The Nicene Age · AD 313–400

Aurelius of Carthage

bishop c. AD 391/392 – d. 429/430 (the year is uncertain) · Bishop of Carthage · President of the African councils · Carthage

The Nicene Age

Who Aurelius of Carthage was

The man who chaired the African church for nearly forty years, and under whom the Latin West's first binding list of the canonical scriptures was enacted.

A deacon of Carthage when Augustine returned to Africa in 388, he became bishop about 391 or 392 in succession to Genethlius, and **presided over more than fifteen plenary councils** — Hippo in 393, where the canon of scripture was first drawn up by a council; **Carthage in 397, which re-enacted it and referred it across the sea for confirmation**; and the council of 419 whose compilation, the *Codex Canonum Ecclesiae Africanae*, is the reason those earlier acts survive at all.

He was Augustine's patron before he was his colleague: he funded the monastic community at Hippo and supplied it with members for episcopal training, and Augustine dedicated work to him and wrote *On the Work of Monks* at his prompting. In the Donatist and Pelagian controversies he opened and presided while Augustine argued — **he was among the first bishops to denounce Pelagius**, and he had come to the see of Carthage while **Parmenian**, the Donatist bishop of the same city, still held the rival succession.

⚠ The archive states two limits. **The date of his death is given variously as 423, 429 and c. 430**, and the record does not choose. And **almost nothing of him survives outside the conciliar acts and Augustine's correspondence** — he is known as a chairman, which is to say through the documents he signed for other men.

Also listed in the bishops of Carthage.

Common questions

When did Aurelius live?

Aurelius of Carthage is dated bishop c. AD 391/392 – d. 429/430 (the year is uncertain) in the archive, which places Aurelius in the Nicene Age (AD 313–400). The dating is traditional and approximate; the archive marks it as uncertain rather than fixing a year the sources do not give.

Which early sources mention Aurelius?

Aurelius of Carthage is named in 2 primary-source passages catalogued here, drawn from Augustine of Hippo and The councils of Carthage. Every passage is quoted from a named public-domain translation, earliest first.

Where was Aurelius from?

The archive associates Aurelius of Carthage with Carthage.

Who were Aurelius’ contemporaries?

The archive links Aurelius of Carthage to 3 other figures, including Augustine of Hippo, Pelagius and Parmenian of Carthage. Each connection is drawn from a source that places them together, not from inference.

Primary-source mentions (2)

Every passage below is quoted from a named public-domain translation, earliest first.

The Letters of Augustine — the correspondence with Aurelius

c. AD 400
[The relationship in its own words: **Aurelius as patron of the monastery at Hippo**, as the bishop to whom Augustine reports and defers, and as the correspondent whose complaints about clergy prompted *On the Work of Monks*. ⚠ It is Augustine's side of the exchange that survives in quantity, so the archive sees Aurelius mostly as his junior colleague described him.]
Augustine of Hippo · The letters to Aurelius of Carthage · source text

*The Letters of Augustine* — held in this library. English: J. G. Cunningham, NPNF 1st ser. 1 (1886), public domain.

The canons of the African councils, in the Codex Canonum Ecclesiae Africanae

c. AD 419
[He opens, presides and signs. **The acts of Carthage 397 — the canon of scripture and its referral to "the church across the sea" — are enacted under his presidency**, with Augustine among the forty-four bishops who signed; and the compilation of 419 that preserves them is his council's work. ⚠ The archive holds him on the strength of documents he chaired rather than wrote.]
The councils of Carthage · Carthage 397 and 419; Hippo 393

Not held as a text record in this library. Latin in the African code; public-domain English: H. R. Percival, NPNF 2nd ser. 14 (1900).

Connected in the archive

People

Events in this lifetime

Place

Places served

The one place the sources put Aurelius.

  1. 1Carthage

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