[1]: 16 Hermione was born in Cæsarea and was one of the four daughters of Saint Philip the Evangelist, one of the seven deacons as described in chapter 6 in the Acts of the Apostles,[2] chosen by the early Christian church to minister to the community of believers in Jerusalem.

[6][7] According to tradition, around the early 100s, after studying medicine, Hermione travelled with her sister Eukhilda to Ephesus, through Anatolia, to meet St. John the Theologian in the hopes that they could help him in his evangelization efforts.

Soon, her reputation as a doctor and as a devout Christian attracted the attention of the Roman emperor Trajan who stopped in Ephesus on his way to a war with the Persians in 114 to convince her to renounce Christ.

When she refused, he ordered that she be struck in the face for several hours, which she was able to withstand because she was "comforted by a vision of the Lord, in the form of Petronius, sitting upon the throne of judgment.

"[8] Trajan freed her when he saw that she would not recant her faith and that she bore the torture with "patience and courage,"[7] and after she prophesied that he would defeat the Persians and that his son-in-law Hadrian would succeed him.