 He witnessed the Persian invasion of Palestine in 614, and the massacre of forty-four of his companions by the Bedouins.In 619, five years after the conquest of the Holy Land by Chosroes, Ancyra was taken and destroyed by the Persians, which compelled the monks of the neighbouring monastery of Attaline to leave their home, and to move from place to place.As they were, naturally, unable to carry many books with them, the Abbot Eustathius asked his friend Antiochus to compile an abridgment of Holy Scripture for their use, and also a short account of the martyrdom of the forty-four monks of St. Sabbas.