25 November - Catherine is said to have been born in 294 to a noble family in Alexandria, Egypt, and to have died there in 307. She quickly acquires knowledge that places her among the greatest poets and philosophers of the time.

One night, she saw Christ in a dream, and since then she decided to devote herself to Him, believing herself to be his fiancée. One day, she saw a Christian apostasy session organised by the Emperor Maximin. After an interview, in which Catherine tried to convince the emperor of the existence of the unique god of Christians, the emperor, realizing that he could not find a parade for Catherine's wisdom, summoned an assembly of fifty grammarian and rhetorical doctrines. Then she succeeded in silencing the speakers by the pertinence of her argument, and in converting them. The emperor immediately had them burned in the middle of the city. He seduced Catherine and offered her a place in his palace, second only to the queen. A prefect then advised a fierce torment for the virgin, so that the example of this death would frighten the other Christians: four wheels surrounded by iron saws and nails would tear her and crush her body. Then the virgin prayed to the Lord to destroy this machine. And behold, an angel of the Lord struck and broke this millstone. The emperor condemned her to be beheaded

A few centuries later, monks from a monastery built at the foot of Mount Sinai miraculously discovered on the top of a nearby mountain the intact body of a beautiful young woman who is known to be that of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, laid there by angels. It was on the occasion of the Crusades that her legend spread throughout the West, creating the motif of great devotion that inspired many artists. These represent the saint with a tricolour halo: white for virginity, green for knowledge and red for martyrdom. The wheel of her torment is often depicted next to her. Saint Catherine is the patron saint of orators, philosophers, babysitters...