Biography
Longinus of Satala
About Longinus of Satala
Longinus is remembered among seven Christian soldiers exiled toward the Caucasus. The Orthodox Church in America’s received account says he died aboard a ship on July 28 and was buried at Pitinda after the vessel ran aground. The group is commemorated on June 24.
Nicolas Preud’homme’s study places this story among the martyr narratives associated with the eastern Black Sea. It describes Longinus as the last of the seven, whose body reached the shore at Pityous, and suggests that he may have been venerated in that city’s cathedral. The identification is probable rather than certain. The study also stresses that the passion gives no precise origin for the soldiers beyond a broad eastern association. Satala belongs to their remembered military route, not to an established record of Longinus’s birth.
The Norwegian church notice calls the synaxarial narrative legendary and notes that the group is absent from the 2001 Roman Martyrology.
Wondering how to weigh the stories and sources? Learn how to read a saint biography.