ON BLESSED BARTHOLOMEW OF CERVERE
MARTYR OF THE ORDER OF PREACHERS
AT SAVIGLIANO IN PIEDMONT.
IN THE YEAR 1466
CommentaryBartholomew of Cervere, Martyr of the Order of Preachers, at Savigliano in Piedmont (Blessed)
BY AUTHOR D. P.
[1] For suppressing the foul filth of the Subalpine heretics in Piedmont, Liguria, Lombardy, and Savoy, the holy Order of Preachers performed much and faithful work, with Inquisitors of the faith destined to various places infected by the same venom, From the inquisitors of the faith illustrious for sanctity. of whom various in various places and years bore off the laurel of martyrdom, others merited the glory of Confessors through many labors endured in such a good cause. Savigliano venerates three such Heroes, venerably placed in the church of Saint Dominic, and famous for miracles, namely Blessed Anthony Pavo, Blessed Bartholomew of Cervere, Martyrs; and Blessed Aymo, born of the most illustrious family of the Taparelli, Confessor: whose tombs the inhabitants of that and neighboring places devoutly visit, on account of the fame of the miracles by which they are said to have shone living and dead. That we might be able to treat of these more distinctly and clearly, we wrote various letters to Turin, to be handed over to the Prior of the Convent of Savigliano; to which that they should be answered, was studiously done not only through the Rector of our Turin College, three rest at Savigliano, but also through the Dominican Inquisitor of Turin; nothing was obtained: so great is the torpor of certain men, though religious, in procuring the glory of the Saints, even domestic ones. Let him see how he excuses this sloth of his to the Order; we, as on 9 April we gave the history of the martyrdom endured by Anthony Pavo, such as we found at Milan in the manuscript codices of Ambrose Taegius; so now from the same we give, what alone we can, the passion of Blessed Bartholomew. The same Michael Pius has in Italian from the aforesaid Taegius, part 1, book 3, §38, and convicts of error Anthony of Siena in his Chronicle, who thinks that about the year 1230, and others in the same, that about 1250, Bartholomew suffered: but he accuses Castiglione of much greater exorbitance, who believed that Bartholomew was crowned a little after the death of Saint Dominic, which occurred in 1221, and finished his agony by the cutting off of his head: which all things fall from a more certain relation: and it is such.
[2] of whom one is Bartholomew Brother Bartholomew of Cervere, of the convent of Savigliano of the province of Lombardy, killed by the heretics for the defense of the Catholic faith, underwent martyrdom in the year of the Lord 1466, on the 11th day before the Kalends of May. He was a Master in Theology, outstanding in life, holy in reputation, and famous in estimation: a most fervent preacher, an unconquered Inquisitor of heretical depravity, a strenuous defender of the Catholic faith, and a most acute opponent of heretics. This Blessed foresaw and foretold his own death. he himself foretold his death, For when he had to go to Cervere to execute the inquisition committed to him by Apostolic authority against the heretics, he diligently and devoutly confessed to Brother Christopher of Caramagna, and after confession he said such words to him: "I am called Brother Bartholomew of Cervere, and yet I have never been at Cervere: now indeed I shall go there for the office of Inquisition, and there dying I shall finish my life": which was also done. For when from Brayda nearly half a mile before Cervere he was coming with two companions, namely Brother John Boscato and Brother John Peter of Richardis; five heretics, members of the devil, attacked them: of whom two pierced through the blessed man in the belly with lances, in the manner of a cross; he gladly and voluntarily receiving martyrdom for the Catholic faith, and in no way defending himself. Brother John, his companion, was gravely wounded in the shoulder and thigh, and finally escaped: but Brother John Peter escaped wholly unharmed. From the body, however, of the holy Martyr in the hour of death, blood did not go out, until the Brothers of his Convent came into the church of Cervere, in which various prodigies occurred: where his sacred body had been placed: and then immediately from his wounds the greatest rivulets of blood flowed out. In the hour also of his passion, when the sun had almost set, there was seen by the people of Savigliano another sun toward Cervere, where the Blessed man suffered martyrdom. In the place also where he expired, a walnut tree afterwards grew, which produced all its branches and leaves in the manner of a cross, like an olive tree.
[3] Many and almost infinite miracles afterwards he worked by his prayer: one being invoked, a prisoner is freed. of which we shall narrate one, quite manifest. A certain Dean of Savigliano, when he had been imprisoned in the castle of Summaripa of the forest, and bound with iron fetters, and had remained in the said prison for no small time; and was mindful of this holy Martyr, made a vow to God and to the Blessed Martyr Bartholomew, that if by his merits he should escape from the aforesaid prisons, he would take care to place one wax candle at his tomb. A wonderful thing! on the following night, when he was somehow drowsy, he found himself outside Summaripa in the borders of the said town with the iron fetters: which easily removing from his shins, he came to Savigliano, and had these fetters with the said promised candle placed at
the tomb of the holy Martyr: and he caused so stupendous a miracle to be published, to the praise of God and the glory and honor of the holy Martyr. For on that same day great joy was made in the aforementioned castle of Savigliano, with the ringing of bells and spiritual canticles.
[4] He suffered in the year 1466 There is also in the codices of the same Taegius one, written with the title of Chronicle, in which on folio 289 the original narration is inserted. "In the year of the Lord 1466, on the 21st day of April, the Reverend former Master Bartholomew of Cervere, Inquisitor of heretics, was killed near Cervere, namely by John Baridon, Andrew Jayme, Francis Conaza, Michael Morella, and another heretic from Cervere. near Cervere," The rest follow almost word for word as we related above: to which nothing else occurs to be added, except that the place of Cervere is a village adjoining the river Stura, at the sixth or seventh mile from Savigliano toward the East, commonly called Cervire: to which on the north there adjoins a little hill and on it a village or castle, called Bra on the topographical tables, but here Brayda. Summa Ripa of the Forest, where the miracle occurred, one going from Savigliano toward the city of Asti meets at about the tenth mile; and then another castle of the same name, surnamed de Perno from the neighboring place itself. But worthy of mention and praise above all is Savigliano itself, between the Maira and Malea rivers, which there mingle themselves with the Po, where the middle interval is almost between Turin and Savigliano, distant scarcely more than twenty thousand paces. Moreover the place is so commodious in its situation, and buried at Savigliano, that Charles V passing there with his army toward Provence said, he had never seen a place more apt for nourishing however great an army; and Duke Emmanuel Philibert sometime thought of establishing his seat there, and making the city the metropolis of the province, as is read in the most recent description of Piedmont in the Blaeu Atlas.
[5] The body at Savigliano lies religiously placed under a certain altar: under which also the body of Blessed Aymo Tapparello is honored, uncertain on what day or year he died: under an altar under which also Blessed Aymo. who, since he had the care of the translation of Blessed Anthony Pavo, it is credible was the Prior of that same convent, about the end of the 14th century or beginning of the 15th. Michael Pius praises him for the utmost austerity of life, and says that his image is painted in many places of Piedmont in such a way that, with his head girt with rays, he holds a crucifix in his right hand and a book in his left, namely the one which, lying in the bier, he so tightly clasped with his compressed hand, that he did not release it however great the violence was applied. Among his miracles there is named, that for a woman whose milk at the command of physicians he had used in decrepit age, he cured the ulcerated and wholly to be cut off breast, being piously invoked after death.