Blessed Basil of Moscow, the Fool-for-Christ

Basil the Blessed was the best-known holy fool of Moscow, living under Ivan the Terrible and Metropolitan Macarius. According to his Life he went naked winter and summer, had no shelter, and spoke little, hiding his life behind the appearance of madness. The tsar and the metropolitan held him in honour. When he lay dying, the Life says, Ivan came with Tsaritsa Anastasia and their sons, and Basil foretold that young Feodor would inherit his fathers' realm. He died in 1552 or 1557 and was buried by the church on the moat beside the Kremlin; the chapel over his grave gave the whole Cathedral of the Intercession on Red Square its popular name, St Basil's.