Catherine of Alexandria, also spelled Katherine,[a] was, according to tradition, a Christian saint and virgin, who was martyred in the early 4th century at the hands of the emperor Maxentius.

[7] Some modern scholars consider that the legend of Catherine was probably based on the life and murder of the virgin Saint Dorothea of Alexandria and the Greek philosopher Hypatia, with the reversed role of a Christian and neoplatonist in the case of the latter.

The emperor summoned 50 of the best pagan philosophers and orators to dispute with her, hoping that they would refute her pro-Christian arguments, but Catherine won the debate.

[12] Her legend tells that during the confinement she was fed daily by a dove from heaven, and Christ also visited her, encouraging her to fight bravely, and promised her the crown of everlasting glory.

[19] In the 6th century, the Eastern Emperor Justinian had established what is now Saint Catherine's Monastery in Egypt, which had been originally built encircling the purported burning bush seen by Moses.

[20] Sometimes cited as a possible inspiration of Catherine, Eusebius wrote around 320 that Maximinus had ordered a young Christian woman to come to his palace to become his mistress, and when she refused he had her punished by having her banished and her estates confiscated.

[22] The Catholic Encyclopedia, while not denying her historicity, states that most of the details that embellish the narrative, as well as the long discourses attributed to Catherine, are to be rejected as later inventions.

[18] Donald Attwater dismisses what he calls the "legend" of Saint Catherine, arguing for a lack of any "positive evidence that she ever existed outside the mind of some Greek writer who first composed what he intended to be simply an edifying romance.

[27] Hypatia was a Greek mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher who was murdered by the Parabalani after being accused of exacerbating a conflict between two prominent figures in Alexandria, the governor Orestes and the bishop Cyril.

[27][9][30] The earliest surviving account of Catherine's life comes around 600 years after the traditional date of her martyrdom, in the Menologium, a document compiled for Emperor Basil II in 976, although the alleged rediscovery of her relics at Saint Catherine's Monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai was about 800[31] and presumably implies an existing cult at that date (though the common name of the monastery developed after the discovery).

Many aspects of her Passio are clearly legendary and conform to well-known hagiographical topoi.Her name appears in Greek as Αἰκατερίνη (Aikaterínē) or Ἑκατερίνη (Ekaterínē).

In the early Christian era, it became associated with Greek καθαρός (katharós, "pure"), and the Latin spelling was changed from Katerina to Katharina to reflect this.

Her power as an intercessor was renowned and firmly established in most versions of her hagiography, in which she specifically entreats Christ at the moment of her death to answer the prayers of those who remember her martyrdom and invoke her name.

Some were better-known sites, such as Canterbury and Westminster, which claimed a phial of her oil, brought back from Mount Sinai by Edward the Confessor.

[33][34] Other shrines, such as St. Catherine's Hill, Hampshire were the focus of generally local pilgrimage, many of which are only identified by brief mentions in various texts, rather than by physical evidence.

The importance of the virgin martyrs as the focus of devotion and models for proper feminine behaviour increased during the Late Middle Ages.

A footnote to the entry for 25 November in The Synaxarion compiled by Hieromonk Makarios of Simonos Petra states: "Until the 16th century, the memory of St Catherine was observed on 24 Nov.

It is believed that Jacques-Benigne Bossuet dedicated to her one of his most beautiful panegyrics and that Adam of St. Victor wrote a magnificent poem in her honour: Vox Sonora nostri chori.In France, unwed women who had attained the age of 25 were called "catherinettes".

This custom gave rise to the French idiom 'coiffer Sainte-Catherine' ("don St. Catherine's bonnet"), to describe an unmarried woman between the ages of 25 and 30.

Finally, as according to tradition she not only remained a virgin by governing her passions and conquered her executioners by wearying their patience, but triumphed in science by closing the mouths of sophists, her intercession was implored by theologians, apologists, pulpit orators, and philosophers.

[46] In 2022, Catherine was officially added to the Episcopal Church liturgical calendar with a feast day she shares with Barbara of Nicomedia, and Margaret of Antioch on 24 November.

[50] One accepted origin of the namesake of St. Catharines, Ontario, is Saint Catherine of Alexandria, but there are other proposed explanations as "no definitive documentation exists to conclusively prove that the founders chose the unique spelling for any one particular reason".

Notable later paintings of Catherine include single figures by Raphael in the National Gallery, and by Caravaggio (in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid).