Gender Violence in Late Antiquity confronts the violent ideological frameworks underpinning the early Christian imagination, arguing that gender-based violence is not peripheral but is fundamental to understanding early Christian history. By analyzing hagiographical and doctrinal writings, Jennifer Barry reveals how male authors used portrayals of feminized suffering to shape ideals of sanctity and power, exploiting themes of domestic abuse, martyrdom, and sexualized violence to reinforce their visions of piety. The study first traces the roots of gendered violence within the Greco-Roman and early Christian imagination, and then explores the disturbing role of male fantasies and dreams in hagiographical traditions. Barry draws on womanist scholarship and engages with trauma studies and feminist horror theory in order to challenge traditional readings of Christian texts, offering new perspectives for understanding how narratives of violence continue to shape contemporary interpretations of gender and power.
Jennifer Barry is Associate Professor of Religious at the University of Mary Washington. She is author of Bishops in Flight: Exile and Displacement in Late Antiquity and an expert on late ancient studies, early Christianity, later Roman antiquity, and gender studies.
"Jennifer Barry masterfully exposes how early Christian hagiography constructed and perpetuated gendered violence through depictions of dreams and fantasies. Blending feminist, slavery, and horror theories, she reveals the androcentric imagination’s reliance on women’s violated bodies while unsettling contemporary discourses on power and subjectivity. This incisive analysis redefines how we read late antique violence—and its haunting modern echoes."—Chris L. de Wet, Professor of New Testament and Early Christian Studies at University of Pretoria
242 pp.6 x 9
9780520423510$95.00|£80.00Hardcover
Sep 2025