Publications

Analecta Bollandiana

Among the many current periodicals in the world, very few can claim such an authority, that even the oldest issues keep all their usefulness one century after their publication. That is however the case for Analecta Bollandiana, a journal of critical hagiography, edited and published since 1882 by the Société des Bollandistes in Brussels. Since the very beginning, the journal was conceived as a continuous updating of the prestigious Acta Sanctorum series, as well as an entirely new instrument devoted to hagiographical research. Every issue contains both critical editions of hagiographical texts (Greek, Latin, Oriental…), and fundamental studies about hagiography. The articles are published in modern international languages (English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish), each of them being provided with an English and a French summary. About one fifth of each issue is devoted to book reviews and bibliography on hagiography.

Such contents make the Analecta Bollandiana indispensable in any department of medieval, Byzantine, Slavonic or Christian oriental studies, as well as of Church history, comparative religions, ethnology and folklore.

With both the inheritance of the great tradition given by the Acta Sanctorum and the actual support of a highly qualified international scientific committee, Analecta Bollandiana has been for a century and will remain the ideal forum for everyone interested in Christian hagiography.

Latest Issue: Analecta Bollandiana, 143/I (2025)

Giorgia Nicosia. The Syriac Transmission of the Episode of the Siege of Nisibis from Theodoret’s Ecclesiastical History

  • Summary: This article offers a new assessment of the Syriac tradition of the episode of the siege of Nisibis from Theodoret’s Philotheos Historia and Ecclesiastical History. It argues that, although both works were translated into Syriac, it was the translation from the latter which circulated widely and was included in the so-called short recension of the Life of Jacob, in the Life of Ephrem, in the letter of George of the Arabs to Jesus Habib, in Michael I Rabo’s Chronicle, and, via the latter, in Bar ʿEbroyo’s Chronography. Contrary to previous scholarship, it contends that these works relied directly on the version translated from the Ecclesiastical History, and that there is no need to postulate the existence or re-emerging of a “Syriac Legend” of the episode. 
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Jacques Noret.  L’épitaphe de sainte Agathe, égarée, déformée et incomprise, parmi les oeuvres de saint Éphrem

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Xavier Lequeux.  Les homélies mariales traduites du grec transmises dans le ms. Augiensis 80.
Complément à la typologie des manuscrits hagiographiques grecs établie par A. Ehrhard

  • Summary: The homilies translated from Greek and preserved in the ms. Karlsruhe, Badische Landesbibliothek, Aug. Perg. 80 (10th cent.), come from the oldest Greek Marian homily book found to date. This codex, which has now disappeared, contained, among other things, a copy of four homilies by Cosmas Vestitor (8th-9th cent.), of which the Latin translations are the only remains.
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Steven Vanderputten.  Adso of Montier-en-Der’s Life and Miracles of St Basolus (BHL 1034-1035) Revisited.
A Reformist Hagiography ?

  • Summary: Adso of Montier-en-Der’s work as a hagiographer is typically over-looked in discussions of late 10th-century monastic ‘reform’. This paper revisits his Life and Miracles of St Basolus of Verzy (BHL 1034-1035) to do two things. One is to review traditional arguments about the context in which the narrative was created. The second is to argue that the text holds a hitherto unsuspected commentary on two poorly documented trends in 970s-980s monastic organization and spirituality. These trends were a push for greater integration in the governance of religious houses at a regional level, and the fostering of virtual communities of institutions that claimed a shared spiritual ancestry in Columbanian monasticism.
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Gábriel Szoliva, OFM – Jacques Dalarun.  Newly Discovered Witnesses of the Vita beati patris
nostri Francisci (Vita Brevior) by Thomas of Celano from the Medieval Hungarian Liturgical Tradition

  • Summary: The first part of the article publishes a newly discovered 13th century witness to the Vita brevior (VB) by Thomas of Celano, a one leaf parchment fragment of a breviarium notatum from the medieval Esztergom Archbishopric. In addition, the results of thorough research into the surviving medieval and early modern breviaries of Esztergom and Zagreb are given, and the use of VB as a liturgical source in the medieval Hungarian tradition is analysed. The second part of the article establishes that the Esztergom breviaries form a branch of the VB tradition and that the Zagreb breviaries form a twig of it. Stemmata and critical editions are proposed for both. These thirty new partial witnesses will make it possible to improve the edition of VB proposed in 2015 in the Analecta Bollandiana.
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Marco Fanelli.  Il dossier agiografico di san Phanourios (BHG 1510): la storia di un santo mai esistito

  • Summary: This study offers a comprehensive analysis of the hagiographical and iconographical sources concerning the origins of the cult of St Phanourios in Rhodes and Crete. The first section highlights new findings regarding the identity and activities of Nicetas Myrsiniotes, who became the Metropolitan of Rhodes at the beginning of the 15th cent. These new data provide a coherent account of the miraculous discovery of the saint’s icon and the early stages of his veneration, first in Rhodes and later in Crete, at the Valsamonerou Monastery. The second section focuses on assessing the historical reliability of St Phanourios’ actual existence, as well as examining the factors and actors that contributed to the consolidation of his cult in Crete.
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Bernard Joassart.  Quelques Miracles inédits de saint François Xavier

  • Summary: From the beginning of the publication of the AASS, the Bollandists were also interested in saints who had lived at a time close to their own, including those of the Society of Jesus. For this reason, they gathered together documentation concerning St Francis Xavier for publication in the December volumes. The archives of the ancient Bollandists contain documents relating not only to bodily healings at-tributed to him, but also to spiritual favours.
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François De Vriendt – Anne-Clothilde Dumargne.  La collection de cuivres des Bollandistes
(XVIIe-XIXe s.): inventaire, étude et valorisation

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Bulletin hagiographique

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Publications reçues

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Editors

Robert GODDING (Director), Bernard JOASSART, Xavier LEQUEUX, François DE VRIENDT, and Pietro D’AGOSTINO (Editor-in-Chief)

Scientific Committee

Theofried BAUMEISTER (Mainz), Sebastian BROCK (Oxford), Tommaso CALIÒ (Roma), Paolo CHIESA (Milano), François DOLBEAU (Paris), Sergey KIM (Lausanne), Damien LABADIE (Lyon), Cécile LANÉRY (Paris), Michael LAPIDGE (Cambridge), José Carlos MARTIN IGLESIAS (Salamanca), Jacques NORET (Brussels), Pádraig Ó RIAIN (Cork), Flavia RUANI (Paris), Herman SELDESLACHTS (Louvain-la-Neuve), Ugo ZANETTI (Chevetogne)

Submissions

Previously unpublished contributions submitted for possible publication, as well as PDF of articles on hagiographical topics (to be included in the list of “Received Publications”), should be sent to info@bollandistes.be

Books for review should be sent to:

Analecta Bollandiana Editorial
Société des Bollandistes
Boulevard Saint-Michel 24
1040 Brussels (Belgium)

Subscriptions

The journal is published twice a year (in June and December) in issues of 240 pages each.  You may choose between two formulas of subscription:

Indices

How to order

To purchase one or more volumes of the Analecta Bollandiana or to subscribe to the journal, please send an e-mail to the following address: info@bollandistes.be