Adeodatus was the son of Augustine. He was born when Augustine was seventeen years of age.
It began in 372 at Carthage and ended in about 385 in Milan.
In the year 372 this concubine bore Augustine a son.
They named the child Adeodatus, which is Latin for "given by God."
The conception of Adeodatus was described by Augustine as being unplanned, hence the child was "given by God" in a number of senses of the phrase. Augustine felt he contributed nothing to the boy’s making but his fault!
Augustine was then a Manichee, for whom procreation was one of the worst sins possible.
The family of three lived in Carthage until 374, when they moved to Thagaste, the home town of Augustine.
There he opened a simple school that taught grammar.
They moved back to Carthage again in 376, where Augustine now felt confident enough to open a more formal school of rhetoric.
He persisted there for eight years, as Adeodatus approached adolescence.
In 383 the young family moved to Rome, where once again they met some friends from North Africa, including Alypius. In 384 they moved to Milan.
The mother of Augustine, Monica, joined them in Milan in 385. She set about arranging a marriage for him with a Catholic woman of an appropriate rank and means so as to promote his career.
For Augustine, this meant expelling his faithful partner of fourteen years.
This parting was emotionally difficult for both of them, and no doubt for Adeodatus as well.
Whereas the partner was sent back to North Africa, Adeodatus remained with his father and with Monica, his grandmother.
(Continued on the next page.)
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