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Post-2005, scholars zeroed in on the "updated" stanzas, which Merivale had originally suppressed. His original draft contained more graphic detail of Eulalia's nakedness and the gibes of the Roman soldiers. The 2005 revelation allowed modern feminist theologians to argue that the traditional (cleaned-up) version was a 19th-century sanitization of a deliberately shocking early-Christian text. The "real" poem, they suggest, is a critique of voyeuristic suffering.
Alÿs is known for his poetic and allegorical approach to art. This piece explores several profound themes:
Most sources attribute the poem to A.E. Housman (1859–1936), the classical scholar known for A Shropshire Lad. However, a peculiar variant exists: a manuscript titled "Martyr: or, The Death of Saint Eulalia" written in a pseudo-medieval register.
Sample verses (Traditional reading, pre-2005): martyr or the death of saint eulalia 2005 upd
They tore her breasts with iron claws,
They burned her ribs with flaming straws,
She prayed, 'Lord Christ, receive my breath,'
And snow fell down to cover death.
The poem is stark, brutal, and lyrical—a hallmark of Housman's economy of language. But confusion reigned because the poem did not appear in Housman's authorized collections. Some placed it as an undergraduate exercise (c. 1895); others claimed it was a translation from Prudentius by an anonymous Oxford don.
The artwork consists of a miniature scene set inside a glass vitrine (display case). The scene depicts a snowy, windswept street corner. Post-2005, scholars zeroed in on the "updated" stanzas,
No update can ignore the uncomfortable questions that the original hagiography smoothed over with piety. Eulalia was thirteen. Her defiance, so celebrated by Prudentius, is also the defiance of a child before a violent state apparatus. In a post-Freudian, post-#MeToo world, the eroticization of the young female martyr’s body—her bare flesh, her exposed breasts, her “shame” transcended—reads differently. The hooks and torches become not just instruments of persecution but a theater of patriarchal violence that the Church, for centuries, called beautiful suffering.
The 2005 upd must ask: Was Eulalia a martyr in full agency, or a child abused by both the Roman Empire and a religious culture that sanctified her trauma? This is not an anachronistic dismissal of faith; it is a necessary hermeneutic of suspicion. The original narrative required her to be puella (girl) and sapiens (wise) simultaneously—a contradiction that only miracle can resolve. The update, by contrast, allows the fracture to remain. It refuses to heal Eulalia into a seamless icon. Instead, it holds her as a figure of radical ambiguity: a victim who becomes a victor, but only within a system that needed her to suffer.
When discussing "martyr or the death of saint eulalia," one cannot ignore the artist. John William Waterhouse (1849–1917) was a late Pre-Raphaelite painter known for blending classical technique with literary and religious tragedy. They tore her breasts with iron claws, They
The Composition: Unlike traditional paintings of martyrs that show the moment of violence, Waterhouse chose the aftermath. Saint Eulalia lies face down, arms splayed, on a wooden platform. Her body is pale, blending with the falling snow. Above her, Roman guards look down with a mix of curiosity and indifference. A female figure (perhaps Christian) gestures silently.
The "Martyr" vs. "Death" Keyword: Art historians use the terms interchangeably. While the official title is The Death of Saint Eulalia, search engines and museum databases frequently index it under "Martyr or the Death of Saint Eulalia" to distinguish it from other saints' deaths. The painting is currently housed at the Tate Britain, London (N01583).