Matrona

This is a marble statue of Matrone, a saint of the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church. She was recognized as a saint pre-congregation. She lived in the third or fourth century. She was a young girl and a slave to the Jewish woman Pautila (or Pantilla), wife of one of the military commanders (some sources say governor) of Thessalonica. According to legend, she believed in Christ from her youth and Pautila constantly tried to convert her to Judaism. There are two stories of her martyrdom in one she was killed in Rome for taking time to ministering to Christians, in the other she was so severely beaten when she refused to enter a synagogue with her mistress that she subsequently died of her wounds.