Pantaleon (Greek: Παντελεήμων, romanized: Panteleïmon, lit. 'All-compassionate'; c. 275 – 305 AD) was a Christian martyr from Nicomedia in Bithynia who was executed during the Diocletianic Persecution in 305 AD. In Western Christianity, he is venerated as one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers, a group of saints especially venerated during the Late Middle Ages, while in Eastern Christianity he is regarded as one of the Holy Unmercenary Healers.
According to the martyrologies, Pantaleon was the son of a rich pagan, Eustorgius of Nicomedia, and had been instructed in Christianity by his Christian mother, Eubula; however, after her death he fell away from the Christian church, while he studied medicine with a renowned physician Euphrosinos; under the patronage of Euphrosinos he became physician to the emperor, Maximian (or alternatively Galerius).
He was won back to Christianity by Hermolaus of Nicomedia (characterized as a bishop of the church at Nicomedia in the later literature), who convinced him that Christ was the better physician, signalling the significance of the exemplum of Pantaleon that faith is to be trusted over medical advice.
Alphonsus Liguori wrote regarding this incident:
He studied medicine with such success, that the Emperor Maximian appointed him his physician. One day as our saint was discoursing with a holy priest named Hermolaus, the latter, after praising the study of medicine, concluded thus: "But, my friend, of what use are all thy acquirements in this art, since thou art ignorant of the science of salvation?"
By miraculously healing a blind man by invoking the name of Jesus over him, Pantaleon converted his father, upon whose death he came into possession of a large fortune. He freed his slaves and distributed his wealth among the poor. Envious colleagues denounced him to the emperor during the Diocletian persecution. The emperor wished to save him and sought to persuade him to apostasy. Pantaleon, however, openly confessed his faith, and as proof that Christ was the true God, he healed a paralytic. Notwithstanding this, he was condemned to death by the emperor, who regarded the miracle as an exhibition of magic.
According to the legend, Pantaleon's flesh was first burned with torches, whereupon Christ appeared to all in the form of Hermolaus to strengthen and heal Pantaleon. The torches were extinguished. Then a bath of molten lead was prepared; when the apparition of Christ stepped into the cauldron with him, the fire went out and the lead became cold. Pantaleon was now thrown into the sea, loaded with a great stone, which floated. He was thrown to wild beasts, but these fawned upon him and could not be forced away until he had blessed them. He was bound on the wheel, but the ropes snapped, and the wheel broke. An attempt was made to behead him, but the sword bent, and the executioners were converted to Christianity.
Pantaleon implored Heaven to forgive them, for which reason he also received the name of Panteleimon ("mercy for everyone" or "all-compassionate"). He was then beheaded.
Alphonsus wrote about his blood relic changing state:
At Ravello, a city in the kingdom of Naples, there is a vial of his blood, which becomes blood every year [on his feastday], and may be seen in this state interspersed with the milk, as I, the author of this work, have seen it.
The vitae containing these miraculous features are all late in date and "valueless" according to the Catholic Encyclopedia. Yet the fact of his martyrdom itself seems to be supported by a veneration for which there is testimony in the 5th century, among others in a sermon on the martyrs by Theodoret (died c. 457); Procopius of Caesarea (died c. 565?), writing on the churches and shrines constructed by Justinian I tells that the emperor rebuilt the shrine to Pantaleon at Nicomedia; and there is mention of Pantaleon in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum.
Pantaleon is a patron saint of physicians and of midwives, and is invoked against consumption. He is depicted as a beardless young man holding a book with a cross on it.
The Eastern tradition concerning Pantaleon broadly follows the medieval Western hagiographic tradition, but differs in some details of the account of his martyrdom. It states that Hermolaus was still alive while Pantaleon's torture was under way, but was martyred himself shortly before Pantaleon's beheading along with two companions, Hermippas and Thermocrates.
Pantaleon's relics, venerated at Nicomedia, were transferred to Constantinople. Numerous churches, shrines, and monasteries have been named for him; in the West most often as Pantaleon and in the East as Panteleimon; to him is consecrated the St. Panteleimon Monastery at Mount Athos, Agios Panteleimon Monastery in Crete, St. Panteleimon Monastery in Myrtou, Cyprus, and the 12th-century Church of St. Panteleimon in Gorno Nerezi, North Macedonia.
According to Movses Kaghankatvatsi, his relics were brought to a church built in the town of Tsri (then Caucasian Albania, near modern Barda, Azerbaijan) by Grigoris. Catholicos Lazar of Albania built the Church of St. Pantaleon in his honor in Beghame'j (near modern Ağcabədi, Azerbaijan). King Vachagan III of Albania rediscovered his remains and interred them in the Amaras Monastery, located in modern Nagorno-Karabakh, and named his firstborn son after the saint.
After the Black Death of the mid-14th century in Western Europe, as a patron saint of physicians and midwives, he came to be regarded as one of the fourteen guardian martyrs, the Fourteen Holy Helpers. Relics of Saint Pantaleon are found at Saint Denis at Paris; his head is venerated at Lyon. A Romanesque church was dedicated to him in Cologne in the 9th century at the latest.
In the British Library there is a surviving manuscript, written in Old English, of The Life of St Pantaleon (British Library, MS Cotton Vitellius D XVII), dating from the early eleventh century, possibly written for Abbot Ælfric of Eynsham. The Canons' Vestry off the south transept of Chichester Cathedral was formerly a square-plan chapel dedicated to Saint Pantaleon – it was possibly under construction just before the cathedral's great fire of 1187.
In France, he was depicted in a window in Chartres Cathedral. In southern France there are six communes under the protective name of Saint-Pantaléon. Though there are individual churches consecrated to him elsewhere, there are no communes named for him in the north or northwest of France. The six are: