Page "Paulinus of Nola" Paragraph 8

Already during his governorship Paulinus had developed a fondness for the 3rd century martyr Saint Felix of Nola.

Felix was a minor saint of local importance and patronage whose tomb had been built within the local necropolis at Cimitile, just outside the town of Nola.

As governor, Paulinus had widened the road to Cimitile and built a residence for travelers ; it was at this site that Paulinus and Therasia took up residence.

Nearby were a number of small chapels and at least one old basilica.

Paulinus rebuilt the complex, constructing a brand new basilica to Felix and gathering to him a small monastic community.

Paulinus wrote an annual hymn ( natalicium ) in honor of St. Felix for the feast day when processions of pilgrims were at their peak.

In these hymns we can understand the personal relationship Paulinus felt between himself and Felix, his advocate in heaven.

His poetry shares with much of the work of the early 5th century, an ornateness of style that classicists of the 18th and 19th century found cloying and dismissed as decadent — though Paulinus ' poems were highly regarded at the time and used as educational models.