GIOVANNI TERISTI (θεριστής “reaper”), saint. – Basilian monk of the 11th century, born in Palermo to Calista, deported by the Saracens from Stilo, while his father had been killed on the spot. In adulthood he went to Calabria, where he received Baptism and was initiated into the rigours of Greek monastic asceticism under the guidance of the blessed Ambrogio and Nicolò at a monastery in Stilo, which was later named after him and became one of the most celebrated in Calabria. His virtue and ascetic rigours were compared to those of St. Giovanni Battista.
The abbot, in order to humble him, set him to reap with the tenant farmers, whence his appellation Teristi. The date of his death is set by the Bollandists at 1127. But this is unacceptable, since in a diploma of 1110 Count Ruggero makes donations to the “temple of our holy father Giovanni.” Moreover, cod. Vat. lat. 2008 preserves a hymn in his honour composed by St. Bartolomeo of Rossano, who died about 1050. Evidently, the date proposed by the Bollandists must be brought forward by somewhat less than a century.