Beatus

d.798. Spanish presbyter, abbot of the Benedictine monastery of St. Martin's at Liébana, near Santander, diocese of León, and counselor of Queen Adosinda of León. Expecting the sixth age of the world to end in 800, he compiled, largely from earlier writers from Irenaeus to Isidore, a Commentary on the Apocalypse, in three recensions (776, 784, 786). This catena gathers up the Western tradition of Apocalyptic commentary, and in particular preserves much of Tyconius's* lost work and possibly unknown sections of Apringius's (mid-sixth-century bishop of Beja in S Portugal). The richly illustrated MSS of Beatus's Commentary, ranging from the ninth to the thirteenth centuries, are of major significance for medieval Spanish art. Beatus opposed the Adoptianist* Christology of Elipandus, and with his disciple and fellowmonk Etherius, bishop of Osma, wrote in 785 Against Elipandus. He was also a hymnwriter.