Location:Probably Vaucelles - Date:Shortly before 1250 (incorporated in the first 'Passionaire français') ( BHL 4992) (Perrot, 1992: 20, 180-189) - Commission: /

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Life of Saint Lucia of Syracuse (+ approx 303). She was a young martyr who lived at the time of the persecution of Christians by emperor Diocletian. According to legend, she was able to achieve the sacred healing of her incurably ill mother Eutychia by her plea for help at the tomb of St. Agatha of Catania. St. Agatha appeared to her in a vision and fulfilled her wish. During her illness Eutychia wanted to secure the future of her daughter by arranging her a suitable suitor. Lucia, on the other hand, desired to remain chaste so she could consecrate her virginity to Christ. Eventually she managed to convince her mother to distribute the family fortune, the dowry, to the poor. By this way her marriage was cancelled. When her future husband heard the news he denounced her to Paschasius, who sentenced her to death by rape.

MEYER (P.), Légendes hagiographiques en français, in: Histoire littéraire de la France, XXXIII (1906) 402 (fragment)

Bibliotheca Hagiographica Latina 4992
CASSELL (A.), 'Santa Lucia as patroness of sight: hagiography, iconography, and Dante', Dante Studies, 109 (1992) 71-88
HAHN (C.), Portrayed on the heart: narrative effect in pictorial lives of saints from the tenth through the thirteenth century (Berkeley, 2001)
MEYER (P.), Versions en prose des Vies des Pères, in: Histoire Littéraire de la France, XXXIII (1906) 393-458
PERROT (J.P.), Le Passionnaire français au Moyen Age (Genève, 1992) (180-189)
VAN DER LINDEN (S.), De Heiligen (Antwerpen, 1999) 531-532