Page:A Dictionary of Saintly Women Volume 1.djvu/436

422 ST. JA St Ja, Aug. 4 (Ia, Ie), M. c. 360. One of a band of Boman captives bronght from a place on the frontier which Sapor, king of Persia, had conquered from the Eomans. After a year's imprisonment and other torments, St. Ja was con- demned to death by the chief magicians because she had converted their wives to Christianity, which they thought she must have done by magic. She was bound with cords until her hones creaked and cracked, then scourged nearly to death, and finally beheaded, giving thanks to the last. There was an old church of St. Ja at Constantinople in the time of Justinian, who rebuilt it. AA.SS. , from a Greek MS. in the Vatican Library. Men. Basil. Tillemont, Hist. Eccl. St. Jabhthena or Gabtina, July 11, an Irish V. AASS., Preeier. Mart, of ^Tallaght. St. Jadwidz, Hedwig. St. Jaegra, Nov. 1 5, V. M. at Toledo. Her story will be given by the BoUandists in AA.SS. when they come to her day. St. Jamnica, Gamnite. (See Blan- DINA.) St. Jane (1), Joanna, wife of Chuza. B. Jane (2), Jan. 16, Feb 12, May 1. V. of Bagno, in Tuscany, + 1105. GiovANNA of Fonte Chiusi was first a lay-sister and then a nim in the Camal- doleso convent of St. Lucy at Bagno, a place of resort for medicinal waters. At her death, all the bells in the town raog without human interference. Some time afterwards a pestilence was arrested by her intercession, and in gratitude the people set up an altar to her honour in their church. Her convent was after- wards called by her name — Santa Giovanna. A.B.M., Feb. 12. BoUandus, AA.SS.i gives a life of her by Razzi and another by Ferrarius. Bucelinus. B. Jane (3) Spirinx, Deo. 4. Lay- sister at Beaupre, near Mont Gerard, in Belgium. Her parents, who were of the noble class, made some difficulty about letting her become a nun, and among other stipulations bargained that she should do no dirty work ; but she chose to make herself the lowest of the nuns and to help in deaning out the stable. After her death, one of ner mBters had t vision in which she saw Jeanne clothed in brilliant light on aooonnt of her humility. The sistor superior asked her to open her hand. She declined because she held in it a jewel of such splendour that it would instantly blind any mortal She told them it had been giyen to her for the menial work which she had willingly done. Bucelinus. St. Jane (4), May 9, Ang. 4, 2. End of 12th century. Juana de Aza, some- times called Juana Guannan, was the mother of the great St. Dominic^ founder of the Order of Preachers. She and her husband were of noble Spanish families. He is generally said to have been a Guzman, but this is denied. The birth of her third and most fSamons son was foretold as follows : Late in the year 11 GO, Juana, who was yery pious and saintly, was making a nooeiia in the monastery of St. Domingo de Sylos (+ 1153), near Calaruega in Old Castile. On the seventh night of the nooena^ as she was watching in the sepulchre of the holy monk,he appeared to her and told her God would give her a son. From thence- forth she became more devout than ever. Some months before the birth of this child, she dreamt that she brought forth a dog, carrying in his mouth a burning torch which set the world on fire. St. Dominic (in Spanish, Domingo) was born at Calaruega, 1170, and called by the name of his patron saint, Dominic de Sylos, whose fame is lost in that of the son of Juana. She was buried in the convent of San Pedro de Gumiel, until about 1350, when the Infant Don Juan Emanuel, moved by the virtues of this servant of God, his relation by blood, procured the solemn translation of her relics, carrying the bier on his shoulder from Gumiel to the Dominican convent of Penafiel, where a chapel was built in her honour, and where ihe still receives public veneration. In 1828, Ferdinand VII. of Spain — heir of the devotion of his ancestors towards their blessed relative — entreated the holy see