El centón: <i>opusculum ... de alieno nostrum</i>

The aim of this paper is to analyze the literary phenomenon of cento from the perspective of intertextuality. Its imitative nature allows us to define it in relation to the different types of textual quotation, that is, allusion, quotation itself and plagiarism, taking into account the implications of transcribing a given text to a new one. At the same time, we will consider it in the context of the notion of imitatio in Antiquity, pointing out the difficulties of recognizing clear boundaries between\udthe different intertextual procedures