Diaconate of women in early Christianity East, centuriesi to the vAD

Women played a leading role in Early Christianity. Among other kinds of protagonism, the diaconate stands out for its transversal nature and its duration. Women deacons have existed since the beginnings of diaconates, an office that reached its greatest splendor in the fourth and fifth centuries AD. Female-led diaconates would gradually disappear from the sixth century on and would be reduced to a marginal phenomenon by the 12th century. In this article, after a brief introduction to diverse forms of female protagonism, we study the main references to this ministry in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire from the first to the fifth centuries AD, in order to discover its development, functions, and characteristics.