The Vitae Patrum (literally Lives of the Fathers, also called Lives of the Desert Fathers) is an encyclopedia of hagiographical writings on the Desert Fathers and Desert Mothers of early Christianity. The Greek and Latin texts were compiled, edited, and translated into Latin by the Jesuit Heribert Rosweyde and printed by Balthazar Moret in 1615. The bulk of the original texts date from the third and fourth centuries.[1][2] The book is a significant part of the much broader work, Acta Sanctorum.[3]