LENTULO, LETTER of. - An apocryphon, so called after its alleged sender, which describes the physical beauty of Jesus Christ, who, according to Ps. 44,3, would have been the most beautiful of men.
The letter claims to have been written by a contemporary of the Lord, namely the Roman Lentulus, governor (praeses) or official (officialis), according to the various manuscripts, of Judaea. But no L. held such an office in Palestine in the time of Jesus Christ. The writing perhaps depends on the celebrated Testimonium Flavianum (v. GIUSEPPE FLAVIO) and, certainly, on Nicotero Callisto (Hist. ecl., I, 40: PG 145, 748-50). It is first found only in the fifteenth century, in the preface to Ludolfo (v.) di Sassonia (1300-70), printed at Cologne in 1474. But Valla already mentions it in 1450, declaring it outright apocryphal (De falso credita et ementita Constantini donatione declaratio, ed. Lipsia 1928, p. 62). Against Valla’s opinion, very few, despite the wide circulation of the letter, have dared to maintain its authenticity. In all probability, in its present form it came from the pen of some Christian humanist of the fifteenth century, whereas originally it must have been a product of monastic literature of the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Although dependent on Greek sources, it was written in Latin.