Mary Hitchman

Research Topic

The Reception and Transmission of Texts by Late Antique Women, c.200-400

My doctoral research examines how texts by Christian women in the Latin-speaking west were received by commentators and communities, both in the immediate context and in the centuries that followed. My thesis includes writings by women such as Perpetua, Proba, and Egeria, and therefore covers a range of literary genres. I am considering questions of authorial ambiguity and attribution, the extent to which women were recognised as authors in late antiquity and the early middle ages, and the transmission of their writings within medieval manuscripts. More broadly I am interested in the concept of the Christian (usually male) author, the development of female asceticism, and late antique pilgrimage. 

Supervisor: Dr Conrad Leyser

Recent Papers

'Ventriloquism and contested authorship: the letter of Paula and Eustochium to Marcella (Jerome, Ep. 46)', at the Late Roman Seminar at Corpus Christi College, Oxford (17th November 2022)

'St Perpetua and St Felicitas: the transformation of motherhood', at Leeds International Medieval Congress (7th July 2022)

Teaching

I teach late antique and early medieval topics at undergraduate level, and I have taught at St John's College and St Edmund Hall. I was the Researcher in Residence at Bartholomew School (2021-22) and the Waynflete Academic in History at Magdalen College School (2020-22). I am currently a Graduate Outreach Tutor in the History Faculty.