Send message to Author

Paper short abstract

This paper traces the burning woman across biblical, classical, Norse, and early modern texts. While men survive fire sanctified, women are consumed—yet their ashes nourish memory. From Eve to witches, pyres to hearthfires, these flames form an ecofeminist mythology of trauma, renewal, and survival.

Paper long abstract

This paper traces the persistent motif of the “burning woman” across biblical, classical, Old Norse, and early modern traditions, reframing flames not only as instruments of patriarchal punishment but also as sources of feminist regeneration. While male figures in scripture and epic emerge from fire sanctified—Aeneas from Troy, Daniel’s companions from the furnace—female figures are consumed. Yet their ashes feed cultural memory, becoming fertile ground for reimagined narratives.

Beginning with Eve and Pandora, I examine how women cast as originators of suffering are bound by fire: the flaming sword at Eden’s gate, the divine punishment inherent in Pandora’s jar. In Old Norse heroic literature, Guðrún’s silence gives way to incendiary agency, her hall-burning vengeance mirroring wildfire’s dual devastation and renewal. Classical queens such as Dido and Brynhild claim their pyres, transforming betrayal into spectacle, flames that annihilate yet immortalize. By contrast, the witch trials of early modern Europe mark the transition to forced flames, where women were executed for their ecological knowledges—midwifery, herb-lore, weather-working—perceived as dangerous “natural magics.”

Finally, I turn to the hearthfire as counterpoint: the quiet, sustaining flame that preserved community and continuity, tended most often by women. Where the pyre consumes, the hearth nourishes. Together, these narratives invite us to reconsider fire as both trauma and transformation. Burning women are not extinguished victims but embers—soil for future growth, flames that continue to shape identity, resistance, and renewal.