Saint Ephigenia of Ethiopia

Ephigenia of Ethiopia or Iphigenia of Ethiopia (Spanish: Efigenia; Portuguese: Ifigénia/Ifigênia; French: Iphigénie; Greek: Ἰφιγένεια), also called Iphigenia of Abyssinia, is a Western folk saint whose life is told in the Golden Legend as a virgin converted to Christianity and then consecrated to God by Matthew the Apostle, who was spreading the Gospel to the region of Ethiopia. According to the legend, Ephigenia was the daughter of Aethiopian King Egippus. She was dedicated to God by Saint Matthew the Apostle, who veiled her. Upon succeeding Eggipus, Aethiopia's new king, Hirtacus, promised Matthew the apostle half of his kingdom if he could persuade Ephigenia to marry him. So, Matthew invited the king to mass the following Sunday where he explained that she was already espoused to the eternal king and therefore could not marry him. Enraged, King Hiraticus left the church and later sent a swordsman to kill Matthew who was standing by the church's altar at the time, thereby making Matthew a martyr. Not having managed to bend Ephigenia to his will, Hirtacus tried to destroy her home with fire. However, Matthew appeared in spirit and protected the flames from the house, turning them upon the royal palace. The king's son was seized by the devil and the king himself contracted leprosy, eventually killing himself. After Hiraticus's death, the people chose Ephigenia's brother as their king, who reigned for seventy years, leaving his kingdom to his son who filled Egypt with Christian churches. Saint Ephigenia's feast day in the Roman Catholic Church, along with Saint Matthew's, is on September 21. The oldest textual source of her Life seems to be the Legenda Aurea (Golden Legend, also known as the Historia Longobardica or Flos Sanctorum) of Italian chronicler Jacobus de Voragine, compiled around 1275 AD.