Hierarch Sava of Serbia

Saint Sava I of Serbia (born Rastko Nemanjić), founder and first Archbishop of the autocephalous Serbian Orthodox Church, was born c. 1175, youngest son of Grand Župan Stefan Nemanja — founder of the medieval Serbian state, later monk Simeon the Myrrh-streaming — and Anna, later nun Anastasia. At seventeen he secretly left for Mount Athos, was tonsured at the Russian monastery of St. Panteleimon, and later, with his father, restored the ruined Hilandar Monastery. In 1219 he obtained autocephaly for the Serbian Church from the Patriarch of Constantinople, becoming its first archbishop and establishing eight new dioceses staffed by his own disciples. He authored the Life of St. Simeon and compiled the Serbian Nomocanon. He made two pilgrimages to the Holy Land and founded a pilgrims' hospice in Jerusalem in 1234. He died January 13/14, 1236, in Tarnovo, Bulgaria, returning from pilgrimage. In 1237 his nephew, King Vladislav I, translated his relics to Mileševa Monastery. In 1594, during an anti-Ottoman uprising, Ottoman commander Sinan Pasha burned the relics on Vračar hill in Belgrade — the site now hosts the Church of Saint Sava, one of the world's largest Orthodox churches. Feast: January 14/27 (Serbian Church); January 12/25 (Russian Church).