Fantinus (Italian: Fantino) (c. 927–1000) was an Italian saint. He is sometimes called Fantinus of Calabria^[1] or Fantinus the Younger (Fantino il Giovane) to distinguish him from Fantinus the Wonderworker (or the Elder), an earlier Calabrian saint.^[2][3]

Born in Calabria in a locality described as being the "closest to Sicily",^[2] Fantinus was introduced as a child to Saint Elias the Cave-Dweller.^[4] Fantinus' parents were named George and Vriena.^[2] Fantinus' spiritual education was entrusted to Elias, and Fantinus became a monk at the age of thirteen and worked as a cook and afterwards as a porter. At the age of thirty-three, he became a hermit in the region of Mount Mercurion in the north of Calabria. There, many monasteries and hermitages had been established under the Basilian rule. Fantinus lived a life of extreme asceticism, eating only raw vegetables, and occupying his time copying manuscripts.^[4] He also experienced a vision of heaven and hell.^[4]

Fantinus lived both as a hermit and as a monk and abbot. He subsequently convinced his aged parents, as well as his two brothers, Luke and Cosmas, and sister Caterina, to enter the monastic life. When he became a hermit, he left his brother Lucas in charge of the monastery for men he had founded. Though a hermit, he often returned from the wild in order to serve as a guide and spiritual teacher to disciples, such as Nilus the Younger and Nicodemus of Mammola.^[2]

The monastery he founded was destroyed by Muslim raiders during Fantinus' lifetime.^[1] But Fantinus was told by an angel to preach in Greece.^[4] He left Calabria with two disciples, Vitalis and Nicephorus. During the voyage, the ship ran out of drinking water. Fantinus is said to have made the sign of the cross over a container filled with seawater and miraculously converted it into drinkable water.^[2] Fantinus visited Corinth, Athens, and Larissa, where he lived near the sepulcher of Saint Achillius of Larissa. He lived for four months in a monastery dedicated to Saint Menas near Thessalonica, and then lived outside of the city walls of that city. In Thessalonica itself, he cured the sick and caused a corrupt judge to repent of his sins.^[2] He was also given credit for preventing a Bulgarian capture of the city.^[4]

Fantinus died in Greece.^[1]

The eleventh-century Greek life of Fantinus has been edited and translated into Italian by Enrica Follieri.^[5]