Natacha Puglisi (KCL) - 2015-16 Students
natacha.puglisi@kcl.ac.uk

The universalization of the sanctoral cycle in the Christian liturgical year during the 4th and 5th centuries

I intend to study the evolution of the festivals of five saints between the fourth and fifth centuries, in order to highlight the process of universalisation of the sanctoral cycle (celebration of the saints) of the Christian liturgical year. My purpose is to compare the spread in Christendom of the long-neglected saints’ days to the official and much studied celebrations of the events of the life of Christ, such as Easter or Christmas (temporal cycle). To map the spread of the feasts of the saints across the Mediterranean Empire, I shall look for mentions of these festivities in martyrologies and calendars, hagiographies and the other contemporary testimonies, and compare these data to evidence in the homiletic corpus of the attempts of Church authorities to diffuse the ‘official’, and temporal festivals.