Gregory of Agrigentum

c.559-c.638. Byzantine prelate. Born near Agrigentum, Sicily, he traveled in North Africa and the Near East when he was only eighteen. He was ordained deacon by the patriarch of Jerusalem and was consecrated bishop in Rome at the age of thirty-one. Accused and imprisoned by enemies, on appeal to Pope Gregory I he was declared innocent and received with honor by Emperor Maurice. His ten-volume commentary on Ecclesiastes has been preserved, and he had an influence on the development of Byzantine ecclesiastical and literary styles. His life was written by Leontius, hegumen of the St. Sabas monastery in Rome.