Asterius of Amasea

Saint Asterius of Amasea (c. 350 – c. 410 AD) was made Bishop of Amasea between 380 and 390 AD, after having been a lawyer. He was born in Cappadocia and probably died in Amasea in modern Turkey, then in Pontus. Significant portions of his lively sermons survive, which are especially interesting from the point of view of art history, and social life in his day. Asterius, Bishop of Amasea is not to be confused with the Arian polemicist, Asterius the Sophist.

Asterius of Amasea was the younger contemporary of Amphilochius of Iconium and the three great Cappadocian Fathers. Little is known about his life, except that he was educated by a Scythian slave. Like Amphilochius, he had been a lawyer before becoming bishop between 380 and 390 AD, and he brought the skills of the professional rhetorician to his sermons. Sixteen homilies and panegyrics on the martyrs still exist, showing familiarity with the classics, and containing an unusual concentration of details of everyday life in his time. One of them, Oration 4: Adversus Kalendarum Festum attacks the pagan customs and abuses of the New Years feast, denying everything that Libanius had said supporting it - see Lord of Misrule for extensive quotations. That sermon was preached on January 1, 400 AD, which provides the main evidence, with a reference in another to his great age, to the dating of his career.

In Oration 11, On the martyrdom of St. Euphemia, Asterius describes a painting of the martyrdom and compares it to pictures made by the famous pre-Christian Hellenistic painters Euphranor and Timomachus; the speech was quoted twice in the Second Council of Nicaea in 787, which concluded the period of Byzantine iconoclasm, as evidence in favour of the veneration of images. As described, the icon was on canvas, and displayed in a church near her tomb; it has puzzled historians, as the manner of death, from fire, differs from all other accounts in the tradition. It is an exceptionally detailed ekphrasis, or description of a work of art, from this period, although scholars have wondered how well the description matched an actual work. The intended audience is uncertain, though it was apparently all-male, as they are addressed as "gentlemen" (andres). In Oration 1, On the The Rich Man and Lazarus, he objects to richly decorated clothes:

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