The Nicene Age · AD 313–400
Amma Syncletica
d. c. AD 350 · Desert Mother of Alexandria · Teacher of the ascetic life · Alexandria
The Nicene Age
Who Amma Syncletica was
The wellborn Alexandrian who gave away her inheritance at her parents' death and withdrew with her blind sister to a tomb outside the city, where a community of women gathered around her reluctant teaching. The Sayings preserve her voice at length — fire and smoke, the ship and the storm, the treasure that vanishes when displayed — the fullest teaching of any Desert Mother, earned through a last illness she bore, her Life insists, like a martyrdom.
Also listed in women and desert fathers & mothers.
Common questions
When did Amma Syncletica die?
Amma Syncletica is dated d. c. AD 350 in the archive, which places Amma Syncletica in the Nicene Age (AD 313–400). The dating is traditional and approximate; the archive marks it as uncertain rather than fixing a year the sources do not give.
Which early sources mention Amma Syncletica?
Amma Syncletica is named in 2 primary-source passages catalogued here, drawn from The elders of the desert and Pseudo-Athanasius. Every passage is quoted from a named public-domain translation, earliest first.
Where was Amma Syncletica from?
The archive associates Amma Syncletica with Alexandria.
Who were Amma Syncletica’s contemporaries?
The archive links Amma Syncletica to 1 other figure, including Pachomius the Great. Each connection is drawn from a source that places them together, not from inference.
Primary-source mentions (2)
Every passage below is quoted from a named public-domain translation, earliest first.
Sayings of the Desert Fathers (Syncletica 1)
c. AD 400Amma Syncletica said: In the beginning there are struggle and much toil for those who come near to God; but after that, joy unspeakable. For as those who wish to kindle a fire are first choked with smoke and weep, so we too must kindle the divine fire in ourselves with tears and hard labour.The elders of the desert · source text
Life of Syncletica (the Ps.-Athanasian vita built on her sayings)
c. AD 450[A life built out of her sayings: the teaching is hers, the frame around it is the biographer’s.]Pseudo-Athanasius · Life of Syncletica
The Vita Syncleticae, a life of the Alexandrian ascetic assembled around her sayings and transmitted under Athanasius's name, probably fifth-century. Greek: Migne, Patrologia Graeca 28.1487. English translations by Elizabeth Bryson Bongie, The Life and Regimen of the Blessed and Holy Teacher Syncletica (1996), and Elizabeth Castelli in Vincent Wimbush, Ascetic Behavior in Greco-Roman Antiquity (1990); no public-domain English exists.
Connected in the archive
People
Events in this lifetime
- AD 301 · Hripsime and her company, AD 301
- AD 303 · The Great Persecution begins, AD 303
- AD 303 · The search of the church at Cirta, AD 303
- AD 306 · The Council of Elvira, AD 306
- AD 311 · Galerius’ edict of Serdica, AD 311
- AD 313 · The Edict of Milan, AD 313
- AD 314 · The Council of Arles, AD 314
- AD 320 · Silvanus tried before Zenophilus, AD 320
- AD 325 · The Council of Nicaea, AD 325
- AD 339 · The persecution of Shapur II, AD 339
- AD 343 · The Council of Serdica, AD 343
Place
Places served
The one place the sources put Amma Syncletica.