Born: 327 CE (circa), Turkey
Died: 19 July 379
Country most active: Turkey
Also known as: Μακρίνα, Makrina
This biography was originally published in the World History Encyclopedia and was written by Joshua J. Mark. It is shared in line with the Encyclopedia’s policies under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Macrina the Younger (l. c. 330-379) was a Christian ascetic whose devotion to God inspired the work and life of her far more famous younger brothers, Saint Basil the Great (l. c. 329-379) and Saint Gregory of Nyssa (l. c. 335 to c. 395). Macrina, like many of the others on this list, was born to wealthy parents in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) and arranged to marry well. When her fiancé died, she refused to marry anyone else and chose a life of chastity and prayer, claiming (as many other mystics did) that Christ was her bridegroom and she needed no other. Macrina practiced a rigid asceticism and devoted herself to the education of others, especially her younger brothers. After her father’s death, she and her mother moved to an estate on the River Iris in Pontus where she established a Christian community devoted to perfecting their relationship with God and was frequently consulted by pilgrims who came to seek her counsel.