Background
He was a Spanish presbyter of distinguished family.
(Excerpt from Gai Vetti Aquilini Iuvenci Evangeliorum Libr...)
Excerpt from Gai Vetti Aquilini Iuvenci Evangeliorum Libri Quattuor: Recensuit Et Commentario Critico Instruxit Iohannes Huemer De eius uita nihil aliud constat nisi quae idem Hieronymus tradit, de niris illustribus c. LXXXI'V (ed. Herding. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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He was a Spanish presbyter of distinguished family.
About 330 he published his Libri evangeliorum IV, each book containing about 800 hexameters. The division into books is possibly a reminiscence of the number of the Gospels. The work itself, written with the idea of ousting the absurdities of Pagan mythology and replacing them by the truths of Christianity, may be called the first Christian epic. In the Praefatio the author expresses the hope that the sacredness of his subject may procure him safety at the final conflagration of the world'and admission into heaven. The whole is, in the main, a poetical version of the Gospel of Matthew, the other evangelists only being used for supplementary details. It is founded upon a pre-vulgate Latin translation, although there is evidence that Juvencus also consulted the Greek. In spite of metrical irregularities, the language and style are simple and show good taste, being free from the artificiality of other Christian poets and prose writers, and the author has made excellent use of Virgil (his chief model) and other classical writers. Juvencus set the fashion of verse translations of the Bible, and the large number of MSS. of his poem mentioned in lists and still extant are sufficient evidence of its great popularity.
According to Jerome, he was also the author of some poems on the sacraments, but no trace of these has survived. The Latin Heptateuch, a hexameter version of the first seven books of the Old Testament, has been attributed to Juvencus amongst others; but it is now generally supposed to be the work of a certain Cyprianus, a Gaul who lived in the 6th century, possibly a bishop of Toulon, author of the Life of Caesarius, bishop of Arelate (Arles).
(Excerpt from Gai Vetti Aquilini Iuvenci Evangeliorum Libr...)
