The Church Fathers · c. 610–680s
The Miracles of Saint Demetrius
John of Thessalonica and an anonymous continuator
What it is
The patron of Thessalonica defends his city through plague, famine, and a series of Slav and Avar sieges — appearing on the walls in white, capsizing boats, and turning back siege engines. The narrator was inside for several of them.
Why it lasted
The principal source for the Slav settlement of the Balkans and for how a besieged Byzantine city survived, told as hagiography because that was the available form. Historians read it for the siege engineering.
Scripture it works from
Where to read it
Public domain and free to read in full, though not held here. The archives below have it.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
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