In 1551 a marble statue of Hippolytus “Portuensis,” of uncertain date but not later than the 5th century, was dug up in Rome; it is now to be seen in the Vatican. He is represented as seated upon an episcopal throne, Wearing the Greek pallium, over which the Roman toga is thrown. On the sides of the throne is inscribed in Greek the rude Easter Cycle of which he is known to have been the author; behind is given an imperfect list of his numerous works. The catalogues given by Eusebius, Jerome, and Nicephoros differ slightly in details; but all bear witness to his diligence as a writer. The extant fragments were first collected by Fabricius {Hippolyti Opera gr. et lat., 2 vols, fol., Hamburg, 1716-18), and were afterwards reprinted by Galland in the second volume of his Bibliotheca Veterum Patrum (1766). See also Migne, Curs. Patr. Gr., vol. x. They include fragments of commentaries on various books of Scripture, a treatise “On Christ and Antichrist,” an “expository” (άποδίίκτίκή) discourse “To the Jews,” a fragment “To the Greeks” or “On the Universe,” tracts “Against Noetus,” “Against Beronand Helix,” and “On the Holy Theophany,” fragments of homilies (in which kind of composition he particularly excelled), and a few short quotations preserved by the author of the Chronicon Paschale. The appendix in Fabricius, containing doubtful or spurious pieces, includes “A Discourse on the End of the World, and on Antichrist, and on the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Cln·ist,” also a short account of the twelve apostles, stating where each of them laboured and where each of them died, a list of the seventy apostles, heads of the canons of Abulides or Hippolytus as used b'y the ./Ethiopian Christians, and the canons of the Church of Alexandria. Of the spuriousuess of the last mentioned at least there can be no doubt. A new interest in Hippolytus as an ecclesiastical writer was awakened among scholars about 1851 in connexion with his Omnium Hcεresium Refutatio, which has an interesting history. As an anonymous MS. of the 14th century it had in 1842 been brought among various other manuscripts from Mount Athos to Paris by Minoides Mynas, a learned Greek who had been commissioned by the French Government to search for such treasures, and had been deposited in the great national library where it was registered as a work On all Heresies. It failed for some time to attract any special notice; but the attention of Μ. Emmanuel Miller, an official of that institution, having been at length excited by some fragments of Pindar and of an unknown lyric poet which it contained, he was led to examine it more closely and to adopt the conclusion that it was the continuation of the fragment entitled Philosophumena, printed in the Benedictine edition of Origen as the work of that author. Under this persuasion he offered it for publication to the university of Oxford, from whose press it appeared in 1851 under his editorship, bearing the title Originis Philosophumena, siνe Omnium Hcercsium Refutatio. It was at once welcomed by the learned world as a literary treasure of singular value; but it was almost immediately perceived that, though Miller had certainly judged rightly in affirming it to be a continuation of the fragmentary Philosophumena, hè had as certainly erred in attributing its composition to Origen, whose authorship of the previously known portion had already been disputed by Huet, Heumann, and Gale. By Jacobi and Duncker in 1851, who were speedily followed by Gieseler, Bunsen, Wordsworth, and Dollinger, it was with increasing confidence claimed for Hippolytus, to whom it is now attributed with almost entire unanimity by critics,—the arguments of Baur (Thcol. Jahrbb., 1853) in favour of the presbyter Caius, and still more those of Armellinus {Be prisca refutatione hoercseon, Rome, 1863) in favour of Novatian, having been found tobe quite unconvincing.

Originally it consisted of ten books, of which, however, only eight survive, namely, the first and the fourth to the tenth inclusive. Book i. gives an account of the different schools of ancient philosophy—Greek, Indian, and Druidical; books ii. and iii. appear to have dealt with the doctrines and mysteries of the Egyptians and Chaldaeans respectively; book iv. (which is slightly defective at the commeneemeut)treats of Chaldaean horoscopy andEgyptian theurgy; books v.-ix. dispose of the various heresies which had asserted themselves within the Christian Church. These are taken up in chronological order and arranged in five main groups, the Ophite, Simonist, Basilidean, Valentinian or Docetic, and Noetian. Whether they be regarded as attempts to Christianize paganism, to conciliate Judaism, or to gnosticize Christianity, their unscriptural character is invariably insisted on. The entire work is summarized in book x. The value of the Refutation as a whole, in its bearing on the history of the apostolic and subapostolic ages, and on the critical problems arising out of that history, can hardly be overestimated.

Since its first publication by Miller (Oxford Clarendon Press, 1851) it has been edited by Lagarde {Hippolyti Romani quae feruntur omnia Greece, Gottingen, 1858), by Duncker and Schneidewin, (Göttingen, 1859), and by Cruice (Paris, 1860). The Refutation as well as the other extant Works and Fragments of Hippolytus are to be met with in an English translation in the “Ante-Nicene Christian Library” (Edim, 1868-9).

See Bunsen, Hippolytus and his Age (1852; 2d ed., 1854; Germ, ed., 1853); Döllinger, Hippolytus u. Kallistus (1853; Engl transl., Edin., 1876); wordsworth, St Hippolytus and the Church of Rome in the Third Century (1853); Cruice. Etudes sur de nouveaux documents historiques empruntés au livre des Philosophumena, et relatifs au commencement du Christianisme (1853); Volkmar, Hippolytus u. die römische Zeitgenossen (1855); Lipsius, Zur Quellenkritik des Epiphanias (1865), and Quellen der ältesten Ketzergeschichte (18Ÿ5); Harnack, Zur Quellenkritik der Geschichte des Gnostizismus (18Ï3-74). Lipsius and Harnack occupy themselves largely with the question as to the relation between the Refutatio and a shorter tιeatise which can be shown to have formed the basis of the works of Epiphanius and Philaster. See also Jacobi, art. “Hippolytus,” in Herzog-Pitts Real-Encyclopädie (1880).

HIPPOLYTUS, St, according to the Roman breviary, was one of St Lawrence’s converts, who, when summoned before the emperor Valerian on account of the practice of his religion, made a public profession of Christianity. First beaten with rods, he was finally delivered over along with all his family to death, the mode of execution in his case being similar to that by which Hippolytus the son of Theseus perished. The mythical character of this legend, which, however, can in part be traced as far back as to Prudentius (Hym. 11), is recognized by Döllinger (see his Hippolytus u. Kallistus, chap. ii.). This saint, along with Casianus, is commemorated by the Roman Church on August 13. He is the patron of Mexico.