Augustine of Hippo, also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Africa. His writings influenced the development of Western philosophy and Western Christianity, and he is viewed as one of the most important Church Fathers of the Latin Church in the Patristic Period. His many important works include The City of God, On Christian Doctrine, and Confessions.
Hippo Regius is the ancient name of the modern city of Annaba, Algeria. It historically served as an important city for the Phoenicians, Berbers, Romans, and Vandals. Hippo was the capital city of the Vandal Kingdom from 435 to 439 AD. until it was shifted to Carthage following the Vandal capture of Carthage (439).
Donatism was a Christian sect leading to a schism in the Church, in the region of the Church of Carthage, from the fourth to the sixth centuries. Donatists argued that Christian clergy must be faultless for their ministry to be effective and their prayers and sacraments to be valid. Donatism had its roots in the long-established Christian community of the Roman province Africa Proconsularis and Mauretania Tingitana, in the persecutions of Christians under Diocletian. Named after the Berber Christian bishop Donatus Magnus, Donatism flourished during the fourth and fifth centuries. Donatism mainly spread among the indigenous Berber population, and Donatists were able to blend Christianity with many of the Berber local customs.
Augustinians are members of several religious orders that follow the Rule of Saint Augustine, written in about 400 AD by Augustine of Hippo. There are two distinct types of Augustinians in Catholic religious orders dating back to the 12th–13th centuries:
The Rule of Saint Augustine, written in about the year 400, is a brief document divided into eight chapters and serves as an outline for religious life lived in community. It is the oldest monastic rule in the Western Church.
Marcellinus of Carthage was a Christian martyr and saint who died in 413. He was secretary of state of the Western Roman Empire under Roman emperor Honorius and a close friend of Augustine of Hippo, as well as a correspondent of Saint Jerome. Saint Augustine dedicated the first books of his landmark The City of God to Marcellinus in 413.
The Councils of Carthage were church synods held during the 3rd, 4th, and 5th centuries in the city of Carthage in Africa. The most important of these are described below.
Melania the Younger is a Christian saint, Desert Mother, and ascetic who lived during the reign of Emperor Honorius, son of Theodosius I. She is the paternal granddaughter of Melania the Elder.
Alypius of Thagaste was bishop of the see of Thagaste Algeria) in 394. He was a lifelong friend of Augustine of Hippo and joined him in his conversion and life in Christianity. He is credited with helping establish Augustine's monastery in Africa. Most of what is known about him comes from Augustine's autobiographical Confessions.
Fabius Claudius Gordianus Fulgentius, also known as Fulgentius of Ruspe was a North African Christian prelate who served as Bishop of Ruspe, in modern-day Tunisia, during the 5th and 6th century. He has been venerated as a saint.
Pammachius was a Roman senator who is venerated as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches. He married Paulina. After her death, he gave himself up to works of charity.
Thagaste was a Roman-Berber city in present-day Algeria, now called Souk Ahras. The town was the birthplace of Saint Augustine.
Augustinian nuns are the most ancient and continuous segment of the Roman Catholic Augustinian religious order under the canons of contemporary historical method. The Augustinian nuns, named after Saint Augustine of Hippo, are several Roman Catholic enclosed monastic communities of women living according to a guide to religious life known as the Rule of St. Augustine. Prominent Augustinian nuns include Italian mystic St. Clare of Montefalco and St. Rita of Cascia.
Calama was a colonia in the Roman province of Numidia situated where Guelma in Algeria now stands.
The Archdiocese of Carthage, also known as the Church of Carthage, was a Latin Catholic diocese established in Carthage, Roman Empire, in the 2nd century. Agrippin was the first named bishop, around 230 AD. The temporal importance of the city of Carthage in the Roman Empire had previously been restored by Julius Caesar and Augustus. When Christianity became firmly established around the Roman province of Africa Proconsulare, Carthage became its natural ecclesiastical seat. Carthage subsequently exercised informal primacy as an archdiocese, being the most important center of Christianity in the whole of Roman Africa, corresponding to most of today's Mediterranean coast and inland of Northern Africa. As such, it enjoyed honorary title of patriarch as well as primate of Africa: Pope Leo I confirmed the primacy of the bishop of Carthage in 446: "Indeed, after the Roman Bishop, the leading Bishop and metropolitan for all Africa is the Bishop of Carthage."
Thiava was an ancient Roman-Berber civitas in Numidia, Africa Proconsulare and in the Vandal Kingdom. It was a Latin Catholic diocese.
Avensa was a Roman and Byzantine-era civitas (city), in Roman North Africa.
Maximian was a 4th-century Bishop of Carthage and founder of a splinter group that left Donatism.
Petilianus was an eminent Donatist of the 5th century Roman North Africa, who is known to history through the letters he wrote to the Catholic Bishop Augustine of Hippo and discourses in Augustine's replies. Although most of what we know of him comes from Augustine, his main theology seems to have been "that the true church was only composed of those who were repentant."
Perpetua was a late Roman abbess, the daughter of Saint Monica and Patricius, and the younger sister of Augustine of Hippo.
