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Irene of Athens
empress of Byzantine Empire (752-803)
Feast: 7 August (not on the universal Roman calendar; kept in the Roman Martyrology or local calendars)
Who they were
Irene of Athens (Greek: Εἰρήνη, Eirḗnē; 750/756 – 9 August 803), surname Sarantapechaena (Greek: Σαρανταπήχαινα, Sarantapḗchaina), was Byzantine empress consort to Emperor Leo IV from 775 to 780, regent during the childhood of their son Constantine VI from 780 until 790, co-ruler from 792 until 797, and finally empress regnant and sole ruler of the Byzantine Empire from 797 to 802. A member of the politically prominent Sarantapechos family, she was selected as Leo IV's bride for unknown reasons in 768. Even though her husband was an iconoclast, she harbored iconophile sympathies.
Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), until this page is written up in full.
The miracles
Limited information available on this saint.
Why that counted as sanctity
Limited information available on this saint.
Connected on this site
- Leo III Saint“Pope Leo III—already seeking to break links with the Byzantine East—used Irene's alleged unprecedented status as a female ruler of the Roman Empire to proclaim Charlemagne as Emperor of the Romans on Christmas Day of 800 under the pretext that a woman could not rule solely and thus the Roman throne was actually vacant.” — Wikipedia
- Wikidata Q206737 — dates, feast day and identifiers (CC0)
- English Wikipedia — Irene of Athens (CC BY-SA)
Not yet written up in full: no Church source with an account of this person has been found yet. The name, dates and step come from Wikidata and are not yet checked against Church records.