Venantius Fortunatus

Venantius Fortunatus

Infobox Saint
name= Saint Venantius Fortunatus
birth_date= c. 530 AD
death_date= c. 600 or 609 AD
feast_day= December 14
venerated_in= Roman Catholic Church


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birth_place= Veneto, Italy
death_place= Poitiers, France
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Saint Venantius Fortunatus or Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus (c. 530-c. 600/609) was a Latin poet and hymnodist, and a Bishop of the Roman Catholic Church.

Life

Venantius Fortunatus was born in northern Italy somewhere between Valdobbiadene, Ceneda, and Treviso. He grew up during the Byzantine reconquest of Italy and was educated at Ravenna. His later work shows familiarity not only with classical poets such as Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Statius, and Martial, but also with Christian poets, including Arator, Claudian, and Sedulius.

Fortunatus eventually migrated through Germany to Gaul in the mid-560s, probably with the specific intention of becoming a poet in the Merovingian court. After political circumstances impeded his court career, Fortunatus received patronage from various religious figures, including St Gregory of Tours. He became bishop of Poitiers sometime before the year 600.

Works

He is best known for two poems that have become part of the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church, the "Pange Lingua Gloriosi Proelium Certaminis" ("Sing, O tongue, of the glorious struggle"), a hymn that later inspired St Thomas Aquinas's "Pange Lingua Gloriosi Corporis Mysterium". He also wrote "Vexilla Regis prodeunt" ("The banners of the King are lifted"), which is a sequence sung at Vespers during Holy Week. This poem was written in honour of a large piece of the True Cross that had been sent from the Byzantine Emperor Justin II to Queen Radegunde of the Franks, who after her husband Chlotar I's death had founded a monastery in Aquitaine. The Municipal Library in Poitiers houses an eleventh century manuscript on the life of Radegunde, copied from a sixth century account by Fortunatus.

All in all, Venantius Fortunatus wrote eleven surviving books of poetry in Latin in a diverse group of genres including epitaphs, panegyrics, georgics, consolations, and religious poems. His verse is important in the development of later Latin literature, largely because he wrote at a time when Latin prosody was moving away from the quantitative verse of classical Latin towards the accentual meters of medieval Latin. His style sometimes suggests the influence of Hiberno-Latin, in learned Greek coinages that occasionally appear in his poems. He also wrote a verse hagiography of St Martin of Tours and a hagiographic life of his patron Queen Radegunde.

Feast Day

Fortunatus is a saint of the Roman Catholic Church, commemorated on December 14, primarily in the diocese of Poitiers and certain churches of the Veneto.

Further reading

* Brennan, B. “The career of Venantius Fortunatus” Traditio, Vol 41 (1985), 49-78.
* George, J. "Venantius Fortunatus: Personal and Political Poems". Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1995.
* George, J. "Venantius Fortunatus: A Latin Poet in Merovingian Gaul." Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992.
* Reydellet, M. "Venance Fortunat, Poèmes", 3 vols., Collection Budé, 1994-2004.

External links

*http://www.catholicforum.com/saints/saintv40.htm
* [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06149a.htm "Catholic Encyclopedia": St. Venantius Fortunatus]
* [http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/venantius.html Poems] at The Latin Library (Latin)
* [http://www.orbilat.com/Latin/Texts/06_Medieval_period/Poetry-Religious/Venantius_Fortunatus-Pange_lingua.html "Pange, Lingua, gloriosi proelium certaminis"] (Latin)


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • Venantius Fortunatus — Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus (* um 540 in Valdobbiadene bei Treviso, Italien; † zwischen 600 und 610 in Poitiers, Frankreich) war ein Dichter und Hagiograph der Merowingerzeit und Bischof von Poitiers. Inhaltsverzeichnis 1 Leben 2… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Venantius Fortunatus — Venantius Fortunatus, s. Fortunatus …   Herders Conversations-Lexikon

  • Venantius Fortunatus — Venantius Fortunatus, christlicher Dichter, geb. um 530 bei Treviso, gest. bald nach 600 in Poiliers, wo er nach längerm Wanderleben Priester und gegen 600 Bischof wurde, schrieb außer prosaischen Heiligenleben ein Epos auf den heil. Martin, elf… …   Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon

  • Venantius Fortunatus — Venantĭus Fortunātus, lat. Dichter, geb. um 530 n.Chr. zu Duplavilis bei Treviso, gest. 609 als Bischof von Poitiers; schrieb zahlreiche weltliche und geistl. Gedichte, hg. von Leo (1881), und Schriften in Prosa, hg. von Krusch (1885). – Vgl. W.… …   Kleines Konversations-Lexikon

  • VENANTIUS Fortunatus — dictus quoque Clementianus Honorius, Episcopus Pictaviensis, gente Italus, Ravennae studiis incubuit, inde Turones delatus Gregorio Episcopo innotuit, postea Praesul factus est. Scripsit Poema libb. 4. de vita S. Martini: Item alia, cum vitis… …   Hofmann J. Lexicon universale

  • Venantius Fortunatus — Venạntius Fortunatus   [v ], eigentlich Venạntius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus, lateinischer Dichter der Merowingerzeit, * bei Tarvisium (heute Treviso) um 535, ✝ bald nach 600; Bischof von Poitiers, verbrachte den Hauptteil seines Lebens… …   Universal-Lexikon

  • Venantius Fortunatus — Venance Fortunat Venance Fortunat lisant ses poèmes à Radegonde, Lawrence Alma Tadema (1862). Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunat ou saint Venance Fortunat, né vers 530 à Valdobbiadene près de Trévise, mort en 609 à Poitiers …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Pange lingua (Venantius Fortunatus) — Das Pange lingua (deutsch: Besinge, Zunge) des Venantius Fortunatus ist ein lateinischer Hymnus; er trägt den Titel In Honore sanctae Crucis (zu Ehren des heiligen Kreuzes). Bei Kreuzfesten und während der Karwoche ist er Bestandteil des… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Fortunatus — • Lengthy biographical article on the talented sixth century poet and hymn writer Catholic Encyclopedia. Kevin Knight. 2006. Fortunatus     Fortunatus      …   Catholic encyclopedia

  • Venantius — may refer to:* Venantius Fortunatus * Venantius of Camerino (San Venanzio), martyr, patron saint of Camerino * Venantius, brother of Honoratus * Venantius, Bishop of Dalmatia (Martyr) * Venantius, Bishop of Viviers * Venantius (abbot) …   Wikipedia

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