service files saintsof.md

Each month we hope to publish the Troparia for the Saints of the month as they are found in the Greek editions of the ***Mega Horologion***, or ***Large Book of Hours***. The texts for each day are traditionally accompanied by brief notes on the Saints or events commemorated, and they provide a sort of miniature ***Synaxarion***, though their historical reliability is often uncertain, to say the least.

There is much variation among the different editions of the ***Book of Hours*** in the texts of the Apolytikia. This is due in part to the increasing tendency to provide each Saint with an individual Apolytikion, where the older books give the general Apolytikion for the particular class of Saint. This tendency culminated in the work of the late Fr Gerasimos of the Skete of Little Saint Anne on Mount Athos, who provided special texts for every Saint included in the book. These are given as alternatives in the current edition published by the ***Apostoliki Diakonia*** in Athens. The present translation is conservative and limits the special Apolytikia to a minimum.

Unlike the Apolytikia, there are no common Kontakia and the texts given in the various editions of the ***Menaia*** and the ***Book of Hours*** often vary widely.

The Saints who have hymns in the ***Book of Hours*** represent but a tiny fraction of those commemorated by name only in the daily ***Synaxarion*** that is read at Matins after the Kontakion. I hope to begin work on these soon, but it will take some time to complete.

The present translations are based on three editions: 1\] that published by the ***Apostoliki Diakonia*** in 1974, 2\] that published by ***Astir*** in 1974, which is a reprint of the Venetian edition of 1856, with an Appendix containing the additions by Fr Gerasimos: 3\] that published by ***Phos*** in 1975, which claims to be ’according to the edition of the Ecumenical Patriarchate’. It is most ’archaic’ of the three.

Where possible the translations are taken from the edition of the *****Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom***** of the Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain (OUP 1995) and from *****An Orthodox Prayer Book*****, published by OUP in May 1999 .