Calle de San Anastasio
Recalls Saint Anastasius the Persian, a soldier of the Sasanian army who converted to Christianity and died a martyr in the 7th century.
Anastasius was born in Persia toward the end of the 6th century, the son of a Zoroastrian magus, and served in the armies of Khosrow II. When Persian troops sacked Jerusalem in 614 and carried off the relic of the Cross, he was struck that an instrument of torture could inspire such veneration. That strangeness drew him toward Christianity.
He was baptized in Jerusalem as Anastasius and entered a monastery. He preached against the fire worship of his homeland, was arrested and, taken into Persian territory, was strangled and beheaded around 628. Christian tradition counts him among the Persian martyrs.
No record survives of why this saint was chosen to name a street in southern Madrid, beyond the habit of dedicating the new districts' streets to saints and devotions.