From Atlas Obscura-
When Jerome, the Catholic priest and scholar, arrived in Rome in
the middle of the fourth century, he discovered a circle of noblewomen
living in elaborate homes on the Aventine Hill who were nothing like
their neighbors.
They’d given up their silk clothes and
pearl earrings, the hairstyles and rouge and musk, even bathing, as
signs of vanity, and were now wearing coarse robes made of goat’s hair.
They stayed almost entirely in their houses, fasting and praying,
discussing Scripture; in secret, they might visit a nearby basilica or martyr’s tomb.
They never allowed themselves to rest on couches or cushions of any
kind, and at night they slept on thin mats on the floor—though they
hardly slept, spending those hours, instead, crying and
praying. Most importantly, these women—some of them widows, some only
recently of marrying age, all converts to Christianity—had each taken a vow of chastity.
Their ringleader was Marcella, a famous
beauty, now a widow, who lived with her mother. No one was sure where
she’d gotten the idea for this improvised monastic network, but when her
husband died only months after her marriage, Marcella embraced a life
that few of her class would ever understand.
More here-
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