A DICTIONARY OF SAINTLY WOMEN
A
St. Aagot, Agatha.
St. Ab, Ebba.
St. Abba or Alla, May 7, M. in Africa, with an immense number of others, of whom about 90 are named. AA.SS. Boll, from the Mart. of St. Jerome.
B. Abbatissa, first abbess of the Order of the Holy Ghost at Salamanca, about 11th century. Guénebault, Dic. Iconographique.
St. Abda, March 31, M. in Africa. Mart. Rhinoviense. AA.SS.
St. Abdela (Adela, Adla), 13th century. Princess of Bohemia. Abbess of Gerenrhoda. Half-sister of St. Agnes of Bohemia. Daughter of Premislaus Ottocar I., king of Bohemia (1198-1230), by his wife Abdela or Adela, daughter of Otto, margrave of Meissen. The queen was divorced, either on the ground of consanguinity or on account of her siding with her brother in a quarrel with the king. She then became a Cistercian nun at Wassenburg, in Meissen, leaving besides Abdela, two daughters and a son. Fabricius, Origines Saxonum, numbers St. Abdela among the saints of Saxony. Chanowski, Bohemia Pia. Dlugosch, Hist. Polonica, ii. 640. Palacky, Geschichte von Böhmen, ii., Genealogical Table.
St. Abia, otherwise Mariamna (3). See Thecla (1).
St. Abiata, V. M. See Bahuta.
St. Abundantia (1), Jan. 29, called in French Abondance or Bonde. A widow who lived at Spoleto, and buried St. Gregory and other martyrs there, during tho persecution by Diocletian, c. 300. Jacobilli, Santi Dell' Umbria.
St. Abundantia (2), V. Jan. 19 and July 15. † 804. Represented as a child, before the image of the Virgin Mary, receiving a golden apple from the Infant Jesus. Born at Spoleto, of parents who had long been childless. Her birth was announced by the spontaneous ringing of tho bells of the town. At her baptism lamps were lighted without human hands. One day, when about eight years of age, she was seized with a longing for a golden apple she saw in the hand of an image of the Infant Christ in His mother's arms. He gave it to her. She ran to fetch Him a bouquet in return, and although it was mid-winter, she found plenty of beautiful flowers, which she gathered and presented to the Holy Child. Majolo, or Nicholas, abbot of St. Mark's, at Spoleto, undertook her education. He took her to Palestine, where she remained some years. She spent five years as a recluse in the cave of St. Onuphrius, and then, as her father kept constantly asking to have her home again, she returned to Spoleto. At her father's death she gave all her inheritance to the poor. The same mysterious ringing of bells which hailed her birth was also heard at her death, in 804; and where her funeral passed, leaves and flowers burst forth in January, and angels wore heard to sing Veni sponsa Christi. She performed miracles of healing in life and after her death.
