Martyrdom at Amasea
Theodore's cohort was sent to Pontus for winter quarters, and at Amasea the soldiers were obliged to perform pagan sacrifice. Theodore refused and proclaimed his faith in Christ. Rather than execute him at once, his judges delayed their sentence.
During this interval Theodore burned the city's temple of Magna Mater, the goddess Cybele. He was then arrested, tortured, and martyred by immolation. The Orthodox tradition remembers him as having endured this death rather than offer sacrifice to idols, having been ordered to do so under the praepositus Brincus.
Veneration
The veneration of Theodore is attested by the late 4th century. In the winter of 381, Gregory of Nyssa preached an encomium in his honor at the saint's sanctuary. A church at Euchaita connected with pilgrimage in his honor is known to have existed from at least around 400.
His cult spread rapidly and became highly popular. There were fifteen churches dedicated to him in Constantinople, and he was widely venerated in Asia Minor, Syria, and Palestine. After the period of iconoclasm, from the 9th century, he came to be depicted as a soldier in military dress, and he was later adopted as a military saint by the crusaders.
Iconography
Theodore is reported in a legend no younger than the late 9th century to have destroyed a dragon near Euchaita. Iconographic representations of him as a dragon-slayer are dated as early as the 7th century and certainly by the early 10th century.
A poorly preserved wall-painting at the Yılanlı Kilise, the so-called Snake Church, depicts the two saints Theodore and George together attacking a dragon, dated to the 10th or the mid-9th century. The transfer of this dragon iconography from Theodore and George to George alone first becomes tangible in the early 11th century. Theodore is also at times confused with Theodore Stratelates.
Relics & Shrines
His relics were carried to Euchaita, possibly his birthplace, by the Christian empress Eusebia at some point before her death in 360. Euchaita became a center of pilgrimage in his honor, with a church attested there from at least around 400.
Miracles & Traditions
Historically Documented: The Eastern Orthodox Church commemorates a miracle attributed to Theodore on the First Saturday of Great Lent. According to the account, fifty years after the saint's death the Emperor Julian the Apostate (361-363) commanded the governor of Constantinople, during the first week of Great Lent, to sprinkle all food provisions in the marketplace with blood offered to pagan idols, so that Christians would unknowingly eat defiled food. Theodore appeared in a dream to the Archbishop of Constantinople, Eudoxius, ordering him to instruct Christians to boil wheat at home and eat it sweetened with honey instead.
Traditional Accounts: By tradition, this is the origin of the kolyva (boiled wheat) associated with the saint. After the service, kolyva is distributed to all present, and following Holy Communion and the antidoron it is the first food eaten after the strict fasting of the first week. A separate legend, no younger than the late 9th century, relates that Theodore destroyed a dragon near Euchaita.
