Sophia is first documented in a 979 deed of donation, when her father entrusted her education to his first cousin, Abbess Gerberga II of Gandersheim.

[6] Sophia received many grants of rights and property from her father as well as from her brother, Otto III, who succeeded as King of the Romans in 983.

Thangmar is often criticized as being an unreliable and biased source with authorship of portions of the  Vita Bernwardi being brought into question by some scholars.

Sophia insisted that she take the veil from Archbishop Willigis of Mainz, the archchancellor of the Holy Roman Empire, affronting the local Bishop Osdag of Hildesheim.

It is likely that Theophanu saw the veiling of Sophia as an opportunity for Willigis to show authority over Gandersheim as reward for his support during the coup attempt.

[10] Thangmar claimed that on several occasions when Bishop Bernward visited Gandersheim, that Sophia had convinced the canonesses of the abbey to receive him coldly rather than to give him a proper welcome.

Likely as a reward for her support of Henry's claim to the throne, Sophia was made Abbess at the same ceremony where Queen Cunigund was crowned.

[22] Sophia would later fight her ecclesiastical superiors who, with approval of Emperor Henry II, endangered Gandersheim's privileges and her own status.

After an assembly in which many Saxon nobles supported the claim of Duke Henry of Bavaria over Margrave Ekkehard of Meißen, a small feast had been prepared for Sophia and Adelheid.

Sophia and her sister later played the same role in the election of Conrad II as first Holy Roman Emperor of the Salian dynasty.

The rebuilding of Essen Minster was delayed, though recent research suggests that it was Sophia who initiated the remodeling of the Enamel Cross.