Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/916

 near Lyons speaks of him in the highest terms, especially on this account. His great-grandfather held a high official situation (Sid. Ep. iii. 12, i. 3); his father was a tribune and a notary or secretary under Honorius, and under Valentinian III. became praefectus praetorio of Aquitania I. 449 (ib. iii. 1, v. 9, viii. 6).

First Period, 431–471.—Sidonius was born Nov. 5, 431 or 432, probably at Lyons (Carm. xx. 1). He was apparently educated at that then famous seat of education, in the same school as his cousin Avitus. Soon after he was 20 years old he married Papianilla, only daughter of Flavius Eparchius Avitus, a native of Auvergne, who was praefectus praetorio at Arles from 439 to 443. Avitus, a soldier, diplomatist and lover of nature and literature, retired after 451 to his own house and patrimonial estate at Avitacum, near the modern Clermont (ib. vii. 230, 316, 339, 460, etc.). Avitus had two sons, Ecdicius and Agricola, with whom, after his marriage, Sidonius lived on most friendly and affectionate terms. He had a son Apollinaris and two daughters, Roscia and Severiana. A letter is extant, addressed to Apollinaris when almost 16 years old, commending his blameless behaviour, and warning him against the bad example and vicious society of some profligates at Lyons, where he was studying (Ep. iii. 13). There is also a letter to Agricola, mingling tender feeling with quiet humour, excusing himself from joining a fishing excursion as his daughter Severiana was alarmingly ill, on whose behalf, as well as his own, he begs Agricola's prayers. He expresses his firm trust in Christ as his best support (Ep. ii. 12). On the death of Maximus, Avitus was proclaimed emperor at Toulouse and at Beaucaire, 455, and was followed to Rome by his son-in-law, who pronounced on him a panegyric poem of 602 hexameter lines on Jan. 1, 456 (Carm. vii. 369–404, 510–572), and as a reward received the honour of a brazen statue in the basilica of Trajan, in a space between the two libraries. The reign of Avitus ended in 456. Majorian, who became emperor, crossed the Alps, defeated the Burgundian invaders, captured Lyons, imposing hard conditions and heavy taxes on the citizens, which he was induced to remit (Mar. 459) by a florid panegyric in 603 hexameters pronounced by Sidonius and some elegiac verses addressed to him and to his principal secretary Peter, a man ambitious of literary renown, whom Sidonius calls his Maecenas. Sidonius obtained also, perhaps somewhat later, the office of count of the Palace (Ep. i. ii; Carm. iii. iv. v. xiii.). In 460, when the emperor was holding his court at Arles, and had gathered round him the most eminent literary men Of Gaul, Domnulus, Lampridius, and Severianus, Sidonius distinguished him. self by an improvised poem in praise of a book by secretary Peter. From 461 to 465 Sidonius appears to have lived in retirement from public business, but fulfilling his part as a great landed proprietor at Avitacum of a possession into which he came in right of his wife on the death of Avitus, and which he describes enthusiastically, in a letter written in the style of Pliny to his friend Domitius. His description of the house and grounds is very pleasing and picturesque, its trees and underwood, its lake, fountains, and cascade.

Several letters to friends belong to this period, especially one to Eriphius, a citizen of Lyons, perhaps 461, describing a church gathering in commemoration of St. Justus at Lyons on Sept. 2, the procession before daybreak, the large congregation of both sexes, the psalms sung antiphonally by monks and clerks, the Eucharistic celebration, the great heat caused by the crowd and the number of lights, cooled after a time by the autumnal morning.

When Anthemius became emperor, 467, he sent for Sidonius to Rome, on business which the people of Auvergne deputed him to manage on their behalf. Under the favour of Christ, as he says, he undertook the mission, his expenses being provided by the imperial treasury. At Rome he stayed at the house of Paulus, a man of prefectorian rank, possessing literary and scientific ability, who persuaded him, as likely to promote his own interests, to celebrate the inauguration of Anthemius the new consul by a poem. The result was a panegyric in 548 hexameters. This was rewarded by the high office of prefect of the senate and of the city of Rome, of which he writes in a tone of gratified ambition to Philimatius. He remained at Rome until 469, and then retired to Gaul, residing partly at Lyons and partly at Avitacum. Towards the end of that year or the beginning of 470, the province of Lugdunensis I. was surrendered by Anthemius to the Burgundians as the price of their assistance against the Visigoths (Tillem. Emp. vi. p. 357) These barbarians Sidonius describes as less ferocious than other German races, but complains of their perverse ways, revolting and odious to those over whom they domineered. Of their ruler (tetrarches) Chilperic II., and his wife Agrippina, he speaks more favourably (Ep. v. 7; Carm. xii. ). About this time a new church was erected at Lyons through the exertions of bp. Patiens, for whom Sidonius had the most affectionate reverence. He was present at the dedication, which he describes in hendecasyllables (Ep. ii. 10). At the request of bp. Perpetuus he wrote an elegiac inscription for the church of St. Martin at Tours, which Perpetuus had enlarged (Ep. iv. 18).

Second Period, 471–475.—Threatened by invasion and surrounded by enemies political and religious (for Euric, the Visigothic king, whose capital was Toulouse, was a zealous supporter of Arian doctrine and persecuted the Catholics with great severity), the people of Clermont, when their bishop, Eparchius, died, 471, united in a clamorous demand that Sidonius should succeed him. He was not in holy orders, but had shewn himself without ostentation a devout Christian, though a somewhat flexible and elastic politician. His ability was beyond question; as a man of letters he stood in the foremost rank; he held a high place, probably the highest, among the landed proprietors of his province, whose interests he was firm and patriotic in upholding, and had taken an active part more than once on behalf of its inhabitants, in which also he had been ably and zealously supported by his friends, of whom, both in military and civil