Saint George Bishop of Mytilene

Saint George was a bishop of Mytilene, the principal city of the island of Lesbos in the Aegean, during the second period of Byzantine Iconoclasm in the ninth century. According to the synaxarion he held the see in the years 820 to 829 and shepherded his people through the troubles of the iconoclast controversy. He is commemorated on May 16.

Little detailed narrative of his life survives beyond his episcopate and his standing as a confessor during the iconoclast persecutions. The tradition records that he reposed in 842 at Mytilene, the same year associated with the final restoration of the holy icons in the Byzantine Church.

A distinctive note attaches to the memory of his relics: in the twelfth century they were seen by the Russian abbot (igumen) Daniel, who travelled through the Christian East and recorded the holy places and relics he visited, leaving an account that preserved the memory of the saint's shrine at Mytilene.