Le culte de sainte Agathe entre Catane et Constantinople

Abstract

This paper aims to examine some aspects of the history of the official cult of Saint Agatha in Sicily and Constantinople, starting with the Greco-Roman cults of Isis, and then focusing in particular on the unofficial or the initiatory women's festival, celebrated in Constantinople, attested by only one literary source from the 11th century AD. This source, consisting of a short philosophical treatise ascribed to Michael Psellos, informs us about some interesting aspects of the religious and social life of women in Constantinople in the mid-Byzantine era.