Her name means Daughter of Light. Philomena is associated with infants, babies, and youth.

She was thought to be an early martyr and saint and when her tomb was discovered in the early 1800s many people revered her. However she was never canonized due to lack of evidence.

There was a nun who claimed Philomena's story, here:Saint Philomena told her (the nun) she was the daughter of a king in Greece who, with his wife, had converted to Christianity. At the age of about 13 she took a vow of consecrated virginity. When the Emperor Diocletian threatened to make war on her father, her father went with his family to Rome to ask for peace. The Emperor "fell in love" with the young St. Philomena and, when she refused to be his wife, subjected her to a series of torments: scourging, from whose effects two angels cured her; drowning with an anchor attached to her (two angels cut the rope and raised her to the river bank); being shot with arrows, (on the first occasion her wounds were healed; on the second, the arrows turned aside; and on the third, they returned and killed six of the archers, after which, several of the others became Christians). Finally the Emperor had her decapitated. The two anchors, three arrows, the palm and the ivy leaf on the tiles found in the tomb were interpreted as symbols of her martyrdom.[6]I think there was a eponymous movie or book of which I know little.

Philomena is also the name of 2013 movie starring Judi Dench  that is the story of a woman's search for her son, who was taken away from her decades ago after she became pregnant and was forced to live in a convent. That sounds similar to the lost and hidden children themes we've had on the BL.

Tatiana - Interesting that St. Philomena's story includes drowning and decapitation - two things that have appeared throughout the Blacklist and also this season. I've been thinking about drownings lately. Liz has saved two people from drowning, Kirk and Dr. Justin Sperry. We've also had the judge drowning in The Forecaster and Odette supposedly drowning. It's a repeated theme that must be building up to something even larger at the end of Season 4.

lara1 wrote:

Thanks Tatiana, that is interesting.  I wonder if she will be a bona fide blacklister, and if so, what she will be like.

She's #61 so yes, she's a bona fide Blacklister (unless this is a red herring, but I think not)

I just have to say - another female blacklister - that bolsters my argument that the next big bad will be a female.

There was Madeline Pratt too. But, yes, before this season female blacklisters have been far and few between.

Lyndhurst. That's the correct spelling.

Yeti - Welcome! Thanks for giving us the breakdown of female Blacklisters! That's an astute observation that the Blacklisters at the end of each season have been Russians. I've been hoping all the female Blacklisters were foreshadowing Katarina.

The earlier Greek version of Philomena was Philomela, and that version has sisters, birds, and a severed head - all motifs that have been used this season. I've got to give credit for this info to roominthecastle on tumblr. My own interpretation is written below, highlighting the parts that mirror what we've seen this season.

In the myth, Philomela was the daughter of the king of Athens, and her older sister, Procne, had married Tereus, the king of Thrace. Tereus comes to get Philomela to take her to visit her sister, but on the trip becomes overcome by lust and rapes her. Then he cuts out her tongue, so she couldn't tell what happened and imprisons her in a cabin in the woods. But Philomela weaves a tapestry that shows what happened and sends it to her sister. The sister is enraged and kills her son by Tereus and feeds part of his body to her husband. When Tereus finds the severed head of this son, he goes after the sister with an ax, meaning to behead them. The sisters pray to Gods to turn them into birds to escape. Procne is turned into a nightingale and Philomela into a swallow. Later, Tereus is turned into a colorful bird called a hoopoe.

I posted this in the wrong place this morning. So if you've seen it before, that's why. I moved it under the right episode.

I'm looking foward to this one!
 

Last edited by Tuxie400 (3/16/2017 8:44 pm)

You know, I think I may change the emoticon set for the board. There's another set that has twice as many as the one we are using and I am starting to think we need a wider range of expressions! LOL!

lara1, I didn't see the blue bold earlier, but I see it now. Well, that would certainly make sense and be a good reason for bringing up Kate's sister at all. I figure she's going to be involved somehow. The interesting thing is why would Red suddenly need to find out where she is if he doesn't suspect Kate is still alive. Because I think he engineered the theft of that WP list just to find her. I think the reason he gave was just a cover.