Acta Sanctorum

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Title page of volume 1 of the Acta Sanctorum issued by the Bollandists , 1643

The term Acta Sanctorum (Latin for 'deeds of the saints') denotes various collections of legends from older reports about the martyrs and other saints of the Greek and Catholic Churches . In the narrower sense, it denotes, also under the abbreviations ActaSS, AA.SS. and AS, the large-scale hagiographic project of the Bollandists for the creation of a scientifically founded overview of saints.

prehistory

The first foundations of this branch of literature are the Acta Martyrum , reports on the interrogation, condemnation and execution of martyrs by pagan authorities. There are official church reports about it, including so-called proconsular files , recorded by the clerks during the trial, and reports from contemporaries.

Much more numerous, however, are the fictitious, forged or at least later revised acts of martyrs . To distinguish an excellent, if not quite full study, Real of fake that made Maurists Thierry Ruinart (1657-1709) in the "Acta primorum martyrum sincera" (Paris 1689 u. Ö.).

In addition to the Acta Martyrum, the calendars , lists of the days of death and remembrance of the martyrs according to the order of the calendar, should be mentioned. The oldest calendar is the Roman one from 354 ( chronograph from 354 ). An extension of these calendars are the martyrologies dating from the 7th and following centuries, which also include saints who were not martyrs, with sometimes unreliable biographical notes. The oldest wrongly bears the name of Hieronymus , others come from Beda , Ado , Usuard , Rabanus Maurus and Notker Balbulus .

The " Martyrologium Romanum " is the official register of all saints recognized in the Roman Catholic Church. In 1584 this directory was commissioned by Gregory XV. Revised and edited by Cesare Baronio , another revision was instituted by Benedict XIV in 1748 . The historical-critical edition is by H. Delehaye et al. The latest directory is from 2004. There are also martyrologies for individual countries and orders. The synaxaries , menea and menologies correspond to the martyrologies in the Greek Church .

Since the 4th century, numerous biographies of individual saints have appeared, and later collections of them. In particular, those of the Greek Symeon Metaphrastes around 900 and the Legenda aurea of Jacobus de Voragine were widely used .

publication

Since the end of the 15th century, such collections have been published with somewhat more, albeit still very inadequate, literary criticism by Boninus Mombritius (“Sanctuarium”, 2 vols., Venice 1474), Aloysius Lippomannus (“Vitae Sanctorum”, 8 vols., Rome 1551 –1560) and Laurentius Surius (“Vitae Sanctorum”, 6 vols., Cologne 1570–1575). The Jesuit Heribert Rosweyde (1569–1629) collected materials and published a plan for the complete works in 1607 for a larger collection of this kind that would better meet scientific demands .

Volumes of the Acta Sanctorum in the Duchess Anna Amalia Library Weimar

After his death in 1630, the superior Johann Bolland (1596–1665) commissioned the processing . He expanded Rosweyd's plan and published in Antwerp from 1643 in conjunction with Gottfried Henschen and Daniel Papebroek 5 volumes "Acta Sanctorum", which only contain the saints of January and February. This work was continued in increasing detail by other Jesuits, the Bollandists , and continued to be published in Antwerp, from Octobris, vol. IV 1780 in Brussels . By 1786, 52 volumes were published, which last until October 11th. The dissolution of the Jesuit institutions in the Austrian Netherlands after the repeal of the Jesuit order in 1773 by Pope Clement XIV under the influence of Josephinism made it impossible to continue the company in Brussels. The attempt of the Premonstratensians at Tongerloo , who had published the 53rd volume in 1794, to continue the edition project, put an end to the French Revolution and the conquest of the Austrian Netherlands in the course of the Revolutionary Wars by the troops of the French Revolutionary Army. The work then stalled.

In 1837, on the initiative of Pierre François Xavier de Ram (1804–1865), the founding rector of the Catholic University of Leuven , founded in 1835 , some Jesuits, the so-called New Bollandists, with the support of the Belgian government, took over the continuation. Volumes 54-68 appeared with the exception of vol. 60 (Octobris, vol. XIII), (Palmé) Paris 1883, vol. 61 (Octobris, vol. XIV), (Palmé) Paris 1875 and vol. 62 (Novembris, vol I), (Palmé) Paris 1887 back in Brussels, the Index hagiologicus by Rigollot at the end of the 1863–1867 reprint of Acta sanctorum by Viktor Palmé in Paris in 1875, which was partly incorrect and differing in the pagination. The work, which was continued until November 10th (ActaSS November IV, 1925), will probably remain unfinished, as the calendar sequence has proven to be incompatible with modern scientific requirements. With a publication period of almost 300 years, the Acta Sanctorum is likely to be the edition project with the longest ever realized duration. Today the editions are mainly in the Subsidia Hagiographica series , which include important aids for hagiographic research, but also monographs on individual topics and texts as well as editions, and in the journal Analecta Bollandiana , both published by the Société des Bollandistes.

Companies that partially overlap with the Bollandist company are the Acta sanctorum ordinis St. Benedicti, Seculum I – VI (500–1100), published in 9 volumes by Jean Mabillon and Thierry Ruinart . Coll. Lucas d'Achéry, Paris 1668–1701 and the Acta sanctorum martyrum Orientalium et Occidentalium in duas partes distributa. Adcedunt Acta S. Simeonis Stylitae. ... Stephanus Evodius Assemanus Chaldaicum textum recensuit, notis vocalibus animavit, Latine vertit, admonitionibus, perpetuisque adnotationibus illustravit . J. Collini, Rome 1748. A more recent edition of Ethiopian sources are the Vitae sanctorum indigenarum edited by Boris Turaiev, K. Conti Rossini and others and translated into Latin . Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1904–1912 (cf. the series Scriptores Aethiopici of the Corpus scriptorum Christianorum orientalium ).

See also

literature

see also literature in the article Bollandists

  • Martyrologium Romanum. Ex decreto sacrosancti oecumenici Concilii Vaticani II instauratum auctoritate Ioannis Pauli PP. promulgatum. Editio altera. Libreria editrice Vaticana, Città del Vaticano 2004, ISBN 88-209-7210-7 .
  • Joannes Baptista Boone: De Prosecutione Operis Bollandiani Quod Acta Sanctorum Inscribitur. Douxfils Typographia, Namur 1838.
  • Robert Godding, Bernard Joassart, Xavier Lequeux, Francois De Vriendt: De Rosweyde Aux Acta Sanctorum. La Recherche Hagiographique Des Bollandistes à Travers Quatre Siècles. * Van Rosweyde dead de Acta Sanctorum. Actes du colloque international (Bruxelles, 5 octobre 2007). Société des Bollandistes, Bruxelles 2009, ISBN 978-2-87365-022-3 ( Subsidia hagiographica 88).
  • Jan Marco Sawilla: Antiquarianism, Hagiography and History in the 17th Century. On the work of the Bollandists. An experiment in the history of science (Early Modern Age 131). Niemeyer, Tübingen 2009. ISBN 978-3-484-36631-2
  • Adolf Jülicher : Acta Sanctorum . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume I, 1, Stuttgart 1893, Col. 302 f.
  • David Gniffke, Konstantin Liebrand, Gerhard Müller: Eichsfeld preparatory work for the "Acta Sanctorum". The correspondence between the Jesuits Johannes Knackrick and Daniel Papebroch in 1692/93. In: Eichsfeld-Jahrbuch 23rd vol. 2015, Mecke Druck and Verlag Duderstadt, pp. 71–187

Web links

Wiktionary: Acta Sanctorum  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Acta Sanctorum. Novembris: Tomi II pars prior qua dies tertius partim et quartus continentur. Praemissus est 'Martyrologium Hieronymianum' ed. Johann Bapt. de Rossi and Ludwig Duchesne. Societe des Bollandistes, Brussels 1894; Acta sanctorum Novembris. Collecta digesta illustrata - Tomi II pars posterior qua continetur Hippolyti Delehaye commentarius perpetuus in martyrologium hieronymianum ad recensionem Henrici Quentin. Société des Bollandistes, Bruxelles 1931.
  2. ^ Jacques Paul Migne , Patrologia Latina 123
  3. ↑ Ute Önnerfors:  Usuardus (Huswardus). In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 20, Bautz, Nordhausen 2002, ISBN 3-88309-091-3 , Sp. 1483-1484.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
  4. ↑ Hraban, Martyrologium. Edited by I. McCulloch (CCCM 44). Turnhout 1979.
  5. ^ Acta Sanctorum Decembris. Propylaeum: Martyrologium Romanum ad formam editionis typicae scholiis historicis Instructum. Société des Bollandistes, Bruxelles 1940.
  6. ^ Franz Heinrich Reusch :  Surius, Laurentius . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 37, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1894, p. 166.
  7. ↑ See article "Pierre François Xavier De Ram" from English Wikipedia and his report for the Académie royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique : Pierre François Xavier de Ram, Les nouveaux Bollandistes. Report fait a la Commission royale d'histoire. Hayez, Bruxelles 1860 (also in: Bulletins de la Commission royale d'histoire, 3rd série, Vol. II 1, 1860.
  8. ↑ For an overview cf. Overview of the volumes of the AASS . Another project for a reprint was previously incomplete with only 43 volumes, Venice 1734–1760. A reprint of the first 60 volumes and the index hagiologicus appeared in 1966–1971.
  9. ↑ homepage of the société des Bollandistes /