EUSEBIO, bishop of SAMOSATA, saint. — He took part in the election of Meletius to the see of Antioch. At the Synod of Antioch in 363, presided over by the latter, he adhered to the Nicene Council and, together with Basil of Caesarea, whose counsellor and friend he was, became one of its most intrepid defenders against the Arian emperor Valens. In 374 the latter exiled him to Thrace, from where he could return only after the emperor’s death. At the Council of Antioch in 379 he adhered to the doctrine of Pope Damasus. He died in 379 or 380 at Dorliche in Syria, struck, according to Theodoret (Hist. ecl., V, 4, 8), by a stone thrown at him by an Arian woman. Feast day: 21 June.
BIBL.: Acta SS. Iunii, IV, Antwerp 1707, pp. 233–42; Tillemont, VI, Venice 1732, V. index, and VIII, pp. 319–36, 750 sq.; Bedian, Acta martyrum et sanctorum, VI, pp. 335–377 (Syriac biographies); H. R. Reynolds, s. V. in Dictionary of Christian Biography, II, p. 269 sqg.; Fliche-Martin-Frutar, III (1940), pp. 250–94, V. index. Ireneo Daniele