In three letters addressed to her younger cousin Costanza d’Avalos Piccolomini, Vittoria Colonna paints a surprisingly authoritative picture of the Virgin Mary. The letters were collected and published in Venice in 1544 with the title Litere della divina Vetoria Colonna Marchesana di Pescara a la Duchessa de Amalfi sopra la vita contemplativa di santa Caterina e sopra de la activa di santa Madalena. What the title suggests is that the letters focus on two saints who were of special importance for Colonna. Catherine of Alexandria and Mary Magdalene represented two forms of spiritual life, the vita contemplativa and the vita activa, which were widely celebrated in Christian tradition and were the objects of a renewed interest in the Italian Renaissance. Despite not appearing in the title, however, the true protagonist of the volume is the Virgin Mary, who in many ways epitomized the fusion of the contemplative and the active life, an ideal for which Colonna herself so eagerly strove. As we can read in the third letter, while Catherine and Magdalene represent two different approaches to the ‘true sun’ (vero sole) whose rays adorn and embellish them both, the Virgin is chosen over all other women. She is the glorious queen of Paradise and the woman who gave birth to the sun. Therefore, it is Mary, ‘our most singular patron’ (singularissima patrona), as Colonna calls her in the first letter, whom she encourages Costanza d’Avalos to imitate.