«Mirabile prorsus evenit ostentum»: riprese apuleiane nelle «Vitae» di Romedio BHL 7144 e K

Until the rediscovery made by Zanobi da Strada (1312-1361), the narrative works of Apuleius seem to have had a narrow circulation during the Middle Ages, principally limited to the area surrounding Montecassino (where the most ancient surviving manuscript containing these texts, the codex F, was written) and to authors which might have copied parts of Apuleius without having a direct knowledge of him. New evidence of the presence of apuleian echoes from Metamorphoses has been discovered in two hagiographical texts, the Vitae sancti Romedii BHL 7144 and K, the first of which was probably written between the end of the XIIIth and the beginning of the XIVth century in the Tyrolean area, generally considered marginal in comparison to the main centers of humanism. These echoes from a literary source, which was used in particular for the miracle of the bear tamed by the saint, show how the indirect tradition of Apuleius might still be important in order to reconstuct the history of the transmission of his writings.