Philip Polcar’s Hieronymus’ Witwenbüchlein für Salvina

Abstract

In the monograph under review, a revised version of a dissertation submitted at the University of Konstanz in 2019, Polcar sets out to provide a full-scale commentary on a single letter of Jerome’s correspondence such as will be familiar to those who have read the work of Scourfield, Adkin, and Cain. The letter under investigation, epistula 79, is addressed to the newly widowed Salvina, containing both consolation for the loss of her husband, Nebridius, and exhortation to chaste widowhood. After a brief introduction to Jerome and the letter’s place in the ancient epistolographic tradition (pp. 11–19) and a survey of the edition and the manuscripts consulted (21–24), there follows a Latin text with a facing translation (pp. 24–45).