VENANTIUS Fortunatus

Venantius Fortunatus (c. 530 – c. 600/609 AD), a Christian poet of the sixth century, born in Upper Italy, at Duplavis, near Treviso in Venetia, Italy. Fortunatus is best known for two poems that have become part of the liturgy of the Catholic Church, the Pange lingua gloriosi proelium certaminis ("Sing, O tongue, of the glorious struggle"), and also wrote Vexilla Regis prodeunt ("The Royal Banner forward goes"), which is a sequence sung at Vespers during Holy Week. He has been venerated as Saint Venantius Fortunatus since the Middle Ages.