“Between Tradition and Reception: Constructions of Female Sanctity in Gallic Saints’ Vitae at the Transition from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages”

The dynamic developments of the fourth century CE paved the way for the transformation of early Christian communities into a Volkskirche (“people’s church”) and for a new Christian self-conception centered on the ideal of an unbloody imitatio Christi. In this context, the literary genre of martyr acts and passions was gradually replaced by the earliest saints’ vitae. Following the first biographies of male saints, the first vitae of female saints soon emerged, including Gregory of Nyssa’s Vita Sanctae Macrinae and Gerontius’ Vita Melaniae Iunioris. This genre would reach its peak in the High Middle Ages.

As a central region in the formation of Western monasticism, Gaul occupies a particularly significant position, underscored by its indigenous tradition of sanctity exemplified by figures such as Martin of Tours. From the sixth century onward, the number of accounts devoted to holy women appears to increase. Following the Vita Genovefae, further vitae were composed, including Gregory of Tours’ Vita Monegundis and the Vita Radegundis by Venantius Fortunatus and by the abbess Baudonivia.

The study focuses on questions of intertextual dependence and original constructions of female Gallic saints’ vitae of the Early Middle Ages in relation to saints’ lives devoted to both men and women at the transition from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. The aim is to identify specific formal and thematic features of Christian female sanctity and to demonstrate how these were adopted and simultaneously reshaped in order to articulate distinctive aspects of female holiness, thereby contributing to the formation of an independent textual genre.

Furthermore, the vitae, reflecting the increasing participation of Frankish elites in the Christian cult of saints, offer insights into the development of early medieval religiosity, the transformation of concepts of female sanctity, and the emergence of gender-specific types of holiness in the Latin West.