Poems and Letters

Poems and Letters (Volume 1) by St Sidonius Apollinaris, translated by WB Anderson, 241 pages

The 5th century is generally regarded as the century that saw the end of the Roman Empire in the West.  In 410, Alaric sacked Rome.  A few decades later, the Vandals took possession of North Africa, while the Anglo-Saxons invaded Roman Britain and Attila ravaged Italy and Gaul.  Finally, in 476, the Emperor Romulus was deposed by his general Odoacer, who sent the imperial insignia to Constantinople.

Sidonius Apollinaris witnessed much of this history.  Born into the aristocracy of Roman Gaul, he died under the heel of the barbarian Burgundians.  He composed a panegyric celebrating the accession of his father-in-law Avitus as Emperor, and another a few years later exalting Avitus' usurper Majorian, and another a few years later celebrating the accession of Majorian's successor's successor, Anthemius.  As bishop of Auvergne, he rallied the people during the siege of that city by the Goths, and was imprisoned by the victors after the city fell.  After his release he resumed his ministry to the vanquished, as well as his correspondence with figures ranging from his fellow Gallic bishops to barbarian kings and princes.

Admittedly, even the best poems of Sidonius have more antiquarian than aesthetic interest.  The fading of the classical world is exemplified by the Christian saint's invocation of pagan deities in praise of ephemeral emperors created and destroyed by barbarian generals.  More subtle are Sidonius' overriding concern with form at the expense of sense and his own distance from the literary masters of Augustan Rome he strives to imitate.  And yet the decadence itself presumes continuity, and Sidonius and his correspondents provide ample evidence of the stubborn persistence of Latin culture despite political disintegration.