Saints' Lives and the Rhetoric of Gender

In this revisionist work, John Kitchen depicts the lives of both male and female saints, by authors of both sexes - from sixth-century France. Looking at the works of the most prolific male hagiographers of the period, Venantius Fortunatus and Gregory of Tours, the author examines how these writers treated male saints in comparison to female saints, and considers the significant differences.

He then focuses on one of the few biographies written at that time by a female author, Baudonivia's Life of Saint Radegund. Baudonivia's story of a female saint is considered in light of the previous observations on Fortunatus, Gregory, and the prominent trends that characterize the literature's early development.

This study's insights and conclusions offer a more penetrating assessment of the literature than has previously been given by modern scholars debating the relationship between gender, sanctity, and the role played by female saints and writers in the religious life of the early Middle Ages. It will be of great interest to students and scholars of religious, literary, and cultural history of late antiquity and the medieval West.