Creating the Female Martyr in Late Antique North Africa

Abstract

In this thesis, I look at different representations of female martyrdom across the long durée of Late Antiquity. I am interested in specific martyrs within the communities that created them, and how they were being represented and reinvented for different audiences. I am interested in the ways these ideas are adapted and come back into fashion, across the many varied communities that made up Late Antique North Africa. In the first chapter, I take the popular figure of Perpetua and discuss some of the considerable literature on her and how focusing on her ‘exceptionality’ has had the effect of overshadowing the study of female martyrs. Next, I look at the much more local example of Salsa, in a close reading that re-examines her role as a local saint and more action-orientated figure, questioning some general assumptions about gender and martyrdom. At the start of the second half of the thesis, I turn to the collection of martyr narratives known as the acta and propose an innovative methodology based on their similarity, particularly when it comes to their so-called ‘unoriginality’, with scenes and characters from Roman comedy and mime. Using the case study of Crispina, among others, I am particularly interested in representations of the relationship between the female martyr and the figure of her antagonist. In the final chapter, I reconsider the role of mothers and maternal imagery across a selection of martyr narratives. This includes a comparative look at Christian and Islamic discussions of motherhood and martyrdom, as a way of incorporating the early history of Islam into the Latin West Late Antique context. Overall, this thesis argues not only for representations of female martyrs to be more diverse and nuanced than often assumed but also with implications for constructions of martyrs and martyrdom more generally.