HOLLIS Primo keyword search 'Passio sanctae Caeciliae' (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Passio%20sanctae%20Caeciliae&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 returns only two records, neither English: a German-Latin study of the Salzburg sermon collection (De Gruyter, 2016) and an Italian-Latin volume, Santa Cecilia martire romana: passione e culto (Rome, 1996). A search for 'Passion of Saint Cecilia translation' (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Passion%20of%20Saint%20Cecilia%20translation&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 and a broader English-title search 'Life of Saint Cecilia English' (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Life%20of%20Saint%20Cecilia%20English&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 return devotional, art-historical and Old-English items but no translation of the Latin passio. The only English-language lives of Cecilia that HOLLIS records are Middle English vernacular legends printed from MSS Ashmole 43 and Cotton Tiberius E.VII (Yale Studies in English 3, 1898) (https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,The%20life%20of%20St%20Cecilia%20from%20ms%20Ashmole%2043&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 which are later adaptations, not translations of the Latin text. No modern English translation of the Latin Passio sanctae Caeciliae was located, and no volume of the standard translation series consulted (Fathers of the Church, Ancient Christian Writers, Translated Texts for Historians, Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library) carries it.
Cecilia is among the most widely venerated of the Roman martyrs and the Passio is the ultimate source of the whole vernacular tradition, from the Golden Legend to Chaucer's Second Nun's Tale. Without an English translation of the Latin text, readers cannot see how the Roman 'gesta martyrum' cycle builds its topographical realism (the house on the Via Appia, the baths, the Urban/Valerian conversions) or how the Latin prose was reshaped by later translators.
| Edition / series |
|---|
| Santa Cecilia martire romana: passione e culto · Antonio Massone · 1996 |
| Record | Citation |
|---|---|
| Chaste Passions : Medieval English Virgin Martyr Legends | Winstead, Karen A. "Chaste Passions : Medieval English Virgin Martyr Legends." Cornell University Press 2018. https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1s5nto6/99153749522903941 |
| Chaste passions : medieval English virgin martyr legends | "Chaste passions : medieval English virgin martyr legends." Ithaca : Cornell University Press, 2000. https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1s5nto6/990083760770203941 |
| Old English lives of saints | Aelfric, Abbot of Eynsham. "Old English lives of saints." Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 2019. https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1s5nto6/99153774555503941 |
| The golden legend of Jacobus de Voragine | Jacobus, de Voragine, approximately 1229-1298. "The golden legend of Jacobus de Voragine." New York, Arno Press, 1969 [c1941], 1969 c1941. https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1s5nto6/990009338920203941 |
| The Gothic missal | "The Gothic missal." Turnhout, Belgium : Brepols, [2017]. https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1s5nto6/990151701590203941 |