[Featured Lot] Prudentius, Aurelius Clemens. Aurelius Prudentius...Opera [bound with] Victoris Giselini, In Aure...

Description

"A Christian poet, born in the Tarraconensis, Northern Spain, 348; died probably in Spain, after 405...He practiced law with some success, and in later life deplored the zeal he had devoted to his profession. He was twice provincial governor, perhaps in his native country, before the emperor summoned him to court. Towards the end of his life Prudentius renounced the vanities of the world to practice a rigorous asceticism, fasting until evening and abstaining entirely from animal food...The two principal didactic poems are the "Apotheosis", on the dogma of the Trinity, and the "Hamartigenia", on the origin of sin. One is somewhat astonished to find Prudentius attacking ancient heresies, such as those of Sabellius and Marcian, and having nothing to say on Arianism. It is due to the fact that he closely follows and imitates Tertullian, whose rugged genius resembles his own. These poems are interesting examples of passionate, glowing abstractions, precise exposition being combined with poetic fantasy. ..Orthodoxy is his great preoccupation in these poems, and he invokes all kinds of punishments on heresy... The "Psychomachia "is the model of a style destined to be lovingly cultivated in the Middle Ages, i. e., allegorical poetry, of which before Prudentius only the merest traces are found (in such authors as Apuleius, Tertullian, and Claudian)...A genius more powerful than pliant, Prudentius displays a more versatile and richer talent than that of his pagan contemporary, Claudian. The rhetoric he disparages, he himself misuses; he often exaggerates, but is never commonplace. The superior of many pagan poets, among the Christian he is the greatest and the most truly poetic."

Giselinus was a Flemish physician and humanist (1534-1591)," After Latin school at Bruges, he went c.1588 to study classic authors and philosophy at the University of Louvain. In 1561 he left for Paris. On his return to the Netherlands he worked as occasional proof-reader for Plantin..."

This part includes Easmus' commentary on Prudentius' two hymns.