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Anonymous / folk tradition.

Unmarried Women and the Feast of Saint Catherine

Saint Catherine of Alexandria was martyred on November 25. Princess Catherine, so the story goes, had gone to the Roman Emperor Maxentius to plead with him to halt the persecution of Christians. Maxentius tried to change her mind, even offering to marry her, an offer which Catherine declined. She had decided to remain a virgin. Maxentius turned to threats of torture, including the terrible torture of the wheel. But when Catherine touched the torture device, it came apart under her fingers. Instead, she was beheaded.

This story led to Saint Catherine becoming the patroness of unmarried women. In French parts of the world, on November 25, women who were older than 25 but still unmarried often marked the day by wearing a colorful bonnet which indicated that they were unmarried but open to proposals. The Industrial Revolution brought this country tradition into the cities, and hatmakers enthusiastically sold extravagant hats to Catherinettes, as the unmarried women were called. In the past, society took an interest in helping women who wanted to be married find spouses, and special balls were held on the Feast of Saint Catherine where Catherinettes could look for love.

We used AI to generate an image of Catherinettes, but the hats were still not quite as delightfully silly as the real thing, which included the byplane hat above.’

Women often invoked the prayers of Saint Catherine to find a husband.

St Catherine, St Catherine, O lend me thine aid

And grant that I never may die an old maid.

Or the longer prayer:

A husband, St. Catherine

A handsome one, St. Catherine

A rich one, St. Catherine

A nice one, St. Catherine

And soon, St. Catherine

The feast of Saint Catherine is still marked in different ways in some parts of the world today. It was so successful that there was a brief attempt to create a parallel feast for unmarried men on December 6, the Feast of Saint Nicholas, where men would wear an early version of a Santa Claus hat. It turned out that seeing a man in a shapeless Santa hat did not make anyone want to marry him, and the idea was abandoned.