Saint Simeon Stylites

Also known as

• Simeon Stylites the Elder

Memorial

• 5 January

Profile

Son of a poor shepherd, and worked as a shepherd as a child. A would-be monk at age 13, he was turned away from monasteries because his severe self-imposed penances. Tired of the gossip and arguments from fellow religious, he lived as a hermit on top of a column, occasionally preaching to those who gathered to watch and pray with him, and starting a movement of pillar-living among Eastern hermits.

Born

• c.390 at Cilicia, near Syria

Died

• c.459 of natural causes

Canonized

• Pre-Congregation

Patronage

• shepherds

Additional Information

• Book of Saints, by the Monks of Ramsgate
• Catholic Encyclopedia
• Kirken i Norge
• Lives of the Saints, by Father Alban Butler
• Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints
• Pictorial Lives of the Saints

MLA Citation

• “Saint Simeon Stylites“. Saints.SQPN.com. 13 January 2013. Web. 19 June 2013. <>