HELENA, helle-na, SAINT: 1. The most famous of the saints of the church bearing the name of Helena was the mother of Constantine the Great (q.v.). Little is known of her life, although it is certain that her importance in the career of her son was less than is generally supposed. There is no doubt that she was of humble birth, and the legend which makes her a British princess is late. Her only child, Constantine, seems to have been born at Naissus in Upper Moesia in 274, while she herself probably came from Drepanum, later called Hele nopolis, on the Gulf of Nicomedia. According to Ambrose, she was a female tavern-keeper, and it is not certain whether her marriage with Conatantius was at first legal. Her husband divorced her in 292 to marry Theodora, the stepdaughter of Maximus Herculius, for reasons of state, and Helena then retired to obscurity, although her son, after his accession, recalled her to court and heaped honors upon her. Late in life, after the defeat of Licinius in 324, she visited Palestine, founded churches in various cities, and dispensed much charity, but the date of her conversion to Christianity is unknown. She was still living when Crispus was murdered in 326, and overwhelmed her son with reproaches for the assassination of her grandson. Nevertheless, Constantine had coins struck in her honor. The place and date of her death are uncertain, but she must have died between 326 and 328 or 329. Her body was brought to Constantinople by her son, although the church of Aracceli in Rome, the city of Venice, and the monastery of Hautvilliers near Reims have all claimed to be her final resting-place. The best-known legend connected with her is the invention of the Holy Cross (see Cross, Invention of the), a tradition told neither by Eusebius nor by Cyril of Jerusalem, but first by Rufinus, on whom Socrates, Sozomen, and others based their accounts. The foundation of the legend is Josephus' story of the Jewish convert Helena, queen of Adia bene (Ant. XX., ii., iv. 3), and this tradition was

first transferred to the mother of Constantine in the latter part of the fourth century. Her day is Aug. 14. See Constantine the Great and His Sons, I., § 2.

2. A second St. Helena is the Russian Grandprincess Olga, the widow of Igor, who was baptized at Constantinople 955, when she assumed the name of Helena. Her day in the Julian calendar is July 11.

3. A third saint of this name is Helena of Sklifde, in Sweden, where she was murdered by her noble kinsmen of West Gothland about 1160, after her return to Sweden from a pilgrimage. She was canonized by Alexander III. in 1164, and her remains are interred on the island of Seeland. Her cult is restricted to the Scandinavian countries, and her day is July 31.

(Adolf Harnack.)

Bibliography: 1. Sources are: Eusebius, Life of ConStantine, iii. 41-47; Socrates, Hist. eccl., i. 17-18; Sozomen, Hist. eccl., ii. 1-2; Rufinus, Hist. eccl., x. 7-8; Theodoret, Hist. eccl., i. 18. The Vita by the cenobite Altmannus (d. 882), with comment, is in ASB, Aug., iii. 548-599. Consult: DeMas Letrie, Hist. de L'ile de Chypre, Paris, 1852-61 (for traditions as to place of her death); Abbé Lueot, S. Hellne, . . . sa vie, eon culte en Champagne, son suaire d Chdlona, son corps d Paris, Paris, 1877; S. Beissel, in Geschichte der Trierer Kirchen, i. 82-90, 123, 124-131, Trier, 1887; H. V. Sauerland, Trierer Geschichtsquellen, pp. 61-79, 140 sqq., 144-172, ib. 1889; Ceillier, Auteurs sacrés, iii. 118-119, 143, 579-580, vii. 482-483, viii. 71-72, 114-115, 516, x. 44, xii. 697, xiii. 524-525; Gibbon, Decline and Fall, i. 397 sqy., ii. 211, 290, 455; Neander, Christian Church, ii. 7, 31, 377; DCB, ii. 881-885; KL, v. 1735-39.

2. E. Castremont, Hist. de l'introduction du christianisme our Is continent russe et la vie de S. Olga, Paris, 1879; KL, v. 1741.

S. ASB, July, vii. 329-333; KL, v. 1739-41.