Enciclopedia Cattolica

ABDON E SENNEN

Abdon and Sennen

Volume I · p. 61 · 1948

English translation · Testo originale italiano

ABDON e SENNEN - *Incoronazione dei martiri* (al centro). Affresco nel Cimitero di Ponziano.
ABDON e SENNEN - *Incoronazione dei martiri* (al centro). Affresco nel Cimitero di Ponziano.

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

ABDON and SENNEN - Parchment of the relics of the saints deposited by Cardinal Marco Barbo in the year 1474 in the high altar of the Basilica of St. Mark. - Rome.

*A solis ortus cardine* (PL 19, 765-70; I. Huemer, in CSEL, X [1885]); in Hilary, with the hymns *Ante saecula qui manes* and *Fefelliti saevam*; in Fulgentius of Ruspe, against the Arians (first published by D. C. Lambot, *Rev. Bénéd.*, 48 [1936], pp. 221-34); in Venantius Fortunatus (Carm. I, 16: PL 88, 81 ff.).

But the best known is the *Psalmus contra partem Donati* of St. Augustine (PL 43, 23-32; M. Petschenig, in CSEL, LI [1908], pp. 3-15; D. C. Lambot, *Rev. Bénéd.*, 47 [1935], pp. 319-30). It is a polemical account of Donatism (v.) written for popular use in rhythmic verse that entirely disregards classical metrics; the lines are octonaries with accentual rhythm, all ending in *e*, arranged in 20 strophes beginning with the letters of the alphabet from A to V, plus an introductory line repeated as a refrain and a conclusion of 30 lines.

BIBL.: H. Vroom, *Le psaume abécédaire de s. Augustin et la poésie latine rhythmique* (Latinitas Christianorum primaeva, fasc. 4). Nijmegen 1933; A. Vaccari, in *La Civiltà Cattolica* 1947, I, pp. 214-220.