Saint Tatiana was a

Christian Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι ...

martyr in 3rd-century Rome during the reign of Emperor Severus Alexander.

Biography

According to legend, she was the daughter of a Roman civil servant who was secretly Christian, and raised his daughter in the faith. This was dangerous, and one day the

jurist A jurist is a person with expert knowledge of law; someone who analyses and comments on law. This person is usually a specialist legal scholar, mostly (but not always) with a formal qualification in law and often a legal practitioner. In the Uni ...

Ulpian captured Tatiana and attempted to force her to make a sacrifice to Apollo. She prayed, and miraculously, an earthquake destroyed the Apollo statue and part of the temple. Tatiana was then blinded, and beaten for two days, before being brought to a circus and thrown into the pit with a hungry lion. But the lion did not touch her and lay at her feet. She was then sentenced to death, and after being tortured, Tatiana was beheaded with a sword on January 12, around AD 225 or 230.

Veneration

Tatiana of Rome (Menologion of Basil II)

Tatiana is venerated as a

saint In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of Q-D-Š, holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term ''saint'' depends on the context and Christian denomination, denominat ...

, and her

feast day The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context d ...

is on January 12 (for those churches which follow the traditional Julian Calendar, January 12 currently falls on January 25 of the modern Gregorian Calendar). The miracles performed by Saint Tatiana are said to have converted many people to the fledgling religion. Her skull was translated in 1955 from Bistrița Monastery to the

Cathedral of Saint Demetrius The Cathedral of Saint Demetrius (Russian language, Russian Дмитриевский собор) is a cathedral in the ancient Russian city of Vladimir (city), Vladimir. It was finished in 1197 during the reign of the Grand Prince Vsevolod the Big ...

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, Romania, and is enshrined with the relics of Saints Sergius and Bacchus and those of Patriach Nephon II of Constantinople. Saint Tatiana is patron saint of students. In Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine, Tatiana Day is semi-formally celebrated as "Students' Day." The similarity of her life with those of Martina and

Prisca Priscilla is an English female given name adopted from Latin '' Prisca'', derived from ''priscus''. One suggestion is that it is intended to bestow long life on the bearer. The name first appears in the New Testament of Christianity variously a ...

has led some to question whether they may even all be the same person, or if perhaps similar hagiographies were assigned to them posthumously. There is no early evidence of veneration of either Martina or Tatiana in Rome, and Prisca (or Priscilla) is hard to identify.

References

*Attwater, Donald and Catherine Rachel John. ''The Penguin Dictionary of Saints''. 3rd edition. New York: Penguin Books, 1993. .

External links

Martyrdom of Saint Tatiana (includes icon)Martyr Tatiana of Rome, and those who suffered with Her
Orthodox icon and

synaxarion Synaxarion or Synexarion (plurals Synaxaria, Synexaria; el, Συναξάριον, from συνάγειν, ''synagein'', "to bring together"; cf. etymology of ''synaxis'' and ''synagogue''; Latin: ''Synaxarium'', ''Synexarium''; cop, ⲥⲩⲛⲁ ...

The Holy Female Martyr Tatiana
''Prologue from Ochrid'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Tatiana Year of birth unknown Ante-Nicene Christian female saints Italian saints 3rd-century Christian martyrs Christian martyrs executed by decapitation 226 deaths