Her story
Her Life says she was born into a noble Roman family whose father was three times consul, and that she served as a deaconess in one of the churches of Rome, fasting, praying, tending the sick and helping the poor. Under the young emperor Alexander Severus, whose regent Ulpian persecuted Christians, she was arrested and taken to the temple of Apollo to offer sacrifice, and she refused. After she was tortured she was condemned to be beheaded, and her father was put to death with her, because he had raised her to love Christ.
Her feast day
12 January: Her feast in the Catholic Church and in the Orthodox churches on the new calendar. The Russian Church, which keeps it as Students’ Day, and the other churches on the old calendar keep it on 25 January.
The Roman Martyrology, 1916, 12 January; Martyr Tatiana, 12 January, Orthodox Church in America
Why people ask St Tatiana
Students and exams
She is Russia’s patron of students. Moscow University was founded on her feast in 1755, and her day, 25 January, is Russian Students’ Day, near the end of the winter exams.
Where it comes from
Who wrote it
This Russian hymn comes from the service for her feast. No one knows who wrote it or when.
In Church Slavonic
Агнцу Пречистому и Пастырю последуя,агнице словесная Татиано,мысленных зверей не убоялася еси,но знамением крестным вооружившися,до конца тех низложила еси,и вошла еси в Небесную ограду,
идеже помяни и нас, мученице Христова многомудрая.
