Paul the Deacon and Rome

Costambeys, Marios ORCID: 0000-0003-4201-5895 (2018) Paul the Deacon and Rome. In: Writing the Early Medieval West. Cambridge University Press,Cambridge, pp. 49-63. ISBN 9781107198395

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Abstract

It is very likely that Paul the Deacon visited Rome. An itinerant scholar and monk who was the principal Italian representative of the fl owering of intellectual life under Charlemagne, Paul knew about some of the city’s monuments, such as the so- called templum Romuli and the Servian walls. He also worked with texts that came from Rome: not only those produced during his lifetime, notably the latest papal biographies in the Liber Pontifi calis, 2 but also those that were preserved in Rome more securely and in greater abundance than anywhere else. It was almost certainly there that he found the collection of fi fty- four of Gregory the Great’s letters which he sent to Adalhard of Corbie ; 3 and it is also becoming increasingly clear that he knew very well the texts of Roman law that were still preserved most fully there. 4 Yet the extent of Paul’s knowledge of Rome, which as we shall see went beyond what could be gleaned from books, suggests direct personal acquaintance.

Item Type:	Book Section
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	16 May 2018 15:18
Last Modified:	14 Mar 2024 22:06
DOI:	10.1017/9781108182386.005
Related URLs:	Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3021356