Martyrs The 72 Martyrs of Yuriev, Who Suffered with Venerable Martyr Isidore

The 72 (by other lists, 73) Martyrs of Yuriev were Orthodox laypeople of the Livonian city of Yuriev (now Tartu, Estonia, then also known as Dorpat), who suffered a martyr's death together with their pastor, Hieromartyr Isidore of Yuriev, in 1472. The city's Catholic German authorities, displeased by the growth and strengthening of the Orthodox community, demanded under threat of death that the parishioners of the Church of St. Nicholas renounce the Orthodox faith and convert to Catholicism; when all, including the priest Isidore, refused, they were placed under guard and then, on the eve of Theophany, January 8, 1472, drowned in an ice hole cut in the shape of a cross in the Omovzha (Emajõgi) River. According to church tradition, in the spring, when the ice melted, the bodies of the martyrs were found incorrupt and buried by the same church. The Church honors their memory together with Hieromartyr Isidore on a single day — January 8 (21); this entry is dedicated specifically to the lay companions, while Hieromartyr Isidore of Yuriev is described in a separate entry.