Joanikije I

Who was Joanikije I?

Joanikije I was the fifth Metropolitan of Peć and Archbishop of Serbs, from when he replaced Archbishop Danilo I in 1272 to 1276.

He was a disciple of Archbishop Sava II, when Sava II was still a bishop. Together they went to the Holy Land and the Holy Mountain, from whence they returned to Serbia.

Joanikije departed again for the Holy Mountain, to Hilandar monastery. He was an ekonom of the monastery around 1255/56, until he became the hegumen in 1257. He left that office around 1262 or 1263.

Upon he return to Serbia, he became the hegumen of the Studenica monastery.

After the removal of Archbishop Danilo I in 1272 due to an unknown transgression, the next Serbian Archbishop was chosen with care, as evidenced in the writings of Saint Danilo II: "And because they expected much, they did not find anyone else worthy of such a position, apart from this blessed Joanikije, who at that time was the hegumen of the place of the Virgin Most Holy, the place called Studenica".

During his time at the head of the Serbian Orthodox Church, the Byzantine Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos, who restored the Byzantine Empire in 1261, made a tenuous union with the Western Church at the Second Council of Lyon in 1274. Two years later Stefan Uroš I was overthrown by his son Stefan Dragutin, to whom he had not given half his kingdom as he had promised. At that time, Joanikije withdrew with the king, who soon died as monk Simon. In 1279 in Zahumlje, Archbishop Joanikije died as well. Their relics were buried in Sopoćani monastery by the dead king's wife, Queen Hélène d'Anjou.