Saint Menas
feast day: 11 November

Menas is thought to be an Egyptian who served in the army in Phrygia under Diocletian; he proclaimed himself Christian in a theater and was executed. Although the cult of the saint originated in Egypt, it rapidly spread throughout the rest of Byzantium. A collection of stories, some ascribed to Timothy the patriarch of Alexandria, record Menas's posthumous miracles. One of these tales reports that Menas's coffin floated to Constantinople. He was venerated as the protector of pilgrims and merchants.

Many images of Menas survive. He is usually portrayed as an orans in a short tunic, flanked by two camels. A sixth-century ivory pyxis shows his martyrdom and his effigy standing within in his shrine receiving pilgrims. Most of the images of the saint are preserved on Menas flasks, produced from the fifth to the seventh centuries at his shrine at Abu Mina. These clay flasks are round with a flat body, a projecting neck, and a pair of large handles. They were used by pilgrims to carry home miracle-working waters from the cisterns at the shrine. A workshop for the production of these flasks was discovered at the site. BLR

COMPARANDA
Pyxis (London, British Museum)
Ampulla with St. Menas (New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Terracotta pilgrim flask with St. Menas (?) from Abu Mena (Paris, Louvre)

BIBLIOGRAPHY
"Menas" Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Ed. Alexander Kazhdan. 3 vols. New York: Oxford University Press. 1339.

"Menas Flasks." Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Ed. Alexander Kazhdan. 3 vols. New York: Oxford University Press. 1340.