Tertullianus
- A Q. Septimius Florens, Tertullian, a learned father of the Church, a native of Carthage, in the first half of the third century of the Christian era, Lact. 5, 1, 23; 5, 4, 3; Isid. 8, 5, 60.—
- B A celebrated jurist under Septimius Severus, Dig. 29, 2, 30, § 6; 28, 5, 3, § 2.
, usually called Tertullian, the most ancient of the Latin Christian Fathers now extant. Notwithstanding the celebrity which he has always enjoyed, our knowledge of his personal history is extremely limited, and is derived almost exclusively from a succinct notice by St. Jerome. From this we learn that Tertullian was a native of Carthage, the son of a proconsular centurion (a sort of aide-de-camp to provincial governors); that he wrote chiefly during the reigns of Septimius Severus and of Caracalla; that he became a presbyter, and remained orthodox until he had reached the term of middle life, when, in consequence of the envy and illtreatment which he experienced on the part of the Roman clergy, he went over to the sect of the Montanists (see Montanus), and wrote several books in defence of these heretics; that he lived to a great age, and was the author of many works. His birth may be placed about A.D. 160, and his death about 240. The most interesting of his numerous works is his Apologeticum, or defence of Christianity. It was written at Carthage, probably about A.D. 200. Other treatises of his that are of especial value as throwing light on the history of his times and upon questions of antiquities are the Ad Nationes, the De Idololatria, the De Spectaculis, and the Adversus Iudaeos.
Tertullian is an interesting figure—a Puritan of the early Church—stern, uncompromising, and filled with a passionate religious fervour which makes some of his declamatory passages read like the exhortations of a Mucklewrath or a Macbriar. His Latinity is also worthy of careful study, as being a good specimen of the literary African, strongly tinged with an Hebraic colouring. It is he who first coined the Latin ecclesiastical terminology to which St. Augustine gave currency a little later. He quotes the Bible freely from a current translation into Latin now lost, and known as the Itala. See Hieronymus; Itala; sermo plebeius.
The best complete edition of his works is that of Oehler in 3 vols. (Leipzig, 1853-55); but a more critical edition is now in course of publication in the Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiast. Lat. (pt. i. Vienna, 1890). See Harnack, Dogmengeschichte, 2d ed. in 3 vols. (Freiburg, 1888-90). The contents of the separate treatises are summarized by Fuller in Smith and Wace's Dictionary of Christian Biography, vol. iv. (London, 1887). There is an edition with English notes of the De Spectaculis, De Idololatria, and De Corona Militis by Currey (Cambridge, 1883). For an English translation of Tertullian, see Clark's Ante-Nicene Christian Library.