"Tragédie sacrée d’Holoferne et Judith" de Pierre Heyns (1596) : un miroir éclaté

The Old Testament Judith is one of the most important and, at the same time, the most controversial heroines of Christian didactic literature. Pierre Heyns, schoolmaster of a Calvinist school for young ladies in Antwerp, made her a heroine of one of his school theatre plays. According to the intention declared by the author in the Foreword to the "Tragédie sacrée d’Holopherne et Judith", it is supposed to be a “mirror” showing the widows the perfection of good behaviour and stigmatizing the dissolute and dishonorable life. The aim of the article is, firstly, to examine to what extent the construction of the drama’s negative heroines meets the didactic goal announced in the preface; secondly, to check whether the figure of Judith as a Biblical "virago" can be enclosed in the mirror and morality trope adopted by the author.