The end of the Roman Persecutions in the fourth century led to a transformation of Christian holiness in late antiquity. A spectacular act of devotion in the giving of one's life to Christ via martyrdom would no longer be the most available means for establishing one's unique relationship to God. The new heroes of Christian sanctity would prove their mettle through a witness given in time of peace. It is the concept of holiness per se, renegotiated given the changed circumstances in which Christians found themselves, that forms the object of Michel Fauquier's study.
Fauquier focuses on thirty saints’ vitae of twenty-nine saints written during or shortly after their lifetime between the fourth and sixth centuries. From a close reading of these source texts, Fauquier organizes his formulation of holiness in late antique Gaul around the categories of theology, politics, and sociology, forming the basis of the tripartite division of his book.
The first part, “Le Saint en parole: Une théologie de la sainteté” (139–471), begins with a study of the semantic range of the words sanctus and beatus within the vitae, followed by an excellent summary of associated themes and images, giving ample attention to Gregory of Tours's particular conception of sanctity (214–224). Readers will find useful Fauquier's treatment of pagan precursors to Christian holiness and moral virtue (225–232, 319–340). His conclusion (441–471) discusses the development of monastic versus episcopal models of holiness.
The second part, “Le Saint en acte: Une politique de la sainteté” (479–819) examines the saints as public people. The role of the bishop as the defender of the faith in the vitae is augmented by exhaustive discussion of the theological controversies over grace, and the relations of the authors of the vitae to them (525–595). Fauquier highlights two models of episcopal interaction with political figures in contrasting Saints Martin of Tours and Germain of Auxerre (610–622). The thorough treatment of miracles recorded in the vitae is admirable in its balanced approach. In sum, there are accounts that are strictly literary—and would have been likely understood as such by their intended audience—but there are others that were certainly based upon events witnessed by the authors of the vitae. Unfortunately, Fauquier is not sure what to do with this latter kind of miracles, preferring to move quickly to the discussion of their moral significance (777–786).
Part three, “Parcours et rayonnement des saints: Une sociologie de la sainteté” (823–1040), discusses the sociological dimensions of the saints in the vitae. A study of the tendency to clean up the backgrounds of saints is backed by statistical analysis of their parentage and social background (848–856). Fauquier's treatment of their clerical and/or monastic careers is preceded by the cases of Saints Martin of Tours, Radegund, and Germain of Auxerre, all notable for their late call to a consecrated life (889–907). Contrasting depictions of monastic versus episcopal funerals (1024–1033) highlight again the different expressions of holiness encountered in this period.
Fauquier's general conclusion (1043–1061) presents a fine synthesis of the themes related to holiness in the vitae placed within the larger scholarly consensus on the cult of the saints in late antiquity.
As a historian, Fauquier tries to take a middle path between an excessively critical appraisal of hagiographical texts as propaganda and an overly credulous reading which eschews scientific scrutiny (41–45, 72–94). He well establishes the historical, geographical, and political contexts of the selected saints and the bona fides of their hagiographers as historians, albeit ancient ones using a different set of critical criteria from modern authors. While writing with a pastoral purpose in mind, the authors of the vitae intended to provide true accounts (46–62, 80–97). Fauquier takes seriously the authors of the vitae not as producers of boilerplate to be sifted through in search of historical realia but as sincere men who both defined and expressed a vision of holiness during a period of cultural transformation (43).
By way of criticism, the unwieldy length of Martyres pacis, a reworking of the author's doctoral thesis (35, 94), makes one wonder if the study would not have benefitted from a more ruthless editor. For example, with all respect to Saints Ulrich of Augsburg, Simeon of Padolirone, and Cunegunda (Orate pro nobis!), I cannot see how a two-page excursus on the Nachleben of the process of canonization made the final cut (731–732). Fauquier's engagement with secondary sources (overwhelmingly French) is of uneven depth. On page 67, the reader is informed that Sulpicius Severus's words regarding Saint Martin of Tours—Ut qui sanctus . . . habebatur (Vita s. Martini 7.7)—was once taken by some critics as proof of a later redaction of the Sulpician text, a point relevant to the development of the word sanctus. Who? When? There is no citation. Regarding the cult of Saint Martin at Tours, disputes over the extent of Perpetuus's patronage of Paulinus of Périgueux in the compostion of the latter's Vita s. Martini are omitted (375n370). The section relies too heavily upon Luce Pietri's 1983 work La ville de Tours du IVe au VIe siècle: naissance d'une cité chrétienne (École française de Rome, Palais Farnèse). On the evolution of the figure of Saint Martin in the poems of Paulinus of Périgueux and Venantius Fortunatus, no mention is made of the extensive work of Sylvie Labarre on this very topic. Furthermore, although he is clearly using Michael Petschenig's edition of Paulinus's opera in quoting the Vita s. Martini (Paulini Petricordiae Carmina, Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, vol. 16 [Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences, 1888]), only the Migne edition is mentioned (1112).
I discovered some footnote errors: Altar for Altare (372n352), Inlustrera virtuto virum for Inlustrem virtute virum (625n86). Paulinus's passage on the siege of Arles in book 6 of Vita s. Martini begins at verse 111, not verse 5 (667n245).
In his detailed study of the selected vitae, Fauquier provides scholars with a wealth of philological and statistical material. Its value, I would argue, lies not so much in any new insights into the development of the ideal of holiness in Christian late antiquity as it does in its serious and sympathetic engagement with the authors of the vitae sanctorum as genuine pastors and promoters of Christian virtue.
