Hymnographic Work
According to the Synaxarion of Constantinople, Romanus composed over 1,000 hymns or kontakia; some sources give a figure as high as 8,000. Of the surviving manuscripts, 89 works are attributed to him, with nearly 60 widely accepted as genuine. His earliest complete manuscripts date from centuries after his lifetime, though some papyri fragments survive from the sixth to eighth centuries.
Notable kontakia include the Nativity of Christ, regarded as his masterpiece, as well as the Martyrdom of St. Stephen, the Death of a Monk, the Last Judgment, the Prodigal Son, the Raising of Lazarus, Adam's Lament, and the Treachery of Judas. His hymns celebrated feasts, saints, and themes of repentance and the life to come.
Romanus established the kontakion in the form it would retain for centuries. The form comprises metrically identical acrostic stanzas, called ikoi, that share a common refrain, preceded by a prelude in a different meter; a full kontakion contains roughly 18 to 30 verses.
Style and Reputation
Romanus wrote in an Atticized literary koine, a popular yet elevated language, with abundant Semiticisms reflecting his origin. His style is marked by arresting imagery, sharp metaphors and similes, bold comparisons, antitheses, memorable maxims, and vivid dramatization.
He has been called 'the Pindar of rhythmic poetry.' The scholar Karl Krumbacher judged that 'in poetic talent, fire of inspiration, depth of feeling, and elevation of language, he far surpasses all the other melodes.'
Most recent scholarship holds that Romanus was not the author of the famous Akathist Hymn to the Theotokos, though significant scholarly dissent remains.
Legacy in Worship
His Nativity Kontakion remained sung annually at imperial banquets in Constantinople through the twelfth century, performed jointly by choirs from Hagia Sophia and the Church of the Holy Apostles.
Another celebrated work, beginning 'My soul, my soul, why sleepest thou,' is chanted during the Great Canon of Andrew of Crete on the fifth Thursday of Great Lent.
Romanus is commemorated on October 1, a feast shared with the Protection of the Mother of God. He appears as a central figure in icons of the Protection, despite having no historical connection to that tenth-century event.
