c. 285 – c. 386 (4th century)
A monk of Nitria associated with Sts Anthony and Macarius, known through monastic literature.
Our Venerable Father Cronius of Nitria
Cronius of Nitria was an Egyptian monk of the 4th century, counted among the Desert Fathers. He lived at Nitria in Lower Egypt and is associated in the monastic tradition with Anthony the Great, for whom he is said to have served as a Greek interpreter.
Sources for his life are sparse: he survives chiefly through brief notices in monastic literature rather than a developed vita. He is commemorated as a venerable monastic on July 11.
Cronius belonged to the monastic settlement of Nitria in Lower Egypt, one of the principal centers of early Egyptian monasticism. He is reported to have begun his monastic life within a community before later adopting the more solitary life of an anchorite.
He is remembered as a Greek interpreter for Anthony the Great, a role that would have bridged the Greek- and Coptic-speaking worlds of the desert. In time he was ordained a priest at Nitria.
Cronius had disciples, the best known being Isaac of the Cells, who is recorded as having succeeded him in 395.
4th century.