Sts. Andronicus, Probus and Tarachus

Andronicus, Probus and Tarachus were martyrs of the Diocletian persecution (about 304), executed in Cilicia. Their feast day is 11 October. According to tradition, Tarachus was beaten with stones. Probus was thrashed with whips, and his back and sides were pierced with heated spits; finally he also was cut up with knives. Andronicus was also cut to pieces with knives.

Tarachus (c. 239–304), a Roman who was a native of Claudiopolis in Isauria and a former soldier, the plebeian Probus of Side in Pamphylia, and the patrician Andronicus, who belonged to a prominent family of Ephesus, were tried by the governor Numerian Maximus and horribly tortured three times in various cities, including Tarsus, Mopsuestia, and Anazarbus of Cilicia.

They were then condemned to death by wild beasts, and when the animals would not touch them in the amphitheatre they were put to death with the sword. Three men, named Marcian, Felix, and Verus, witnessed their martyrdom and added an epilogue to the saints' Acts. They retrieved the bodies of the three saints, buried them, and watched over them the rest of their lives, requesting that they be buried in the same vault as the martyrs at the end of theirs.

Their feast is celebrated in the Roman Catholic Church on October 11, and in the Greek Orthodox Church on October 12.