(urth) The Maids of Contessa Carina

[Dave Tallman]

In Eschatology and Genesis, the Contessa Carina has three maids. She 
calls on Solange and Kyneburga. Her maid Lybe is present with her. I 
found their saint's legends on the net.

St. Solange: She was abducted by force, but she struggled so violently 
that she fell from his horse while he was crossing a stream. Her 
abductor grew enraged and beheaded her with his sword; Solange's severed 
head invoked three times the Holy Name of Jesus. Solange picked up her 
head in her own hands and walked with it as far as the church of 
Saint-Martin in the village of Saint-Martin-du-Crot.

St Cyneburga: It is said that a prestigious Royal marriage was arranged 
for the young Cyneburga, presumably involving her abandoning her nunnery 
in Gloucester. To avoid leaving the service of God, she fled into hiding 
in the city where she was taken in as the servant of a baker. The baker 
soon wished to adopt her, but his wife was consumed with jealousy and, 
when the baker was out one day, she murdered Cyneburga, chopped off her 
head and threw it into a well near the south gate of the city. When the 
husband returned home and called out to his maidservant, she replied 
from the well!

St Lybe: Virgin martyr of Eutropia, with Eutropia and Leonis. They died 
at Palmyra, Syria. Lybe was beheaded.

St. Carina: One of her companions was beheaded, but she was not. She 
died under torture.

Three maids of the Contessa, all named for beheaded saints. This starts 
to look like a clue. Too much time is spent on the description and 
emotional reactions of the woman on the Bridge of Air for her not to be 
highly significant in Sev's life; i.e. she's his mother, Catherine. 
(There's also the Catherine/Carina name near-match). The maids with 
names of beheaded saints hint at a series of her khabits that 
participated in the elevation ceremony as "Katharine." I think we can 
allow Wolfe enough leeway for trickery to say that Catherine's face was 
"strange" and "unknown" if Sev only saw her khabits.  The Thecla khabit 
in the House Azure was not a perfect double.

After Catherine time-traveled back, got pregnant, and bore Severian, she 
herself might have been kept young using khabit blood in the third level 
of the dungeon until she was finally executed by Allowin's Necklace to 
provide the grave-robbery corpse.  Years in the dungeon and the effects 
of strangulation might render her unrecognizable as the same woman Sev 
saw on the day of the flood.