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Pilgrimage in the Holy Land

St John Phocas, tr. Stewart, 1889

Chapter 24

The monastery of Calamon also is built with towers and curtain-walls,¹ and in the midst of it stands a church built with cement, covered by a vault, resting upon cylindrical arches. With this is connected on the right hand another exceedingly small vaulted church, built, it is said, in the times of the Apostles, in the apse of which is a picture of the Virgin with the Saviour Christ in her arms, being in form, colour, and size like that of the ὁδηγήτρια in the imperial city. There is an ancient tradition that it was painted by the hand of the Apostle and Evangelist St. Luke; and what tends to corroborate this story are the frequent miracles wrought by the picture, and the thrilling perfume which proceeds from it. Next to this, about five stadia distant, is the monastery of Chrysostom; and about a bowshot from this is a hermitage, wherein a tall man lives a contemplative life. He is a Spaniard, of simple habits and modest speech, who formerly for many years practised asceticism upon a stone set up near the Sea of Attalia,² where I myself met him when I was serving in the army of the most glorious Emperor Comnenus Porphyrogenitus.

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