Pseudo-Apuleius, De Fato. A new study with an editio princeps

Among the writings falsely attributed to Apuleius of Madauros is a treatise entitled De Fato. Its text, however, is a compilation of interpolated excerpts from Firmicus Maternus’ Mathesis, Book 1. The present article offers the first critical edition of this pseudo-Apuleian treatise, based on a collation of all the extant witnesses, and examines the origin and the cultural background of De Fato. The text originated in s. XI/XII somewhere in France, and a connection to the School of Chartres may tentatively be proposed. It appears that with De Fato some anonymus intentionally presented slightly modified excerpts taken from the Mathesis as being authored by Apuleius, thus crafting a piece of Pseudo-Antike Literatur. The present study also demonstrates that the text of De Fato was taken from a lost member of a branch of the transmission of the Mathesis (ω) that has been little studied so far. It casts new light on the reception of the Mathesis in Northern Europe during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and it is a contribution to our knowledge of the production and the reception of pseudo-Apuleiana and, more generally, of pseudo-classical literature in the high Middle Ages.