FORTUNATUS, VENANTIUS HONORIUS CLEMENTIANUS

Poet and bishop of Poitiers; b. near Treviso, Venezia, c. 530; d. c. 609. Fortunatus was reared in Aquileia and educated in Ravenna (c. 552), where he studied rhetoric, grammar, and law. Cured of an eye disease through the intercession of St. martin of tours c. 565, he embarked on a pilgrimage of gratitude, the route of which can be traced by poems he composed at Mainz, Cologne, Trier, Metz, Verdun, Rheims, Soissons, Paris, and finally Tours, where he met Bishop Euphronius before he proceeded to Poitiers.

On a visit to Holy Cross convent in Poitiers, Fortunatus met the former Queen radegunda, who had taken the veil after fleeing from her husband, King Clotaire I of the Franks. He was persuaded to become the director of Radegunda and her spiritual daughter Agnes, abbess of the monastery, where there were about 200 nuns. His devotion to the nuns manifested itself in the constant exchange of gifts, letters, poems, and culinary delicacies. Fortunatus served for a time as steward for the convent and later, after receiving Holy Orders, as chaplain.

In 568 Radegunda received a relic of the true cross from the Byzantine Emperor justin ii, and Fortunatus composed a series of hymns to commemorate the event. His Vexilla Regis Prodeunt and the Pange Lingua Gloriosi Lauream Certaminis were eventually incorporated into the liturgy of Holy Week. After the deaths of Radegunda and Agnes (c. 587), Venantius took up his travels once more and visited the Merovingian King Sigebert, as well as neighboring prelates, St. Felix of Nantes, St. Leontius of Bordeaux, and particularly St. gregory of tours, who encouraged him to publish a collection of his poetry. During his lifetime, Fortunatus edited ten books of poetry; one book was published posthumously.

Elected bishop of Poitiers (c. 599), Fortunatus held that office for about ten years, but his fame rests on his literary achievements. A Christian gentleman of refinement, even of fastidiousness, Fortunatus has been accused of indulgence in flattery and a euphemistic characterization of contemporaries. His personal life was devout, and by the close of the 8th century his tomb was venerated as that of a saint. Although his name is not included in the Roman martyrology, several French and Italian dioceses venerate him as a saint.

He composed prose lives of St. hilary of poitiers, St. Germain of Paris (see germain, ss.), St. Radegunda, and several local patron saints, as well as hagiographical poems, including a Vita S. Martini in 2,243 hexameters. His poetry embraces elegies, panegyrics, and eulogies on grief, death, virginity, patriotism, and womanhood, as well as toasts, inscriptions, epithalamia, and letters in poetical form to friends or hosts.

Fortunatus was a facile poet; but his true merit rests on allusions to contemporary events, persons, and places, depicting the refinement of Christian life and thought during the coarse and harsh Merovingian era. Although he avoided theological allegory, faults in prosody undermine his stature as a poet, and monotony intrudes in his versification. His literary cult declined appreciably after the 16th century.

Bibliography: b. altaner, Patrology, tr. h. graef (New York 1960) 601–603. f. j. e. raby, A History of Christian-Latin Poetry from the Beginnings to the Close of the Middle Ages (2d ed. Oxford 1953) 86–95. f. leo and b. krusch, Monumenta Germaniae Auctores antiquissimi (Berlin 1825–) v.4. b. krusch and w. levison, Monumenta Germaniae Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum (Berlin 1825–) 7.1:205–224, 337–428. h. leclercq, Dictionnaire d'archéologie chrétienneet de liturgie, ed. f. cabrol, h. leclercq and h. i. marrou (Paris 1907–53) 5.2: 1892–97. s. a. blomgren, Studia Fortunatiana, 2 v. (Upsala 1933–34); in Eranos 48 (Göteborg 1950) 150–156, classics. b. de gaiffier, Analecta Bollandiana 70:262–284, cult.

[a. h. skeabeck]