Venerable Milica of Serbia

IMPORTANT CORRECTION: the category has been corrected from "righteous" to "venerable" — St. Milica took monastic and later great-schema vows, and is venerated by the Serbian and Russian Churches specifically as a venerable nun, not merely a righteous laywoman.

Venerable Milica, baptized Euphrosyne, descended from the Nemanjić dynasty through her father, Jug-Bogdan (Vratko). Around 1353 she married Prince Lazar Hrebeljanović. After her husband's death at the Battle of Kosovo (June 15/28, 1389), she took on the regency of Moravian Serbia for her minor sons, conducted difficult negotiations with Hungary and the Ottoman power, securing the survival of the Serbian state at the price of vassalage; for diplomatic reasons she married her daughter Olivera to Sultan Bayezid I.

In 1391 she took monastic vows under the name Evgenia, ceding rule to her son Stefan Lazarević by 1393 while retaining spiritual influence. She founded Ljubostinja Monastery, where before death she received the great schema under the name Euphrosinia and was buried in the narthex. She is also known as the author of penitential prayer texts and as a patroness of the widows of fallen Kosovo warriors, many of whom she led to monastic life. Her relics became known for myrrh-streaming.

Her feast is kept on July 19/August 1.