MARIA EGIZIACA, saint. - Commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on 2 April; it is not, however, established that she was venerated in antiquity with liturgical worship. The oldest source that speaks of her is Cirillo di Scitopoli in the biography of St. Ciriaco. Cirillo relates that, having gone to visit Ciriaco together with the monk Giovanni, the latter showed him M.’s tomb and told him her story as he had learned it from the saint herself.
She was a singer in the church of the Anastasi in Jerusalem and, realizing that many were tempted because of her, decided to withdraw; she retired to a cave in the desert, where she lived for 18 years in absolute
solitude and penance. The monk Giovanni added that, returning from a visit to Abbot Ciriaco, he found her dead and, with the help of the monks of the Laura of Sauca, buried her in the same cave where she had lived, blocking its entrance.
At the beginning of the seventh century St. Sofronio of Jerusalem, making use of Cirillo’s account, wrote a legendary biography, according to which M., born in Egypt, was led to penance and the eremitical life after a licentious life spent in Alexandria. The life of St. Mosco in his Prato spirituale is likewise legendary.