La Passio sanctae Salsae (BHL 7467). Recherches sur une passion tardive d’Afrique du Nord

The Passio sanctae Salsae, a young Christian girl martyrized in Tipasa for having beheaded a statue of the god Draco, has been forgotten for a long time. However, this “epic” or rather “fictionalised” passion, dated here by the early decades of the fifth century, provides an exceptional testimony to the cultural level of Mauretania Caesarensis just before or at the time of the Vandal invasion. The hagiographer, with a rare talent, practice a mannerist and poetic art prose, characterised by the late mixture of genres and by the “jewelled style”. This volume includes a new critical edition of the text with an annotated translation and a series of articles studying the archaeological remains of the cult of Salsa in Tipasa and all the literary aspects of the work by comparing it particularly to the contemporary Passions of Marciana and Fabius, that have often been attributed to the same author.