Reviews
Hieronymus’ Witwenbüchlein für Salvina 
(epist. 79): Text, Übersetzung, Einführung 
und Kommentar. Philip Polcar. Berlin: Peter 
Lang, 2021. 373 pages, 77.10€  
 
Reviewing commentaries is often difficult. As compilations of lore 
from throughout classical scholarship, they often cross the borders 
between the disciplines and exceed the meager confines of a single 
reviewer’s competencies. Nevertheless, reviews are necessary, espe-
cially for a late antique text, where a commentary can often remain 
the only one for the foreseeable future. Serving as the unwary reader’s 
accessus and companion to an ancient text, it can wield dispropor-
tionate influence for generations, rendering quality control all the 
more important. To start with the conclusion: from a philologist’s 
perspective, Philip Polcar’s commentary on Jerome’s epistula 79 is a 
highly competent piece of craftsmanship. It fulfills its core function 
as a commentary well, answering most questions that a reader could 
conceivably have about the text in a way that generally enriches the 
reading experience. Notwithstanding any criticisms in the following, 
it is a worthy addition to any well-stocked library on patristic authors.
In the monograph under review, a revised version of a disser-
tation submitted at the University of Konstanz in 2019, Polcar sets 
out to provide a full-scale commentary on a single letter of Jerome’s 
correspondence such as will be familiar to those who have read the 
work of Scourfield, Adkin, and Cain. The letter under investigation, 
epistula 79, is addressed to the newly widowed Salvina, containing both 
consolation for the loss of her husband, Nebridius, and exhortation to 
chaste widowhood. After a brief introduction to Jerome and the letter’s 
place in the ancient epistolographic tradition (pp. 11–19) and a survey 
of the edition and the manuscripts consulted (21–24), there follows 
a Latin text with a facing translation (pp. 24–45). The Latin is – with 
a few notable exceptions – a reproduction of Hilberg’s CSEL edition 
(1910–1918), which remains the standard to this day. This is not due to a 
lack of philological craftsmanship or enterprise – Polcar has consulted 
Carolingian manuscripts unknown to Hilberg and regularly comments 
on variant readings – but rather a testament to the solidity of the text 
as transmitted. The rendering into German is not slavish and often 
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WILLUM WESTENHOLZ224
seeks to replicate Jerome’s lively style by eschewing Latinate syntax. It 
does, however, hew closely to the sentence and clause divisions of the 
original, making it easy to consult the translation at a glance whenever 
the Latin should prove intractable. The substance of the monograph 
is made up of a section written in continuous prose that deals with 
problems of a broader nature (pp. 47–171), followed by a lemmatized 
commentary on the problems that can more easily be isolated to a single 
word or line (pp. 173–326), capped with a conclusion summarizing the 
most important findings (pp. 327–329). 
In the introduction, Polcar attempts to situate the letter in its 
historical and cultural context as well as within Jerome’s oeuvre. A 
prosopographic chapter delineates the background of Salvina and 
Nebridius, her deceased husband. Both are shadowy figures that 
would scarcely have been known if not for Jerome, which inevitably 
results in several tentative conclusions and inferences. Thus, two pages 
(pp. 55–56) are devoted to the fraught question of whether Salvina’s 
famous father Gildo was a Donatist – a hypothesis Polcar rejects 
as unfounded – which could serve as an indication of the religious 
persuasion of his off-spring. Polcar recognizes the limitations of the 
evidence and is careful to distinguish between hypotheses and facts. 
For example, he suggests that Nebridius might have served as comes rei 
privatae immediately before his death, which would allow the use of the 
tenure of the following office holder, Studius, as a terminus ante quem 
for Nebridius’ death. This, in turn, would allow for more exact dating 
of the letter (pp. 105–106). The problem is that this edifice hinges on a 
maximalist interpretation of a single line in the letter (79.5.12) that is 
perhaps more suggestive than probative. However, the suggestion is 
never represented as more than a pet hypothesis and is always flagged 
with a caveat. Overall, Polcar manages to paint a coherent picture of 
the sort of people Salvina, Nebridius, and their associates must have 
been, which gives the reader a good sense of the intended audience 
for Jerome’s letter.
The question of the audience naturally segues into the question of 
the genre of the text. Polcar resolutely declares himself in favor of the 
widely – if not universally – accepted view that letters do not constitute 
a genre. Except for a few external characteristics, such as carrying the 
addressee’s name at the head, they are principally defined by their 
potential for infinite variability. The seeming tension between the text 
that is both a libellus intended for public consumption and an epistula 
directed at an audience of one is not so much resolved as dismissed 
as only apparent. Like Jerome himself, Polcar will refer to this and 
other of Jerome’s letters alternatively as a “Traktat,” as a “Brief,” or 
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PHILIP POLCAR’S HIERONYMUS’ WITWENBÜCHLEIN FÜR SALVINA 225
as a “Büchlein” without much distinction, see, e.g., p. 163 for all three 
in rapid succession. Accepting that a text can without contradiction 
be both a letter and a treatise is, to some extent, necessary to Polcar’s 
further argument. As he demonstrates in the taxonomical chapter 
(pp. 67–79), epistula 79 is composite, consisting of a consolatory section 
that addresses the specifics of Salvina’s situation (chapters 1–6) and a 
protreptic section on the proper behavior of widows that seems to have 
a wider audience in mind and that at times becomes incongruent with 
Salvina’s circumstances (chapters 7–11). This is all the more paradoxical 
considering that the first section talks about Salvina in the third person, 
while she is addressed in the second from chapter 7 onwards. That fact 
seemingly caused Polcar sufficient discomfort that he felt compelled 
to address it in a truly Teutonic two-page footnote, which has been 
tucked away in a comment on the word sciat (pp. 184–185, n. 52). The 
term “letter” must consequently be flexible enough to include a text 
that has not only two similar but separate purposes but also two similar 
but separate audiences. 
This leads to the two most ambitious chapters in the introduction. 
In chapter 5, “How to get a Camel through the Eye of the Needle” 
(pp. 81–104), Polcar addresses the practical motives behind sending 
the letter to Salvina, treating the text primarily as private communi-
cation. In chapter 7, “Jerome’s Widow Trilogy” (pp. 107–171), epistula 
79 is viewed as a part of Jerome’s broader program on widowhood. 
Chapter 5 delves into the dire state of Jerome’s finances in the years 
around 400 AD, his need for support, and his reputation as an inhe-
ritance chaser or captator. While Polcar is careful to distance himself 
from Jack Goody’s thesis that the reason that patristic authors favored 
virginity and widowhood was that they benefitted from childless people 
leaving everything to the church (p. 81–82), he nonetheless assigns 
much weight to the practical benefits accruing from the amicitia of 
a wealthy and influential widow for one in Jerome’s position. In this 
way, he bolsters the view that the addressee and the letter’s focus on 
charity as a central theme were chosen out of opportunistic concerns 
in the short term. 
Chapter 7 addresses the long-term ideological concerns by consi-
dering the letter a “Fachbuch” for public consumption. In this chapter, 
Polcar compares the three letters on widowhood, Ep. 54, 79, and 123. He 
discusses the themes covered in each letter and how they supplement 
each other to complete the subject when viewed together. This results 
in a thorough overview of the thoughts not merely of Jerome but many 
patristic authors on various themes related to widowhood, from charity 
to remarriage. Moreover, it shows how Jerome’s treatment of the topic 
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WILLUM WESTENHOLZ226
harmonizes with ideas he expressed much earlier and later, elevating the 
content over the immediate concerns at the moment of composition. 
This perspective, however, also introduces one of the more daring 
hypotheses. The subsequent letters, Polcar contends, were written with 
the preceding letter(s) in mind in such a way as to avoid redundancy, 
indicating that Jerome wrote for the audience either familiar with or 
with easy access to his prior letters (p. 165). This touches on the more 
delicate subject of how ancient texts and letters were “published” and 
circulated, which is bound to prove contentious. Polcar is, as always, 
aware of the limitations of his evidence and concedes that it admits 
of different interpretations. In this case, Jerome’s choice of themes 
may have been influenced by the circumstances of his addressee, but 
the general trend of Polcar’s argument is towards an interpretation of 
the texts as carefully crafted to be consumed by the general public, to 
be read within the context of Jerome’s broader oeuvre. It is, however, 
thoroughly fitting that a text as composite as this written by a character 
as complex as Jerome is subjected to a treatment that pulls in so many 
often slightly contradictory directions.
The lemmatized commentary is broad in scope, as indeed it must 
be to evince 150 pages of notes from just over ten pages of text. Polcar 
comments on stylistics, grammar, linguistics, classical and biblical 
allusions, philosophy and theology, cultural and church history, 
and more. This displays an impressive breadth of knowledge and 
interests that does the author credit. Particularly useful are the notes 
commenting on Jerome’s tone and rhetorical strategies. Polcar has a 
keen ear for the coloration of words, for irony and satire, and for the 
development of the argument. This manifests both in the details and 
the broader strokes of each chapter. For example, he explains that 
the word marsuppium is colloquial and is typically used by Jerome 
in satirical contexts (p. 181), an aspect of coloration that the reader 
reliant on Lewis and Short would have missed. The explanation of the 
Biblical allusion behind the “furnace of Babylon,” its use in patristic 
literature, and the punning on fornix / fornax (p. 227–228) similarly 
makes it much easier to follow the thread of argument for those read-
ers unused to the rhetoric of Christian polemics. Shortly afterwards, 
Polcar explains how elements of Jerome’s consolation show similarities 
with the precepts of classical rhetoric for eulogies (p. 233). The mix of 
classical and Christian culture is a healthy one that will not only help 
make the text accessible to readers of various backgrounds but is also 
invaluable to properly understand Jerome.
The notes are perhaps, if anything, too copious. They contain all 
sorts of odds and ends from the antiquarian’s cabinet of curiosities 
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PHILIP POLCAR’S HIERONYMUS’ WITWENBÜCHLEIN FÜR SALVINA 227
that do not necessarily help the reader better interpret the text, calling 
to mind the didactic variorum commentaries of the late Renaissance. 
In 7.18, for example, Jerome lists a series of dishes from which Salvina 
abstains, starting with the Phasides aves or pheasants. The reader is 
told that Isidore, drawing on Martial, erroneously derives their name 
from the Greek island Phasis (p. 262–263). This leaves one with two 
unanswered questions. Firstly, why is Isidore’s etymology relevant? 
Secondly, what is the correct etymology? – To spare the curious a trip 
to their Pauly-Wissowa on the second count: The derivation is etymo-
logically sound, the error consists in calling Phasis, a river in Colchis, 
an island. – Polcar continues: Aristophanes is the first to mention 
pheasants. Pliny the Elder was fascinated by their “feather ears.” Then 
follows the pertinent information: Pliny, Seneca, Galen, and Ambrose 
regarded pheasant as an extravagant delicacy, explaining why it is given 
pride of place among the luxuries, and some otherwise vegetarian 
ascetics made an exception for fish and poultry, marking Salvina as 
morally superior for not resorting to such dubious loopholes. Several 
similar notes could have benefited from some tightening and a clearer 
sense of the implicit question(s) to which they provide the answer. 
If, however, the most grievous fault one can find with a commentary 
is that it is excessively informative, it is a good commentary indeed.  
To end on a literary-aesthetic note: as a non-native speaker, I cannot 
speak with authority about the elegance of Polcar’s prose, but I can say 
that it is uniformly clear and immediately intelligible. Polcar eschews 
the labyrinthine periods characteristic of the German academic style 
in favor of briefer, punchier sentences that seldom exceed three lines 
and never do so gratuitously. The tone, though suitably scholarly and 
laden with subjunctives, is unpretentious and at times playful. Thus 
one chapter heading reads “Poor monk seeks filthy rich widow” (p. 89), 
parodying an advertisement from a lonely hearts column. The problems 
that Polcar attempts to solve are mostly concrete and specific to the text. 
Consequently, his prose is relatively free from abstruse abstractions 
and technical jargon borrowed from anthropology and literary theory. 
Whether this is ultimately a strength or a weakness is perhaps a matter 
for debate, but it does make for an easier read. One never feels the need 
for a commentary to the commentary. The vo lume itself is handsomely 
produced and typeset, and apart from a few minor complaints to be 
directed at the copy editor – inconsistencies in whether a comma or a 
dot is used in references to classical texts (7,13 or 7.13), a missing space 
on p. 237, an aberrant apostrophe in “durch’s” passim, etc. – gives a very 
professional impression.
    Willum Westenholz
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