Simeon the younger Stylite (521–97) is rather implausibly said to have insisted on spending his infancy on a junior pillar, but there is no doubt that he eventually graduated to a full-scale pillar near Antioch, of which there are remnants even more substantial than those of his elder namesake. It was possible for pilgrims to get there without too much trouble from the city, making for an edifying day out. Simeon does not seem to have protested while a large expensive church (whose ruins also still survive) was being built round his pillar, thus making this ragged hermit into a bizarre living
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