Alypius

LATTER FOURTH/early FIFTH century. Bishop of Thagaste. Friend of Jerome and Augustine, he is mentioned as collaborating with Augustine* in the conversion of an Arian physician, Maximus, of the town of Thenae in Byzacena. With Augustine and five others he was a spokesman for the Catholic bishops at a conference between Catholics and Donatists at Carthage in 411. Again with Augustine he represented Numidia at a council at Carthage in 418, at which the Catholic view of original sin and of grace was set forth in nine canons. Alypius is mentioned also among the African bishops summoned to a council at Spoleto in 419 to settle the question of the rival claims of Eulalius and Boniface I to the papacy. He was also a friend and adviser of Pinianus and Melania, a notable Roman couple who had fled before the threat of Alaric and had finally settled at Thagaste.