 mar awgin (died 363 ad), also known as awgin of clysmathomas bishop of marga a.d. 840. the book of governors. transl. e.a. wallis budge. vol. ii. london, 1893. p.694. or saint eugenios, founded the first cenobitic monastery of asia and is regarded as the founder of monasticism in mesopotamia. ==biography== ===in egypt=== originally, saint eugenios was a pearl-fisher from the island clysma or kolzum near suez in egypt. after having worked for 25 years, he joined the monastery of pachomius in upper egypt, where he worked as a baker. he is reported to have possessed spiritual gifts and worked miracles, and draw some following from among the monks. ===in mesopotamia=== about 70 monks accompanied him when he left egypt for mesopotamia, where he founded a monastery on mt. izla above the city of nisibis. the location was well chosen, for nisibis lay on the eastern edge of the roman empire, which had just embraced christianity as the official religion. the rest of mesopotamia was under sassanid rule, which tried to revive the zoroastrian religion and occasionally persecuted the christian population. the community on mt. izla grew rapidly, and from here other monasteries were founded throughout mesopotamia, persia, armenia, georgia, and even india and china. a crisis occurred during the 6th century: to please the zoroastrian rulers, the [[assyrian church of the east
363_deaths 4th-century_Christian_saints 4th-century_births Coptic_Orthodox_saints Egyptian_Christian_monks Egyptian_saints Saints_of_the_Armenian_Apostolic_Church Syriac_Orthodox_Church_saints Syrian_saints