Vibia Perpetua belonged to a wealthy family and had not yet been baptized when she was arrested. She was imprisoned with Felicitas, an enslaved woman and her friend. Their different social positions illustrate the capacity of the Christian community to bring together people who occupied sharply unequal places within Roman society.

The two women were tried before the procurator and executed in the amphitheatre at Carthage on 7 March 203. Their deaths may have resulted from a rescript attributed to Septimius Severus that forbade conversion to Judaism or Christianity, although the excerpt presents this connection as uncertain. The account of their martyrdom preserves a local Christian memory of prison, trial, visions, and death.

The visions attributed to Perpetua and Felicitas reflect a strongly apocalyptic form of Christian instruction. The Book of Daniel, the Similitudes of Enoch, the Book of Revelation, the works of Hermas, and perhaps the Apocalypse of Peter appear to have contributed to the confessor’s religious imagination. Baptism opened the way to suffering in the flesh, while contempt for pagan society and defiance of Roman authorities framed martyrdom as the highest expression of Christian fidelity.