1199 to 1204, after many letters and legations had been sent and received back and forth, it was agreed between the two that the Bulgarian should by a chrysobull subject himself and his dominions to the authority of the Roman see, and that in return the pontiff should send to the king the insignia of the royal dignity, a crown and sceptre with a banner marked with the cross of Christ and the keys of Peter; that besides he should establish Basil, archbishop of Debeltus or Zagora, in the see of Tărnovo, the rights of primate over the Bulgarian church being conferred on him, and finally that he should adorn with the pallium, together with Basil the primate, the bishops of Beiesbugd and Preslav, raised to the metropolitan dignity. The series of these events has been followed in a long narrative by Joseph Simonius Assemani Kalendaria ecclesiae universae, vol. V, page 125 and following. and Giacomo Coleti Illyricum sacrum, vol. VIII, page 210 and following., more briefly by Hurter Histoire d'Innocent III, vol. I, page 283, 424, 563 and following, Brussels ed., Lequien Oriens Christianus, vol. I, col. 1232., Moroni Dizionario di erudiz., under Ternova., and B. M. Antoine Tinnebroek, not long ago my colleague Acta SS. Auct. to vol. VI of October, page 61.. Among the Greeks there is deep silence about these things; and so Basil, called now primate, now patriarch, because he persevered to the end of his life in the communion of the Catholic church, the schismatics omit entirely and take no account of him Cf. Assemani, Op. cit. page 171.. Wherefore, since it is beyond controversy that Basil was thoroughly Catholic, there is no doubt that he had clearly perceived that Blessed Hilarion lived before the Byzantine schism, or at least did not share in it; otherwise he would not have bestowed heavenly honours on his body.
[11] Then about the year 1234 his relics were placed Some will have it that the schism was renewed immediately after Basil's death; but this by no means appears. Yet John Asen, who reigned from the year 1217 to 1241 or 1245, was variable, inclining now to the Latins, now to the Greeks; so that he left it doubtful whether he ended his life in the peace of the church Acta SS. Auct. to vol. VI of Oct. page 61.: but it concerns us little to inquire more accurately into these things. In his reign, we saw above, the bones of St. Hilarion were solemnly translated into the new church of the Forty Martyrs. In what year is uncertain, since nothing else is related in the Prologue than that this was done a long time and many years after the first translation. Nevertheless we shall not stray far from the truth if we place it about the year 1233; when at length, many victories having been won, John Asen had widely extended his dominion. For in the year 1226 he conquered the perfidious Theodore Comnenus, also called Theodore Angelus, and then, having occupied a great part of Thrace and Macedonia, he made an excursion into the mountains of Thessaly, which were called Great Wallachia; he took Elbasan and laid waste everything with plunder as far as Illyricum George Acropolites, in Stritter, vol. II, part II, page 725.; at which time he could truly be said to have ruled the towns of both seas. Afterward he made a treaty with the Greeks, and in the year 1233 joined his forces with the army of John Ducas, who already held the empire of the Greeks, and made war on the Latins. Nor did this expedition turn out unhappily: he moved as far as the walls of Constantinople, which they were defending: but in autumn he returned home. And then at length it was possible to say in some sort of way that he had ruled the Bulgarians, Greeks, Franks, Serbs and Albanians.
[12] in the new church of Tărnovo; whether this still exists is unknown. Of the church of the Forty Martyrs at Tărnovo I have found no other notice besides that which is in the passage of the Prologue recited. And that it is wholly hidden what the present cult of St. Hilarion at Tărnovo is, no one will wonder, since very little is known of Tărnovo itself. This city, which in Latin and Greek is called Trinobus, but commonly Trnova, Tarnoba, Tornoba, Turnowo, Ternova, Ternowa, Trinava, etc. (in all these ways I find its name written in Italian, German and French books), we have already said was formerly the capital of Bulgaria. It is now the seat of a Turkish ayan and of a schismatic archbishop. It has eight or twelve thousand inhabitants, most of them Bulgarians. Other things that have become known pertain to its site and industry. God grant that at length these places may some day become free of the most iniquitous yoke by which they are oppressed; may He also destroy the wall of division by which sons, born of the baptismal waters, are hindered from the embraces of their true mother, the Catholic church; and may He grant at length that there be one shepherd and one fold, as it was when St. Hilarion flourished!