Blossius Aemilius Dracontius

Blossius Aemilius Dracontius was a distinguished Roman-African jurist and poet educated in the flourishing rhetorical schools of late 5th-century Carthage. Imprisoned in chains by Vandal King Gunthamund for composing a panegyric celebrating a foreign ruler (likely the Eastern Roman Emperor), he spent years in a subterranean cell.

During his imprisonment, he composed his greatest masterwork, De Laudibus Dei (In Praise of God) in three books of hexameters, celebrating the creation of the cosmos, human redemption, and divine mercy. His verses represent the final glorious twilight of classical Latin poetry on North African soil.