Icon of Saint Daniel of Moscow (St Daniel’s Monastery – Moscow) – S350

Description

Saint Daniel (a.d. 1261-1303) was the youngest son of the celebrated Saint Alexander of Nevsky.  His father died when Daniel was just two years old.  Saint Alexander had specified that Daniel would inherit Moscow, then the poorest principality of his, when he came of age in 1272.  Saint Daniel was wise, humble, peaceful, and fair, and through these means he built up his inheritance in 30 years from a small and unimportant city, to its first rise in prominence for the Russian land.  In a short time after his death, it became the central administrative city of a renewed and unified Russian empire.

Saint Daniel established the Danilov Monastery in a.d. 1282 on the site of Saint Daniel the Stylite’s wooden church.   By wise use of his resources and inspired rulership, by a.d. 1296 Saint Daniel became the Grand Prince of All Russian Lands.  Living at a time of Tartar domination and wars between the other Russian princes, Saint Daniel brought peace and order to those around him, and consolidated the northern Russian lands.  His sons included Yuri of Moscow and Ivan I of Moscow.  Before his death at just 42 years old, Saint Daniel became a monk, and was buried in Danilov Monastery.