The empress and the Virgin in early Byzantium: piety, authority and devotion

It has been said that empresses from Pulcheria and Eudokia to Sophia displayed a ‘persistent devotion’ to the cult of the Virgin.1 How true was this? Did the cult of the Virgin have a special adherence among empresses? Did a special bond between the Virgin and the empress exist? Such questions are both relevant to the issue of female devotion and authority and perhaps contribute, albeit obliquely, to the debate about the relationship between women and icons.