Martyr Nearchus of Melitene

Saint Nearchus was a Roman military officer stationed at Melitene (Lesser Armenia, Legio XII Fulminata) and a baptized Christian; his closest friend was his fellow officer Polyeuctus, who remained a pagan. When Emperor Valerian's persecution of Christians was announced, Nearchus began to prepare himself for martyrdom, but grieved that he had not yet succeeded in converting his dear friend.

Learning the cause of Nearchus's sorrow, Polyeuctus promised to embrace the faith, and the next day recounted a vision in which Christ appeared to him, removed his soldier's cloak, clothed him in radiant garments, and gave him a winged horse. Polyeuctus was soon arrested, tried, and martyred (his own feast is January 9/22); Nearchus gathered his friend's blood on a cloth as a relic and, according to tradition, recorded the account of his martyrdom.

Nearchus himself did not escape the persecution that followed — he was seized and executed by burning, receiving the crown of martyrdom for Christ in his own right, not merely as a witness to Polyeuctus's confession.

His feast is kept on April 22/May 5.