THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
sequently deprived of her estates and banished. This identification, however, does not agree with the statement of Rufinus (Hist, cccl., viii. 17) that this lady was named Dorothea, nor does it harmonize with the legend of St. Catharine as given both by Simeon Metaphrastes and the Roman martyrology. According to these sources, St. Catharine was a maiden of royal birth (the daughter of King Konstos, in the Greek Ofjicium), and of extraordinary wisdom and beauty. At the age of eighteen, she engaged in a controversy, at the command either of Maximinus or Maxentius (although the latter never ruled Alexandria), with fifty pagan philosophers, whom she converted so signally that they remained faithful to Christianity even to martyrdom. In prison, a few days before her own execution, she converted the empress, the general Porphyrius, and his 200 soldiers, all of whom suffered death by the sword for their faith. Resisting both the pleadings and the threats of the tyrant, Catharine remained unharmed by torture, even on a machine of sharp-pointed wheels, until she was finally beheaded by the command of Maximinus.
The day of St. Catharine is celebrated either on Nov. 25 or on Mar. 5. Her body is said to have been borne by angels to Mount Sinai, where Justinian I. built a cloister in her honor and where her bones were said to have been discovered by Egyptian Christians in the eighth century, thus giving rise to the feast of the discovery of the body of St. Catharine on May 13 or 26. About 1027 Simeon, a monk from Sinai, is said to have carried a portion of the relics of St. Catharine to Rouen, and her monastery on Mount Sinai now retains only her head and one hand. [These are enclosed in a marble sarcophagus.] Inspired by the tradition of her victory over the philosophers of Alexandria, the philosophical faculty of the University of Paris later chose her as their patron saint. According to Occidental tradition, she is one of the fourteen " helpers in need," the only other feminine members of this band being SS. Barbara and Margaret. See Helpers in Need.
In Christian art, both of the East and the West, St. Catharine is an important figure. Her usual attributes are a sword and a wheel (either entire or broken), through which curved knives are thrust. To these are frequently added a palm of victory, a book in token of her learning, and occasionally a crown, or, more often, a bridal ring which the Christ-child himself is said to have placed on her finger in emblem of betrothal. The oldest Oriental picture of this saint is a mosaic over the apse of the basilica of the Transfiguration in the monastery on Sinai, which represents simply a female head without attributes. In a picture by Simon of Sienna (d. 1344) she bears in her hand a palm and a book. Among the numerous representations of St. Catharine in Western art, special mention may be made of the works of Altichiero da Zevio (c. 1380) in the frescos of the chapel of St. George at Padua, the frescos of Masaccio (c. 1420) in the upper church of St. Clement at Rome, eleven marble bas-reliefs (probably dating from the fourteenth century) in the church of Santa Chiara in Naples,
nine pictures of 1385 in the cloister of St. Paul at Leipsic, and the miniatures in the Vie de Sainte Catherine d'Alcxandrie by Jean Mielot, secretary of Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy (c. 1462). After the middle of the fifteenth century the most noteworthy artists of Italy, Flanders, and Germany, such as Fiesole, Raffael, Carlo Dolce, Jan van Eyck, Hans Memling, and Lukas Cranach, vied with one another in the production of pictures of St. Catharine, and the medieval Christian drama repeatedly represented the legend of the saint in mysteries, the earliest being that of the Norman Geoffrey, abbot of St. Albans, which was played at Dunstable about 1120. (O. Zockler|.)
Bibliography: The Legend of St. Katherine, ed. from a MS. in the Cotton Library by J. Morton for the Abbotsford Club, London, 1841 ; Life and Martyrdom of St. Katherine of Alexandria, Roxburghe Club publications, no. 99, ib. 1884; Life of St. Katherine, ed. E. Einenkel for Early Text Society, ib. 1884; The Life Metrical, by J. Capgrave, ed. F. C. Hingeston, is in Rolls Series, no. 1 , pp. 337- 354, ib. 1858. Consult: C. Hardwick, Historical Inquiry Touching St. Catharine of Alexandria, Cambridge, 1849; H. Knust. Geschichte der Legenden der heiligen Catherina, Halle, 1890. On the art side, consult: Mrs. Jameson, Sacred and Legendary Art, ii. 74-97, Boston, 1893; J. Wipfli and J. J. von Ah, Das Leben der heiligen Katharina von Alexandrien, Einsiedeln, 1898.
CATHARINE DE' RICCI, rit'chi, SAINT : Roman
Catholic saint; b. at Florence [Apr. 23] 1522; d. at Prato (11 m. n.w. of Florence) Feb. 2 [1590]. She was educated in a convent at Monticelli and at the wish of her father lived in the world for a short time, after which she took the veil and entered the Dominican nunnery of St. Vincent at Prato. At the age of twenty-five she became prioress, and spiritual counsel was sought from her by bishops, cardinals, and princes. She was also a close friend of St. Philip Neri, with whom she maintained an active correspondence. The intensity of her meditation on the Passion was such that she actually felt the sufferings of Christ and frequently shed blood as if from scourgings and wounds. St. Catharine was canonized by Benedict XIV in 1746 and her feast was appointed for Feb. 13. In art she has the attributes of the crown of thorns and a marriage ring. The elegant style of her letters ranks her as one of the best Italian classics of the second half of the sixteenth century [ed. A. Gherardi, Florence, 1890]. (O. ZocklerI.)
Bibliography: F. M. Capes. Life of St. Catherine de' Ricci. London, 1905, which gives a transl. of a number of her letters.
CATHARINE, SAINT, OF SIENNA: Roman Catholic saint; b. at Sienna [Mar. 25] 1347; d. at Rome Apr. 29, 1380. She was the twenty-third child of a dyer named Jacomo Benincasa. Her early home in the vicinity of a Dominican monastery made a deep impression on the sensitive child, and she believed that St. Dominic himself appeared to her in a dream and urged her to enter his order. Disregarding her mother's wish that she should marry, Catharine, then about twelve years of age, cut off her long blond hair to escape unwelcome attentions. Three years later smallpox destroyed her beauty and she was able to fulfil her heart's desire, to which her mother had consented soma.