ÁLVARO, Paolo (Paulus Albarus, Alvarus), of Cordova. - Spanish medieval writer, a Jew by origin, b. near Cordova at the end of the 8th century and d. probably in 861. He was a fellow pupil of St. Eulogius (v.) at the school of the abbot Sperandio (Sperandeus). Although a layman, he always promoted the interests of the Church and, together with his friend Eulogius, defended the faith during the persecution of the caliph Abd al-Rahman, taking an interest also in theological questions.
A poet and apologist, he left us important writings, remarkable for eloquence and strength of feeling:
1. Vita et passio 1. Eulogii, a tribute of affection to the memory of his friend, a victim (859) of the persecution by the Moors.
2. Indiculus luminosus, of 854, an apology for martyrdom, including "spontaneous" martyrdom, and a vigorous indictment of the doctrines of Muhammad, represented as a precursor of the Antichrist.
3. Confessio Alvari, a colloquy with God whose attributes he extols, describing his own unworthiness; he composed it in his last years. Rich in piety and biblical erudition.
4. Epistolary: 20 letters, including those addressed to him. The last ones (14-20) concern the apostate Eleazar, who turned from Christian to Jew: in them he treats of the messianic prophecies fulfilled in Christianity, and of Jewish perfidy. - The correspondence between A. and Eulogius is included, in Migne, among the works of Eulogius (PL 115, 731 ff., 819 ff. and 841 ff.; cf. coll. 959-66).
5. Poemata: 12 poems, sacred and profane: much celebrated is the one on the nightingale; notable are the hexameters in honor of St. Jerome and the hymn to Eulogius, and above all the verses on the library of Leovigild, interesting for the biblical Canon and a magnificent eulogy of Scripture.
6. The attribution to A. of the Liber scintillarum, sive Lasi communes, a collection of sentences on the virtues and vices drawn from Holy Scripture and the Fathers, already published among the works of Bede (VII, ed. Basel 1563, pp. 515-627), is doubtful.
BIBLI.: Texts in PL 121, 387-368 (according to the ed. of E. Florez); Vita di s. Eulogio: PL 115, 705-24; L. Traube edited the critical ed. of the Carmi, in MGH, Poetae Latini, III, pp. 122-42. - W. Baudissin, Eulogius und A., Leipzig 1872; id., A. von Cordoba, in Realencyklop. f. prot. Theol. u. Kirche, I, Leipzig 1896, pp. 426-28; A. Ebert, Geschichte der Literatur des Mittelalters, II, Leipzig 1880, pp. 305-11; M. Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters, I, Munich 1911, pp. 421-28; J. Pérez de Urbel, Vida de s. Eulogio, Madrid 1928; A. E. Anspach, Das Fortleben Isidors zum VIII. bis IX. Jahrhundert, in Miscellanea Isidoriana, Rome (Pont. Univ. Grez.) 1936, pp. 320-31 (Liber scintillarum).
Igino Cecchetti