The essay examines the interpretations that Étienne Gilson and Robert Markus offered for the civitas terrena (or civitas diaboli) theorized in Augustine’s De civitate Dei. First, the essay recalls the most delicate and ambiguous aspects of Augustine’s notion of the civitas terrena, namely its flexible semantic field and its paradoxical consistency. Then, it takes the way in which Gilson and Markus approached these questions as a starting point for a broader reflection on their re-readings of Augustine’s thought and their application of it to the present. Although these re-readings contrast under many respects, Gilson’s being ecclesiological while that of Markus is political, they are alike in dissolving Augustine’s couple (civitas terrena/civitas dei) within a tripartite scheme. As such, these interpretations are representative of a major tendency in the modern and contemporary reception of the work of the Bishop of Hippo.