Catherine of Alexandria, Saint, Martyr

CATHERINE OF ALEXANDRIA, Saint, Martyr. - Of this martyr, called Αικατερίνη, Ecaterina, Aecaterina, whence by aphaeresis Catherina or Katherina, who became so popular after the year 1000, there are two hagiographic texts: the Conversio and the Passio, late documents, in which it would be arduous if not useless to seek a primitive historical core. The name of C. does not appear in any text, whether literary or liturgical, known thus far, of Christian antiquity. Some have wished to identify C. with the anonymous Alexandrian virgin who resisted the blandishments of Maximinus Daia (Eusebius, Hist. eccl., VIII, 14-15), but this Christian was exiled, not put to death. Others have even thought of the famous Hypatia, killed by Christian fanatics in March 415, but as is well known, she died a pagan.

The Passio of C., in its various recensions and versions, is by now quite well known (BHL, 1657-67, 1673; supplementum [1911], pp. 70-71; BHG, 30-32; BHO, 26); the same cannot be said of the Conversio (BHL, 1668-72,

1676-78; supplementum, p. 71), a preface to certain Western versions of the Passio, because it has not yet been systematically published and studied in its literary tradition. Among the recently published texts, mention is made of the anonymous Genoese (late 13th-early 14th century) and the poem of Bonino Mombrizio (15th century).

The Conversio, besides emphasizing the royal origin of C., contains among other things the account of her mystical marriage with Christ, which took place in the presence of the Most Holy Mary, on the first night after Baptism, during a vision. The Passio contains the discourses of C. to Maxentius [Maximinus], emperor of Alexandria, and to the wise men summoned there by the same; their conversion and their martyrdom by fire; the flagellation and imprisonment of C.; the conversion of the empress; the breaking of the wheel fitted with sharpened spikes with which C. was to be tortured and finally her death by decapitation, which occurred, depending on the recension, on 24 or 25 Nov. 305. The Passio ends with the account of the transport of C.'s body to Sinai by means of angels. The provenance of this Passio from Alexandria is not certain for Fr. P. II. Delehaye. As for its date of composition, the discovery of the index of a lost passionary with the notice: Passio Ecaterine virginis (perhaps identical with BHL, 1657) occurred in the Claramontano manuscript

4554 (late 8th–early 9th century), preserved in Munich, dates the composition of the Greek text at least to the 8th century. It is now known that Viteau placed it between the middle of the 6th century and the middle of the following one. How the legend of the transport of Catherine's body to Sinai came to be formed (it is perhaps an invention in situ or a translation of relics), already known by the 8th century, and when the veneration of the Saint began in the church built there by Justinian between 548 and 568 in honor of Mary Most Holy, is not known.

To this day it is certain that the oldest trace of any veneration of the martyr Catherine is attested by a painting, still unpublished, discovered in 1948 in an oratory situated on the north side of the Pelagian basilica of St. Lawrence on the Agro Verano, representing Catherine beside the throne of Mary Most Holy with the inscription S. Ecaterina. This painting dates to the 8th century, perhaps to its first half, an era in which Eastern monks were numerous and influential in the City. There follow the painting with S. Ecaterina in the catacomb of St. Januarius at Naples, placed by Achelis at the end of the 8th century (the dating to the late 10th–11th century, proposed by Weigand, is unfounded) and the Passio contained in the aforementioned Claramontanus manuscript. The Neapolitan subdeacon Peter (early 10th century) would have made or revised a version of the Passio of the Saint. Catherine is commemorated on Nov. 25 in the Menologion of Basil II (976-1025) and in the Synaxaria.

Toward the close of the 10th century, Catherine must have been particularly well known, if not an object of cult, at Montecassino; indeed a calendar of the abbey (2nd half of the 10th century) commemorates her on Nov. 25 (cod. CCXXX, cf. Bibliotheca Casinensis, IV: Florilegium [Montecassino 1880, p. 370]); a lectionary and a passionary of the 11th century (ibid., III, 1877, pp. 74, 184) contain her Passio (BHL, 1658, 1662) and the Cassinese monk Alfanus, later archbishop of Salerno (1058-86), composed in her honor three splendid hymns (PL 147, 1240-41). Also in France the principal center promoting the cult of the Saint is the Benedictine monastery of La-Trinité-au-Mont, near Rouen, where between 1033 and 1054 relics of Catherine were brought which soon became very well known for their thaumaturgic virtues (cf. Miracula in BHL, supplementum, p. 71). With the 11th century the cult of Catherine begins to become popular and the insertion of her feast becomes ever more frequent in sacramentaries, missals and breviaries (at first in additions, then in the text), as appears from the catalogues of Ebner (the present collect already appears in a Missal of the 12th century: p. 160) and of Leroquais. With the 12th century, the cult of Catherine may be said to be diffused throughout all Europe. There is no city of any importance or diocese that does not erect churches and oratories in her honor, and sometimes her feast is preceded by a vigil (cf. Breviary of Beauvais of the 11th century, in V. Leroquais, Les bréviaires, III, p. 419). Her name appears among the Auxiliators (v.). The University of Paris wished her for its patroness, and today she is still the protectress of students, philosophers and young women. Doyé enumerates 30 other categories of persons who invoke her as their patroness.

A. Pietro Frutaz

ICONOGRAPHY

The characteristic iconographic motifs of the saint are: the broken wheel, sometimes with twisted spikes, placed at the lower side or raised in the right hand; the book, a sign of learning; the crown, to indicate her royal origin; and furthermore the episodes relating to the mystical marriage, the martyrdom and the translation to Sinai.

In the East the representation of Catherine is very frequent, including in miniatures; one of the oldest is in the Menologion of Basil II.

In the West, a singular iconographic document of C. is a diptych of the 15th century by a local artist in the museum of Esztergom, in Hungary, with scenes of the mystical marriage. In the royal chapel of Granada (Spain), in a panel with the various medieval legends of Sinai, the translation of C. is also depicted at the bottom. Ms. lat. 540 of the National Library of Paris (15th century) has interesting miniatures with scenes of the vine and the genealogical tree of the saint.

In Italy, there are also to be remembered in Rome a fresco of the 13th century in the church of the SS. Quattro Coronati; in Pisa, in the Civic Museum, a polyptych of the 14th century century with stories of the saint, still called Catherine. In the same museum the other polyptych that Simone Martini painted in 1320 for the Pisan church dedicated to the saint has now been reassembled, in which C. is depicted in one of the side panels. She likewise appears in a compartment, now in the Kress collection in New York, of the polyptych painted by Giusto de' Menabuoni in 1363 for Sister Isotta Terzaghi in Padua.

The stories of the disputation, of the conversion of the learned men and of the empress, and of the martyrdom were frequently the subject of entire pictorial cycles. Stefano da Zevio narrated them in the chapel of S. Giorgio in Padua, Masolino in S. Clemente in Rome, Mattia Preti in S. Pietro a Maiella in Naples, Guglielmo Borremans in the oratory of S. C. annexed to the church of S. Francesco d'Assisi in Cosenza. A Mystical Marriage by Correggio is in the Louvre, another by Van Dyck is in the museum of Vienna, a scene of the martyrdom is in an engraving by Dürer.

Sculptors too often depicted her, always with the hooked wheel. Notable are the bas-reliefs of the school of Tino da Camaino (14th century) in S. Chiara in Naples.

FOLKLORE

The saint, commonly known to the people by the name of "St. C. of the wheel," on account of the most conspicuous emblem taken from the instruments of her martyrdom, enjoys a vast popular cult. She is the patroness of maidens and of unmarried women in general, and it is precisely to them that her feast is dedicated.

In certain countries, as, for example, in France, girls were accustomed to celebrate this day with games and dances, during which they elected a "queen"; the little girls awaited gifts of sweets and toys in an empty stocking or little shoe, put out on the evening of the vigil, as for the Befana. In Valtellina, besides the traditional games, the "vampate," bonfires lit in honor of the saint, are typical on the eve of the feast. In popular tradition the day of St. C., around which a number of weather proverbs circulate, announces the beginning of winter and of the Christmas season. From this day, in Emilia, in religious households, they begin to recite the Hail Marys, which must reach the number of a thousand on the day before Christmas Eve. In Rome, as one reads in a celebrated sonnet by Belli, it was customary to remove the mats from the stairs and the light covers from the beds, and they began to light the fire in the rooms, while from the mountains of Abruzzo the pifferari came down for the Christmas novena.

A reflection of the popularity of the cult of C. is offered us by the numerous production of popular poems inspired by her legend, which in their details present notable divergences due to their popular character, tending toward the fantastic. In Italy the most ancient of these poems were composed in the north, in stanzas reminiscent of the laisse. The following are to be remembered: the Anonymous Genoese of the 13th century, published by N. Lagomaggiore; a Veronese text, from a 14th-century codex of the Marciana in Venice, by Mussafia; a Tuscan-Venetian-Lombard redaction of the versified legend, by Ranier; another in the Franco-Veronese language, by Beuer; an Abruzzese composition by Buccio di Ranallo of Aquila (d. 1363) in juggler's meter and tone (14th century). Somewhat later are certain "storie" in ottava rima, of which manuscripts and incunabula are known; to be noted are incunabulum no. 1617 (O. VII, 26) of the Casanatense, and another attributed to a Johannes dictus Florentinus, in the Palatine collection of the Nazionale of Florence; a cantare in 110 ottavas is preserved in ms. 2273 (parchment of the 15th century) of the Angelica library in Rome. Such "storie" continued to be printed for several centuries and to spread by means of popular booklets. There also exist songs still alive in the oral tradition of the people, which narrate, in very brief strokes, the principal episodes of the legend. The legend has also been treated dramatically several times. A grandiose representation of 204 stanzas (1632 verses) in the ancient meter of the lauda is preserved for us in cod. I, II, 33 of the Biblioteca Comunale of Siena (perhaps the laudario of the Compagnia di S. C. della notte): it is divided into three days and is "the only representation of large dimensions that the Italian theater of the Middle Ages produced in such a form." A

sacra rappresentazione in ottava rima was composed in Florence in the 15th century. - See Pl. LXIII.

Paolo Toschi