St. Germanus I › Hymnals

Germanus, St. [634-734.] One of the Greek hymnwriters, and one of the grandest among the defenders of the Icons. He was born at Constantinople of a patrician family; was ordained there; and became subsequently bishop of Cyzicus. He was present at the Synod of Constantinople in 712, which restored the Monothelite heresy; but in after years he condemned it. He was made patriarch of Constantinople in 715. In 730 he was driven from the see, not without blows, for refusing to yield to the Iconoclastic Emperor Leo the Isaurian. He died shortly afterwards, at the age of one hundred years. His hymns are few. Dr. Neale selects his canon on The Wonder-working Image of Edessa as his most poetical piece (see Neale's Hymns of the Eastern Church, 1862, and later editions). The earliest biographical account of Germanus is found in Basil's Menology, under May 12. Later we have a Memoir by Henschew (Boll. Acta S.S. Mai, iii., 155). His hymns are given in Migne and Daniel, and have been translated to a small extent into English by Dr. Neale. (For further biographical details see Dictionary of Christian Biographies, pp. 658-659.) [Rev. H. Leigh Bennett, M.A.]
-- John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)