Sidonius Apollinaris, Selected Letters: 146 Epistulae

Judith Hindermann (University of Basel)

Ed. by Elodie Paillard, University of Sydney
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.1.2: Ancient Roman Writing and Culture (Republic and Empire), -750-476.
Vol. editors: William John Dominik (University of Otago), Giacomo Fedeli (University of Exeter), Victoria Fendel (University of Oxford), Thomas Habinek (University of Southern California), Emily Kneebone (University of Nottingham), Elodie Paillard (University of Sydney), Sophia Papaioannou (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens), Jula Wildberger (American University of Paris)

Dates

First circulation or publication 469 - 483

Places

Ancient Rome (Republic & Empire) (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Non-Fiction
- Letter(s)

Resources

Save to Bookshelf

The collection of letters by the late antique Gaul author and bishop Sidonius Apollinaris (5. Nov. 429/432–486?) closely follows the tradition of ancient epistolography, the art of writing letters. Sidonius refers to his predecessors Quintus Symmachus, Pliny the Younger, Cicero and Fronto in his programmatic letter 1.1.1. Following the ancient epistolary ideal (see Demetr.

Eloc.

231) most of Sidonius’ letters deal with only one topic (see about this rule Sidon.

Ep.

7.18.4). The letters are addressed to numerous addressees of different social rank (see Mathisen 2020) and are arranged in a carefully varied order. The nine books differ in their content.

In the first book (containing 11 letters), which deals with Sidonius’ life before he became bishop in the city of Clermont (situated in

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

1254 words

Citation: Hindermann, Judith. "Selected Letters: 146 Epistulae". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 24 November 2023 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=30112, accessed 31 October 2024.]

Sidonius Apollinaris, Selected Letters: 146 Epistulae

Dates

Places

Genres and Modes

Resources

Save this article

Leave Feedback