Paula was a Roman patrician of the noblest blood — descended from Aemilianus and the Scipios — married to the noble Toxotius, with five children including Sts. Blesilla and Eustochium. Widowed at thirty-two, she devoted herself to charity and ascetic life.
Under the spiritual direction of St. Jerome (who arrived in Rome in 382), she became one of the principal patrons of his biblical translation project. When Jerome left Rome in 385 amid scandal over the rigor he asked of Roman noblewomen, Paula and her daughter Eustochium followed him to Bethlehem.
They founded two monasteries — one for men under Jerome's direction, one for women under Paula's — adjoining the Cave of the Nativity. Paula governed the women's monastery for the next twenty years, financing Jerome's translation of the Bible (the Vulgate), pilgrim hospices for visitors, and the burial of poor pilgrims. She died at fifty-six in Bethlehem in 404; Jerome wrote her epitaph and the long letter to Eustochium (Epistle 108) that is the principal source for her life. She is buried at the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem.