Vita Brevis [antikvár]

When i visited the book fair in Buenos Aires in the spring of 1995 I was urged to set aside a morning for the renoumedflea markel in San Telmo. After a few hectic hours in front of all the stalls on streets and market-places I ended up taking refuge in a small antiquarian bookshop. Among a modest selection of old manuscripts my eyes were drawn to a red box fde labelled 'Codex FloriaeSomething must have aroused my interest, for I opened the box carefully and looked down at a bundle of handwrítten sheets. They were certainly oldy extremely old, and moreover I quickly realised that the text was in Latin. An introductory greeting was written in large letters on a single line: Floria Aemilia Aurelio Augustino Episcopo Hipponiensi Salutem/ Greetings from Floria Aemilia to Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo ... So it must be a letter. But could it really be written to the theologian and church father who spent most of his life in North Africafrom the middle of the fourth century onwards? From someone who called herself Floria? I was already well acquainted with Augustine's biography. No other single figure shows more clearly the dramatic change of culture through the transition from the old Greco-Roman to the universal Christian culture which was to characterise Europe right up to our own time. The best source of Augustine's life is naturally Augustine himself. Through his Confessions