The hagiography details Shushanik's extensive resistance to imprisonment, isolation, torture and cruelty.

[1] According to this legend, Shushanik was a daughter of the Armenian military commander Vardan Mamikonian and married the Mihranid ruler (pitiakhsh) Varsken, son of Arshusha II.

Varsken was a defiant vassal of Vakhtang I Gorgasali, King of Kartli (Iberia), and took a pro-Persian position, renouncing Christianity and adopting Zoroastrianism.

He killed Shushanik after she refused to submit to his order to abandon her Christian faith.

Her feast day is celebrated on October 17 in Georgia and the Tuesday between September 20–26 in Armenia.