St Catherine of Alexandria

In the writings of Eusebius, known as "the father of Church history", there is a brief note about a young Christian noble-woman of Alexandria and the Emperor Maximus, one of several rival emperors who struggled for mastery during the first few years of the fourth century, and who tried to crush what he considered the dangerous institution of the Christian Church. Maximus apparently ordered the young lady to come to his palace, presumably to become his mistress, and, when she refused she was punished by banishment and the conžscation of her estates. (Of course it might not have been Maximus, because the same story is said of his father, Maxentius.) Later Christian writers had a tendency to embellish the traditions of their martyrs to make them more memorable, and it is likely that it was on this brief note that the story of St. Catherine of Alexandria was founded.

According to the popular tradition, Catherine was the daughter of a patrician family of Alexandria. From childhood she always had her nose stuck in a book, and through her reading she learned much of Christianity, and she was converted to the faith after having a vision of Mary and the child Jesus. When Maximus, a pagan and not a very nice man, began his persecution, Catherine went to him and told him off for his cruelty. She argued against his pagan gods, and he could find little to say in reply. So he summoned fifty philosophers to argue on his behalf. Unfortunately they were all won over by her reasoning, which upset Maximus, and they were all ordered to be burned to death. The Emperor then tried bribery, and offered Catherine a high position in his court if she renounced her faith. When this failed, he had her scourged and thrown into prison. Maximus then went off to inspect his military forces, but when he got back he discovered that his wife Faustina and a high ofžcial, one Porphyrius, had been visiting Catherine in prison and had been converted, along with something like 200 soldiers of the Imperial guard. This was too much for him, and he had them all put to death. Catherine was sentenced to be tortured on a spiked wheel. When she was fastened to the wheel, her bonds miraculously came undone and the wheel itself broke, its spikes flying off and killing some of the onlookers. (The modern Catherine-wheel, from which sparks fly off in all directions, took its name from the saint's wheel of martyrdom.) Maximus, being a poor loser, had her beheaded on 25th. November 310, which has become her Feast Day.

In 527 the Emperor Justinian built a fortified monastery for hermits in the region of Mount Sinai in her honour. During the next two or three centuries the story of Catherine was amplified by the statement that, after she was beheaded, milk flowed from her veins instead of blood, and her body was carried by angels to Mount Sinai where a church and monastery were built in her honour.

The spiked wheel has become the emblem of Saint Catherine, and because of this all craftsmen who work with a wheel, such as potters, spinners, knife grinders, millers, turners and wheelwrights have placed themselves under her patronage.

Bill Hutchings