The prize was a green branch of golden apples

CARTHAGE, Roman Africa, 203 AD — The night before she was to die in the amphitheatre, Saint Perpetua saw a fight in a vision. She threw a man, put her foot on his head, and was handed a green branch hung with golden apples. She wrote it out in her own hand, in her cell, the day before she was to fight for real.

Twenty-two, with a baby, and sentenced to die

St. Perpetua was twenty-two, and married. When she was arrested this year she was still feeding her baby son.

She was taken with four other people. One of them, St. Felicity, was a slave. None of the five had been baptised yet. They were catechumens — people being taught before baptism.

The one thing the judge wanted

Last year the Emperor Septimius Severus made an order: nobody was allowed to become a Jew or a Christian. It fell hardest on people at exactly their stage, on their way into the Church. Their case went to Hilarianus, who had just taken the power of life and death at Carthage.

He wanted one thing from St. Perpetua: a sacrifice for the well-being of the emperors. That meant burning incense in front of a statue of the Emperor, and the law required it. She refused, and said she was a Christian. So Hilarianus sentenced them to the beasts.

A knock at the prison gate

They were shut in a dungeon first, and the dark frightened her. Two deacons, Tertius and Pomponius, paid the jailer. The prisoners were let out for a few hours a day into a better part of the building. Her mother carried the baby in to her. Once she had permission to keep him, she wrote that the prison had suddenly become a palace. Then the prisoners were moved to the camp prison.

That was how things stood the night she slept. In the vision Pomponius the deacon came to the gate of the prison and knocked hard. She went out and opened the gate for him. He said to her: “Perpetua, we are waiting for you; come!” He took her hand, and they went “through rough and winding places”. They arrived at the amphitheatre out of breath. He walked her into the middle of the arena, told her, “Do not fear, I am here with you, and I am labouring with you,” and left her there.

No beasts came out

She was looking at the huge crowd when she noticed it. She had been given to the wild beasts — and no wild beasts were let loose on her. An Egyptian came out to fight her instead.

Young men came to her side as her helpers. They rubbed her with oil, the way fighters were got ready for a contest. The Egyptian rolled in the dust.

Then the man in charge of the fight walked out. He stood higher than the top of the amphitheatre. He carried a rod and “a green branch upon which were apples of gold.” He said what each of them stood to get: “This Egyptian, if he should overcome this woman, shall kill her with the sword; and if she shall conquer him, she shall receive this branch.”

They came together and began hitting each other. The Egyptian tried to grab her feet, and St. Perpetua struck at his face with her heels. Then the fight stopped going anywhere. She twined her fingers together and took hold of his head. The Egyptian fell on his face, and St. Perpetua trod on his head.

She went to the man with the branch and took it. He kissed her and said: “Daughter, peace be with you.” Then she walked out by the gate a victor left by.

She woke up in the camp prison, with the games still in front of her. She wrote the last thing in her account: “Then I awoke, and perceived that I was not to fight with beasts, but against the devil. Still I knew that the victory was awaiting me.”

She stopped there. About what happened at the games, she wrote, “let who will write.” A Christian who was there for the games did the finishing. After their deaths he added the account of the arena, and the completed record was read out in the churches of Africa.