Published in The rise and fall of Western tradition

Language:

Portuguese, Brazil

PDF download:

02._art._monizsantos.pdf

This article examines Augustine’s reception of Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue as a privileged case study for understanding the bishop of Hippo’s relationship with his pagan past and classical education. The poem’s eschatological imagery, the figure of the puer, and the promise of a renewed age made it one of the most readily Christianized texts in late antiquity. Within the framework of Classical Reception Studies, reception is understood not as passive transmission but as an active process of reconfiguration, through which ancient texts acquire new meanings in new historical contexts. Against that background, Augustine’s five references to the Fourth Eclogue, scattered across commentaries, letters, and The City of God, show a selective and strategic use of Virgil in apologetic contexts. Rather than treating the poem as a complete Christian allegory, Augustine mobilizes its language to mediate between Roman literary culture and Christian truth. The article argues that this reading reveals not only Augustine’s nuanced engagement with Virgil, but also the broader formation of a Christian Romanitas in Late Antiquity.