Latinus (or Latinius) Pacatus Drepanius was born during the 4^th c. in the south of Gaul, in the area of Aginium (modern Agen), as Sidonius Apollinaris testifies (Ep. 8.11.2).  He probably resided and studied rhetoric at Bordeaux, perhaps becoming one of the professors of the famous school celebrated by Ausonius (Pan. 2.1); the fact that Drepanius is not named in the Commemoratio, however, indicates that he was still living at that time.  He was a dear friend of Ausonius, who dedicated to him a few refined and lovely works, such as the Eclogues, the Technopaegnion, and the Ludus septem sapientium, and considered him one of the greatest Latin poets, inferior only to Vergil.    He went to Rome in 389, in which year he recited his Panegyricus before Theodosius; it is not clear, however, if this mission was of an official nature, or if it was in some way related—from a political point-of-view—to the defeat in Gaul of the usurper Maximus in 388.  He quietly became a significant person in the imperial court: in 390 he obtained the proconsulship of Africa, and in 393 the charge of comes rei privatae, though this latter fact is not certain because it is based on the identification of our panegyrist with the Drepanius mentioned at Cod. Theod. 9.42.13 (contra Lippold; following Matthews, Nixon-Rodgers).  His religious faith has been discussed.  Although there are no secure reasons to deny his Christianity, as Galletier has proposed, he was in any event familiar with the internal disputes of the new religion, as is demonstrated by the persecution of the Priscillian heretics, which perhaps also affected a few of his friends (Pan. 29).  We have no other notices about him in the following years.  [A. Balbo; tr. C. L. Caterine].