PATMOS. - Island in the Aegean, belonging to the Sporades group, south of Samos and west of Miletus. Of volcanic origin, it measures at most 12.500 km. and has a maximum width of 5 km.; it extends between 37° 19' north latitude and 26° 34' east longitude. The aridity of its rocky soil permits only a sparse population (about 3000 inhabitants).
Politically P. followed the fate of the other Sporades; until 1948 it formed part of the Dodecanese ceded to Italy by Turkey (1912); now it has passed to Greece.
The island is mentioned incidentally by ancient authors (cf. Pliny, Hist. nat., IV, 23; Strabo, X, 5, 13), but its fame is due to the fact that it received for some years St. John the Evangelist (v.), who there (Apoc. 1, 9) had the revelations described in the Apocalypse. Already St. Irenaeus (Adversus haereses, V, 30, 3; PG 7, 1207) assigns the event to the last years (94-96) of the emperor Domitian.
Ceded, in 1088, by Alexius I Comnenus to the monk Christodoulos, the latter founded there the monastery of St. John, which soon became a center of monastic life. The Chapel is rich in splendid icons and frescoes with scenes from the life of St. John; the sacristy preserves precious furnishings, vestments and jewels; the Library: imperial diplomas, bulls, firmans, codices, e.g.: the manuscript of the Gospel of St. Mark on purple parchment, with letters of silver and gold; the discourses of St. Gregory of Nazianzus to priests, transcribed by two Calabrian monks and donated by Alexius I Comnenus to Christodoulos; the book of Job (7th cent.), illuminated Gospels (11th cent.); the litoria or parchment rolls containing the Basilian liturgy or that of St. John Chrysostom.
Bibliography2 works
Angelo Penna