Soteris of Rome

Ambrose, who calls her "the forebear of your race" writing to his sister Marcellina, gives her as the ancestor of his own house: a virgin of high Roman nobility who esteemed her family's honours far less than the faith and refused an advantageous marriage to consecrate herself to Christ. Arrested during the persecution, she was first struck across the face, a punishment reserved for slaves and calculated to humiliate a patrician woman. Ambrose writes that she did not turn her head, uttered neither groan nor tear, and gave her very face to the executioner until she found the sword she desired.