Peter the Sicilian

Peter The Sicilian an Italian prelate, was born in Sicily near the beginning of the 9th century. In order to escape the persecution of the Saracens, who ruled in Sicily, he went to Byzantium in 830, and there spent a large part of his life. He gained the friendship of the emperor Basil, and the princes Constantine and Leo, his sons, who provided him with ecclesiastical benefices. He was sent by the emperor to Tabrica, in the district or on the frontier of Melitene, near the Euphrates, to negotiate an exchange of Christian prisoners, apparently with the chiefs of the Paulicians, a purpose which, after a residence of nine months, he effected. We have of his works, Petri Siculi, humillimi Argirorum Episcopi, Funebris Oratio in B. Athanasium, Methones Episcopum.

It is given in the Latin version of the Jesuit Franciscus Blanditius, in the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists (January), 2:1125, etc.: — Petri Siculi Historia de vana et stolida Manichaeorum Haeresi tanquam Archiepiscopo Bulgarorum nuncupata. This account of the Paulicians was translated into Latin, and published by Matthaeus Raderus (Ingoldstadt, 1604, 4to), and has been reprinted in various editions of the Bibliotheca Patrum.

There was another bishop of Argos of the name of Peter, author of Eulogium Cosniae et Damiana SS. Anargyrorum in Asia s. Oratio in sanctos et gloriosos Anargyros et Thaumaturgos Cosnum et Damianum, which has never been printed. — Smith, Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Biog. and Mythol. 3:222; Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Generale, 40:183.