Situated in a period that witnessed the genesis of institutions that have lasted to this day, this path-breaking study looks at how ancient Christian women, particularly in Asia Minor and Egypt, initiated ascetic ways of living, and how these practices were then institutionalized. Susanna Elm demonstrates that--in direct contrast to later conceptions--asceticism began primarly as an urban movement, in which women were significant protagonists. In the process, they completely transformed and expanded their roles as wife, mother, or widow: as Christian ascetics, they became virgin wives',virgin mothers', and virgin widows' - with all the legal and economic implications of such a dramatic shift. As importantly, though, Christian men and women ascetics lived together. Asvirgins of God' they created new families in Christ'. No longer determined by their human bonds or human sexuality, they wereneither male nor female'. Finally, the book demonstrates how asceticbishops - today known as saints - eventually reformed' these early models of communal, ascetic life by dividing thevirgins of God' into monks and nuns and thus laid the foundation for the monasticism we know today.