Krystyna z Markyate – wprowadzenie do Żywotu

This article presents information about Christina, saint, eremite and subsequent superior in Markyate, who lived in England in the 12th century. The study aims to elucidate the person of the saint, so little known in Poland. In order to encourage reading of the “Life,” the author, apart from sketching the saint’s biography, discusses the role of women during the Middle Ages as well as refers to an extraordinary friendship between Christina and an abbot from one of the most influential monasteries of the twelfth-century England - Geoffrey of Gorham – who was a cause of damnatio memoriae after his death.