Holy harlots are, by the very paradox their name seems to represent, very malleable figures. They were used as models and invested with meaning by various groups and people in the medieval period, whether by reformists, women, the Church, the laity, or Everyman in general. Almost cipher-like, their multivalence is comparable to the ancient Roman lupa – simultaneously she-wolf, nourishing mother, and whore – a figure whose complexity permitted her to be used by numerous political, social, and religious entities, with various agendas. I have shown the central importance of holy harlots in our understanding of the wider significance of femininity in the medieval period, especially in its intersections with sexuality, holiness, and authority.

For women, this hagiographical model permits a much more inclusive and overarching representation of femininity when compared to the figure of the virgin martyr or that of the holy mother. From Eve to Mary and all iterations of women in between, the harlot saint is so versatile that she provides the blueprint for the lives of two diametrically different mystics: Margery Kempe, a laywoman and a mother, and Christina of Markyate, a virgin and female religious. All of the mystics and saints we have encountered in the previous chapter found the holy harlot, and Mary Magdalene in particular, a worthy model for emulation because she represents their life journey as women in all of its complexity and paradoxes, rather than a static picture of timeless femininity.

More than this, the harlot saint is a model of femininity that is inextricably linked with authority. This may be explained to a certain degree by the fact that she is a public, and influential, woman even before her conversion. Throughout the Middle Ages she leads and “converts” men to sin even before her repentance, so much so that in the later medieval period she does not need to change her behaviour with her repentance, her negative influence pre-conversion simply gathering a positive meaning later on in her life. In this way, unlike a virginal Katherine or Margaret whose enticing sexuality before they become public saints serves only to attract the unwanted attentions of a suitor, Mary of Egypt, Thaïs, or Pelagia already live a life in the public eye as harlots before they become holy and turn their sensuality – we have seen most importantly from the twelfth century onward – into their later sanctity as Brides of Christ.