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| | Otfried Lieberknecht: L'avvocato de' tempi cristiani |
 | | Paulus Orosius, adduced first by the Ottimo commento (1331/32-1334), is the author today most often accepted to identify this person {P. Toynbee, Dante Studies and Researches (London, 1912), 121-136; C. Riessner, "Paradiso X, 118-120: 'quello avvocato de' tempi cristiani': Orosius oder Lactantius?", DDJb 47 (1972), 58-76; A. Martina, "Orosio," ED 4 (1973), 204-208}. |
 | | With his Historiae adversus paganos, Orosius in fact would qualify perfectly as an "avvocato de' tempi cristiani," because it was his objective to defend the "tempora christiana" against the pagan view that Christian religion and the abandonment of pagan idolatry had initiated an era of historical calamities and general decline {CSEL 5, 1ss., 563s.}. |
 | | This is more than may be said about any other candidate except Orosius, and should suffice to establish him as a viable choice right after Orosius, even if it may still be desirable to remain on relatively safer grounds by giving preference to the latter. |
| www.princeton.edu /~dante/ebdsa/lk.html (937 words) |
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