Records about the life of Catharine of Alexandria are sparse and contradictory. What is known with certainty is that she was a very educated, very articulate woman who professed the Christian faith. She lived during the reign of the Roman Emperor Maximinus II during the late 200s and early 300s, and was renowned for her excellent scholarship and her ability to think (and speak) on her feet, entering into high-level philosophical discussions with the greatest minds of the day (who were, largely, located then in Alexandria).

Maximinus–whether out of disgust at Catharine’s gender or of her erudition or of her willingness not to tuck either away for the comfort of others–ordered a public contest, a kind of ancient Philosophy Slam. Five of the most preeminent male philosophers v. Catharine, in a public forum. Like tag-team wrestling! The end result? Not only did Catharine’s wisdom and rhetorical abilities prevail, but–each of the five male philosophers made the decision, on the spot, to convert to Catharine’s way of thinking, and they became Christians themselves!

These were not the results that Maximinus desired and, being a petulant Emperor with power, he ordered that the five male philosophers be bound together and burnt publicly in a great bonfire. Maximinus further ordered that Catharine, after a period of wretched torture, be beheaded. Perhaps there was something particularly symbolic for him in chopping off the part of the body containing Catharine’s brain and her tongue.

Festivals (even stamps) have continued to commemorate and honor Catharine through the ages. She has further been designated the patron saint of Christian philosophers. I cannot help but believe that radical lesbian feminist Mary Daly, although she herself led a very public, 20th-century exodus of women from the Church, was in her own way a descendant of Catharine’s tribe, for which I am personally thankful.