PROBA. - A poetess, daughter of the consul Petronio Probiano (322) and wife of the praefectus urbi Adelio (351), she introduced into Christianity the fashion (v. Tertulliano, De praeser. haer., 39: PL 4, 191-240) of Virgilian centos.
Her work, composed between 360 and 370, describes the contents of the Old and New Testaments in Virgilian phrases. Previously she had composed a poem on the conspiracy of Magnenzio. In the meantime she had converted to the Christian religion. The Decree of Ps. Gelasio condemned the practice of expressing divine subjects in Virgilian verses (v. E. V. Dobschütz, Das decretim Gelasianum, Lipsia 1912, pp. 120, 299), which nevertheless did not hinder either the reading of P.'s verses in the monastic schools of the Middle Ages or admiration for the poetess herself (G. Boccaccio, De claris mulieribus, 95).