The martyrs suffered for the holy icons in the year 730 during the reign of Emperor Leo the Isaurian. The emperor deposed the holy patriarch Germanus and elevated the iconoclast Anastasius to the throne. By the emperor's decree, all icons were to be destroyed. A soldier, who came to remove the miraculous icon of the Savior, fell and was killed instantly, which outraged the people. The patrician Maria and others defended the icon, for which the emperor condemned many Orthodox to death. The protospapharius Gregory accepted a martyr's death. Julian, Marcian, John, Jacob, Alexius, Dimitri, Leontius, Photius, and Peter were imprisoned in a dungeon, where they endured tortures. Their faces were burned with molten iron, and their heads were severed. Maria, upon learning of the execution, voluntarily accepted a martyr's end. The bodies of the martyrs were buried in the Pelagiae region and were found incorrupt 139 years later.
