Università Roma Tre

Title 2018-2019: Peter and Paul in Rome, between history and legend (I-III century)

Course description: from the end of the second century, the presence in Rome of the "trophies" of Peter and Paul is attested. Not much, however, do we know of the last phase of the lives of the two apostles, through historically reliable sources. On the other hand, in the second century begins the production of apocrypha (Acts of Peter, Acts of Paul) that have Peter and Paul as protagonists and the capital of the Empire as a place of many of the events narrated. The module proposes to deepen, according to various perspectives of investigation (philologico-critical, linguistic-literary, historico-doctrinal), these works, with special attention to the sections set in Rome.

Materials for the lessons (critical editions of Lipsius and Vouaux, Italian translations of Erbetta and Moraldi, scientific bibliography) will be provided by the teacher.

Course title 2018-2019: Peter and Paul in Rome, between history and legend (from the fourth century).

Course description.
After the turning point of Constantine, the Church of Rome reaffirms its jurisdictional primacy over the entire universal Church, undermined by the progressive strengthening of the see of Constantinople. In this process the claim of the apostolic foundation of the Roman primacy plays an important role, supported also through the production of new works (Passions of the Pseudo-Linus, Pseudo-Hegesippus, Pseudo-Marcellus) in which the legend of Peter and Paul in the Urbs is fixed in the "official" form. Beyond its immediate political function, it become paradigmatic, in the following centuries (Virtutes Apostolorum, Legenda Aurea), for hagiography, worship and artistic production. The module aims to follow the development of these traditions on the two apostles.

Materials for the seminars (critical editions of Lipsius, Ussani, Fabricius and others, Italian translations, scientific bibliography) will be provided by the teacher.