Athanasius II
Athanasius II (Pattelarus) was elected Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople in 1450, succeeding the deposed Gregory III, as the Ottoman Turks prepared their attack on the city. Little is known about him other than that he was born in Crete early in the fifteenth century.10
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Identity | Athanasius II Pattelarus, born in Crete early in the fifteenth century10 |
| Election | Elected patriarch in 1450, succeeding the deposed Gregory III, as the Ottomans prepared their attack10 |
| Predecessor | Gregory III, patriarch 1443–1451, a signer of the Union of Florence who retired to the Peloponnese in 1450 and Rome in 14521 |
| Union question | Whether a 1450 Council of St. Sophia condemned the union is disputed; the tendency of recent scholarship is to treat its acts as false11 |
| End of tenure | Traditionally said to have escaped the fallen city and retired to Mount Athos10 |
| Successor | Gennadius Scholarius, chosen after the fall of May 29, 1453 and consecrated in the spring of 14542 |
The unionist crisis and the election of 1450
Athanasius was elected into a patriarchate fractured by the Union of Florence. Gregory III Mammas, patriarch from 1443 to 1451, had accepted and signed the formula of union at Ferrara-Florence in 1439, and campaigned against the anti-union opposition led by Mark Eugenikos and George Scholarius.1 The union proclaimed at Florence widened the breach between pro- and anti-unionists in the Byzantine Church and society, and the Decree of Union was refuted point by point and word for word by John Eugenikos, brother of Mark Eugenikos, sometime after Mark's death in 1444 and before 1449.3
Facing hostility from anti-unionist monks and clergy, Gregory retired to the Peloponnese in 1450 and then to Rome in 1452, where he presided over Greek territories under Venetian control until his death.1 OrthodoxWiki dates Athanasius's election to 1450 as Gregory's successor, describing Gregory as deposed.10 The two accounts do not fully agree on how Gregory's tenure ended and when the see became vacant: the encyclopedia entry keeps him in office until 1451, while the wiki has him deposed by 1450.
A disputed council stands behind this moment. Scholars have long argued over whether a council held in Hagia Sophia in 1450 condemned the Union of Florence and restored Orthodoxy. Leo Allatius, a well-known seventeenth-century scholar in Italy, first published fragments of its acts but considered them spurious. In more recent times the tendency has been to consider the acts false and to deny that the council was ever convoked, although some scholars still maintain that it took place.11
The church on the eve of 1453
Whether Athanasius was the same Athanasius known as a noted anti-unionist ascetic remains an open question.
The union pressed to the end. The unionist cause was not abandoned during Athanasius's tenure. Isidore of Kiev, a cardinal who had participated in the Union of Florence, solemnly promulgated the union and celebrated the union liturgy in St. Sophia in December 1452, five months before the fall of the city.11
A shrunken flock. The city Athanasius shepherded was a fraction of its former self. The monk Joseph Bryennios, writing between 1415 and 1421, put Constantinople's population at seventy thousand, higher than other contemporary reports (Leonard of Chios, Kritoboulos, Andrea di Arnoldo, Tetaldi, and the anonymous 1437 Report), which yield figures from 25,000 to 60,000; even the lower estimates indicate a population counted in the tens of thousands rather than the hundreds of thousands of better times.4 A modern estimate places the population in 1453 at between 30,000 and 50,000, against a Justinianic peak of perhaps half a million.5 The state supporting the church was reduced to Constantinople, its surrounding region, some cities on the Propontis and the Thracian Black Sea coast, and some islands, with revenues limited to taxes on wine sales, salt monopolies, and custom duties.6
The end: 1453 and the transition to Gennadius
According to OrthodoxWiki, Athanasius escaped from the fallen Constantinople and retired to Mount Athos, settling into a monastic house on the site of the old Monastery of Xistrou, which he dedicated to St. Anthony the Great.10 Whether he resigned, died, or fled before the fall, and on what dates, remains an open question.
The office passed to the anti-unionist leader. George Scholarius had become a monk with the name Gennadius in 1450 and led the antiunionist party; after the fall of the city on May 29, 1453 he was taken prisoner and became patriarch under Sultan Mohammed II, who wished to use the Church to stabilize his new empire and presented him with the insignia of the patriarchal office.7 Because Hagia Sophia and the patriarchal palace were in Turkish hands, Gennadius was consecrated in the spring of 1454 by the metropolitan of Heraclea and resided successively in two monasteries of the city.2 One synthesis dates Mehmed's installation of Gennadios Scholarios as patriarch to January 1454.5 With Gennadius's accession the Greco-Roman union entirely ceased to exist.9
Chronologies differ. The encyclopedia dates Gennadius's patriarchate from 1453 (to about 1466),7 while Metropolitan Kallistos Ware's survey dates it from 1450 (1450–1472), a tradition that effectively treats the see as passing to the anti-unionist leader around the time of Athanasius II's alleged tenure.8 Ware records that learning the office of patriarch was vacant after the fall, Mohammed summoned the monk Gennadius and installed him on the patriarchal throne, and that his appointment meant the final abandonment of the Union of Florence.8
References
- Gregory III, Patriarch of Constantinople, Encyclopedia.com
- Gennadius II, Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge
- C. Dendrinos, Reflections on the Failure of the Union of Florence, Royal Holloway
- Joseph Bryennios on the Population of Constantinople in the Fifteenth Century, Ariadne
- Constantinople to Istanbul: The City After 1453, Byzantine Culture
- Historical framework of the Fall of 1453, Encyclopaedia of the Hellenic World, Constantinople
- Gennadius II Scholarius, Patriarch of Constantinople, Encyclopedia.com
- Metropolitan Kallistos (Ware), The Orthodox Church, Chapter 5
- Gennadius II, Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)
- Athanasius II (Pattelarus) of Constantinople, OrthodoxWiki
- ellopos.net
Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Philosophy, religion, and mythology › Religion and spirituality › Religious biographies › Orthodox, Eastern Catholic, Protestant, and early Christian bishops › Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Eastern Catholic bishops › Greek Orthodox bishops (Greece and Ecumenical Patriarchate) › Patriarchs of Constantinople (late Byzantine, 14th–15th centuries)
Initially written Oct 10, 2026 · Edited: Oct 11, 2026; Oct 15, 2026
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