07 — Sisoes and the Tomb of Alexander
The most arresting image associated with St. Sisoes the Great is one the early Sayings know nothing of: the Byzantine and post-Byzantine icon of the desert father standing astonished over the open tomb and skeleton of Alexander the Great, meditating on the vanity of worldly glory and the terror of death. These two files present that iconographic type honestly — as a later devotional development built upon Sisoes’ memory, not a scene from the Apophthegmata — and unfold its meaning as Orthodox memento mori.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Desert Father; model of repentance)
The icon shows Sisoes bent over an open sarcophagus from which a crowned skeleton’s remains spill, his hand raised in lament or wonder, and it carries an inscription in which the saint addresses the dust of the world-conqueror on the vanity of all earthly glory. It is among the most powerful memento mori in Orthodox art. It is also, as Section 05 insists must always be said, not found in the early Apophthegmata Patrum: it is a later iconographic creation that took Sisoes — the desert’s model of humility and the meditation on death — and placed him before the tomb of the greatest of worldly conquerors to teach, in a single image, the lesson of his whole life. The first file describes the type, its inscription, and its disputed origin; the second sets it within the Orthodox tradition of memento mori.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| The Icon of Vanity | The Byzantine/post-Byzantine iconographic type — Sisoes over the open tomb and skeleton of Alexander; the composition, the inscription/troparion, and the disputed origin and dating of the image; its character as a later development, not a scene from the Sayings. |
| Memento Mori in Orthodox Art | The meaning of the image within Orthodox spirituality: the remembrance of death, the vanity of worldly glory, and the place of memento mori in the ascetic and iconographic tradition. |
See Also
- The Historical Sisoes — the distinction between the early dossier and the later developments
- The Humility of Sisoes — the virtue the icon dramatizes
- Repentance Without End — the meditation on death as a spur to repentance
- Icons and Iconoclasm — the theology and use of the icon in Orthodoxy
References
- The Sayings of the Desert Fathers: The Alphabetical Collection. Trans. Benedicta Ward. Rev. ed. Cistercian Studies 59. Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1984.
- Chitty, Derwas J. The Desert a City. Oxford: Blackwell, 1966.
- Harmless, William. Desert Christians. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004.