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Summary

The figure of Thecla knew very early success in Egypt as a model for female ascetics and pilgrims. In learned Alexandrian circles, Thecla was also a literary rallying point for rich women who cultivated an intellectual persona. The association of the character with the blurring of gender categories was also made in the same circles and eventually spread to the equivalent circles in Valley cities. One of the most interesting literary texts in that respect is built around characters called Thecla and Paul, but not explicitly the ones from the APT, and adding a third, Egyptian character called Paese, whom it sets up as the central figure. This seventh- or eighth-century text, entitled the Martyrdom of Paese and Thecla, plays on several motifs of the APT, subverting them and reversing roles and characters, but it also borrows motifs of male companionship from the late sixth- and early seventh-century ascetic literature produced in the area between Palestine, Cyprus, and Alexandria.

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Chapter 6 - Shifting the Poetics of Gender Ambiguity

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Chapter 6 - Shifting the Poetics of Gender Ambiguity

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