Sedulius (sometimes with the nomen Coelius or Caelius, both of doubtful authenticity) was a Christian poet during the first half of the 5th century.

Biography

Little is known about his life. The only trustworthy information, contained in his two letters to Macedonius, recounts that he devoted his early life, perhaps as a teacher of

rhetoric Rhetoric is the art of persuasion. It is one of the three ancient arts of discourse ( trivium) along with grammar and logic/ dialectic. As an academic discipline within the humanities, rhetoric aims to study the techniques that speakers or w ...

, to secular literature. Late in life he converted to

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...

, or, if a Christian before, began to take his faith more seriously. One medieval commentary states that he resided in Italy.

Isidore of Seville Isidore of Seville (; 4 April 636) was a Spania, Hispano-Roman scholar, theologian and Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seville, archbishop of Seville. He is widely regarded, in the words of the 19th-century historian Charles Forbes René de Montal ...

( 560 – 636) and the

Gelasian decree The Gelasian Decree () is a Latin text traditionally thought to be a decretal of the prolific Pope Gelasius I (492-496). The work reached its final form in a five-chapter text written by an anonymous scholar between 519 and 553. The second chapt ...

refer to him as a

presbyter Presbyter () is an honorific title for Christian clergy. The word derives from the Greek ''presbyteros'', which means elder or senior, although many in Christian antiquity understood ''presbyteros'' to refer to the bishop functioning as overseer ...

Works

His fame rests mainly upon a long poem, ''Carmen paschale'', based on the four

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christianity, Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the second century Anno domino, AD the term (, from which the English word originated as a calque) came to be used also for the books in which the message w ...

s. In style a bombastic imitator of

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; 15 October 70 BC21 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Rome, ancient Roman poet of the Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Augustan period. He composed three of the most fa ...

, he shows, nevertheless, a certain freedom in the handling of the Biblical story, and the poem soon became a quarry for the minor poets. His description of the

Four Evangelists In Christian tradition, the Four Evangelists are Matthew the Apostle, Matthew, Mark the Evangelist, Mark, Luke the Evangelist, Luke, and John the Evangelist, John, the authors attributed with the creation of the four canonical Gospel accounts ...

in ''Carmen Paschale'' became well-known; the English translation below is from . His other writings include an Abecedarian hymn in honour of Christ, '' A solis ortus cardine'', consisting of twenty-three

quatrain A quatrain is a type of stanza, or a complete poem, consisting of four Line (poetry), lines. Existing in a variety of forms, the quatrain appears in poems from the poetic traditions of various ancient civilizations including Persia, Ancient India ...

s of iambic dimeters. This poem has partly passed into the

Roman Rite The Roman Rite () is the most common ritual family for performing the ecclesiastical services of the Latin Church, the largest of the ''sui iuris'' particular churches that comprise the Catholic Church. The Roman Rite governs Rite (Christianity) ...

liturgy Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, remembra ...

, the first seven quatrains forming the

Christmas carol A Christmas carol is a Carol (music), carol on the theme of Christmas, traditionally sung at Christmas itself or during the surrounding Christmas and holiday season. The term noel has sometimes been used, especially for carols of French or ...

"A solis ortus cardine",This incipit was borrowed for the

Carolingian The Carolingian dynasty ( ; known variously as the Carlovingians, Carolingus, Carolings, Karolinger or Karlings) was a Frankish noble family named after Charles Martel and his grandson Charlemagne, descendants of the Arnulfing and Pippinid c ...

'' Planctus de obitu Karoli''; see Peter Godman (1985), ''Latin Poetry of the Carolingian Renaissance'' (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press), 206–211. which has been translated into

vernacular Vernacular is the ordinary, informal, spoken language, spoken form of language, particularly when perceptual dialectology, perceived as having lower social status or less Prestige (sociolinguistics), prestige than standard language, which is mor ...

languages by, among many others,

Martin Luther Martin Luther ( ; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, Theology, theologian, author, hymnwriter, professor, and former Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. Luther was the seminal figure of the Reformation, Pr ...

and Allan MacDonald. The Epiphany hymn, "Hostis Herodes impie"and "Veteris et novi Testamenti collatio" in

elegiac couplet The elegiac couplet or elegiac distich is a poetic form used by Greek lyric poets for a variety of themes usually of smaller scale than the epic. Roman poets, particularly Catullus, Propertius, Tibullus, and Ovid, adopted the same form in L ...

s have also come down.

Editions

* Faustino Arévalo (Rome, 1794), reprinted in

Jacques Paul Migne Jacques Paul Migne (; 25 October 1800 – 24 October 1875) was a French priest who published inexpensive and widely distributed editions of theological works, encyclopedias, and the texts of the Church Fathers, with the goal of providing a u ...

's ''

Patrologia Latina The ''Patrologia Latina'' (Latin for ''The Latin Patrology'') is an enormous collection of the writings of the Church Fathers and other ecclesiastical writers published by Jacques Paul Migne between 1841 and 1855, with indices published betwe ...

'' vol. xix. * Johann Huemer (Vienna, 1885). *Victoria Panagl (Bearb.), Sedulius, ''Opera Omnia, Ex Recensione Iohannis Huemer'' (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, 10), Wien, 2007, XLVII, 532 S. *

References

Sources

* This work in turn cites: **Johann Huemer, ''De Sedulii poetae vita et scriptis commentatio'' (Vienna, 1878) ** Max Manitius, ''Geschichte der christlich-lateinischen Poesie'' (Stuttgart, 1891) **Teuffel-Schwabe, ''History of Roman Literature'' (Eng. trans.), 473 **Herzog-Hauck, ''Realencyklopädie für protestantische Theologie'', xviii. (Leipzig, 1906) **Smith and Wace, ''Dictionary of Christian Biography'' (1887)

External links