Venerable Kyriakos the Hermit of Palestine

Kyriakos was born at Corinth around 447, the son of a priest, and came to Palestine as a young man, about 466. He became a monk under Euthymius the Great and then a disciple of Gerasimus of the Jordan, and in time spent his life in the Judean desert as a hermit. His Life was written in the sixth century by Cyril of Scythopolis, who knew him.

According to Cyril, in his seventies Kyriakos withdrew deeper into the desert with a disciple and, when food ran out, lived for years on wild bitter herbs. He is said to have healed the possessed and to have met the abbot Sabbas. He died in 556 at a very great age, over a hundred, and is remembered as one of the founders of Judean desert monasticism.