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Paulinus, born to a wealthy senatorial family of Bordeaux and a pupil of the poet Ausonius, gave up a public career and much of his wealth to live an ascetic life at Nola in Campania, where he became bishop. His poems include verse letters to Ausonius defending his renunciation; the Natalicia, poems composed each year for the feast of St Felix of Nola; a propempticon for Bishop Nicetas; an epithalamium for Julian, later bishop of Eclanum; a consolation on the death of a child; and paraphrases of the Psalms.
Paulinus is one of the founders of Christian Latin poetry, adapting classical forms such as the epistle, the epithalamium, and the birthday poem to Christian purposes. The Natalicia are a rich source for the cult of saints, pilgrimage, and church building in late antiquity, and the exchange with Ausonius vividly records the tension between classical culture and ascetic renunciation. His verse influenced later Christian poets in Gaul and Italy. His metrical skill and range are notable among Christian poets of his generation.
About this edition. The Latin text comes from the Open Greek and Latin digital edition of the Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum (edition: Wilhelm von Hartel, CSEL 2, 1894), licensed CC BY-SA. Every word has been analyzed with LatinCy, a neural language model for Latin — click or tap any word for its dictionary form, part of speech, and complete morphology, together with the full entry from Lewis & Short’s A Latin Dictionary.