ON THE BLESSED BARDUCCIO AND JOHN OF VESPIGNANO, LAY CONFESSORS,
AT FLORENCE IN ETRURIA.
IN THE YEAR 1331.
A HISTORICAL COLLECTION.
Of their pious death, miracles, cult, and relics.
Barduccio, lay Confessor, at Florence in Etruria (B.)
John of Vespignano, lay Confessor, at Florence in Etruria (B.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
Of the life and deeds of these Blessed [men] a most brief synopsis was left us by one who could have known both by face, the writer of the Italian Florentine Chronicle, Giovanni Villani, in book 10, chapter 179, prefixing this title: The memory of their virtues and miracles surviving. "Of certain miracles which were wrought at Florence." The whole chapter I render into Latin: "In the year 1331 there ceased to live two good and just men, of holy life and conversation, and of large alms, although they were laymen. To one the name was Barduccio, who was buried in the church of the Holy Spirit at the place of the Eremite friars. The other was called John of Vespignano, whom they laid down at St. Peter Major. Each God illustrated with open miracles, healing the sick and those crippled in various members; each is famous by a solemn funeral; to each were hung up several votive tablets of wax." Thus Villani, whose text in the Ecclesiastical Annals, at the said year 1331, Raynaldus thus contracted: "There were wrought also in the same year at Florence several miracles, by the work of two pious secular laymen, of whom one, Barduccio by name, was buried at the church of the Holy Spirit of the Augustinian friars, the other, John Vespignano, at the temple of St. Peter Major … and very many gifts were hung up at their tombs."
[2] And this is all the surviving notice of the Acts of either Blessed, by Silvano Razzi, in part 2 of the Etruscan Saints, thus expounded, that it suffers the holiness and cult of both by no means to be doubted. The Acts either not written, or lost. "I should believe," he says, "that a long history of their deeds and miracles would have survived, had not, a plague arising which some years after, namely from 1348, began to rage, the memory of those, as also of other things, wholly perished." Razzi goes on to narrate that the church of the Holy Spirit, in which we said Bl. Barduccio was buried, was so consumed by flames that of his sacred body nothing was afterward heard, nor anything of the relics handed down to memory. The time of the mournful conflagration Francesco Cionacci, a Florentine presbyter, author of the latest Italian Life of the Venerable Humiliana, formerly denoted in a paper transmitted to Papebroch, writing of it in the Acts of the 19th of May, thus: "When in the year 1370, on the night between the 13th and 14th of March, the temple and ancient convent of the Holy Spirit was consumed by fire, there were reduced to ashes the tomb, altar, votive tablets, and all the other sacred memorials of the aforesaid Bl. Barduccio."
[3] But that nonetheless some cult persevered, the writer of that same paper is again witness, Both are joined, although the day of death is uncertain. adducing a certain old Florentine Calendar from the archive of the manuscripts of Senator Carlo Strozzi, number 1144 of the books on the shelf, where at the end of the months are read particular indulgences to be gained from Septuagesima Sunday up to the octave of Easter in various temples. Then indeed (these are the words of the writing) "And on the octave day of Easter is celebrated the festivity of Bl. Barduccio at the church of the Holy Spirit." Whether this cult perseveres today, I have not ascertained; that it was before the fire of the aforesaid temple, and afterward endured, this is enough that this place here be granted to that Blessed, although it can be affixed no more to this day than to any other uncertain [day]. It is here inserted on account of the society of Bl. John of Vespignano, whom they assert to be venerated on the Sunday within the octave of SS. Peter and Paul, on account of the translation of his sacred body made on that day, for which it seemed good to select this fourth day of July, although for the rest the day of death of either Blessed is unknown, inasmuch as Villani had neglected to note it.
[4] Nothing was omitted by Papebroch, The burial of the former consumed by fire, by which more distinct notices of either Blessed might be acquired through Florentine friends; but from the letters received thence I see that he and we too are referred to the above-praised Silvano Razzi, who, where he has suggested a very few things of Bl. Barduccio, continues concerning the other: "The burial of Bl. John, of which Villani speaks, was at first not in the temple itself, where it now exists, but, by the custom of that time, rather in the monastery itself or cloister, whence, with others of which the vestiges still appear, it was removed and translated into the temple, all access of men being shut off to the monasteries of women, which before the Council of Trent lay more freely open." Here Razzi brings forward a certain brief little commentary, found among the nuns, in which it is thus had in Latin: "For at the tomb of this illustrious man (Bl. John) they report that, now for a long time, a blind man was enlightened; which indeed to believe, considering the merits of his life, I judge to be right. And they report that at first he was buried in the cloister of the nuns of St. Peter Major, where he adjudged himself to be laid."
[5] The body of Bl. John was raised whole. Papebroch wrote more than once to Florence to obtain a sincere transcript of that paper or little commentary, with vain labor and effort, since in the aforesaid convent of virgins nothing was found; so that consequently all things are recalled to the credence of Razzi, although he, I know not for what cause, has suggested only shreds of that writing. He says therefore that from that first tomb the sacred body was raised, whole and immune from every law of corruption, [and] exposed with due honor on some altar of the temple, the people running together to the spectacle. Then the paper continues, whose words alone we here distinguish: "While these things meanwhile are being done, a little woman now already decrepit with age, lame indeed of foot, and deprived of both eyes, on hearing these things, immediately, going to that same basilica to pray, as she could more fitly, carried herself up, aid being afforded, etc." It premised before that she was restored to complete health. But Razzi is wondrous, who, mutilating the autograph, judged his own words to be preferred to it. For the rest, he asserts the sacred spoils were then laid down in a chapel of the temple to the left, yet so that, since they did not sufficiently appear, they were afterward placed in a more illustrious position, as we shall show below from two Latin inscriptions expressed on either side of the altar, which we have taken care to have engraved.
[6] The last shred Razzi sewed on, which regards each Blessed, A little paper reporting few things of both. or the conjunction of both, thus beginning from Bl. Barduccio: "He held indeed, I suppose, a true friendship with a certain John of Vespignano. Frequently they met by turns; concerning the order of prayer and the rite of compunction they very often discoursed together, the one rendered the other more prompt to alms, to love, to macerations of the body, and to the hope of eternal life: and at the same time and month, loosed from the bonds of the flesh, they migrated to the heavenly kingdoms, in the year 96; but of our recovery conceived, 1335." What that year 96 means, I do not at all understand, nor is it needful to inquire: the epoch of death here appended deceives no less, the eye-witness testimony of Villani standing for the year 1331. Nor am I moved by the scruple of a learned Florentine, who found in the testament of the most illustrious Giovanni Boccaccio, deceased in the year 1375, the name of some Barduccio, as of an heir, and who consequently must have been surviving after that year 1375. Ours, together with Bl. John, put off mortality in the above-said year 1331. To say [it] in a word; so much stands firm of the report of these two Blessed [men]'s virtue, holiness, and primitive cult, as the authority of Villani, the contemporary writer, testifying of things done in his time, evinces.
[7] A not incurious observation the praised Cionacci adduces, Dante seems to have designated only [these just men.] by which he thinks there can be fitted to these two Blessed Florentines of the same time the words of the most famous Etruscan poet Dante, when, singing his Inferno, he asks in the sixth canto whether at Florence even a single just man is found, and receives this for answer: "Giusti son due, ma non vi sono intesi" Just men there are two, but they are not heeded: that is, there are two just men, but they are not heard. As if he should say, Barduccio and John of Vespignano live piously and holily, but to the tumultuous people and populace, distracted into grave factions, they are most unknown, nor are they much moved by their virtues, as being beset by contrary vices, pride, envy, avarice, with which the hearts of the disordered multitude are kindled. Well enough do the matters and times agree and suit, the Florentines struggling foully among themselves at the beginning of the 14th century, but Dante ordered into exile, who, since he protracted life at Ravenna up to the year 1321, could have known and praised those Blessed [men], alone out of all Florence following Christian justice; for so much the more did their virtue shine forth, as by graver crimes the citizens were at that time immersed. Let the pious conjecture avail, joined with so apparent a verisimilitude.
[8] The monument of Bl. John is explained. It remains that we represent the illustrious monument of the cult of Bl. John, the altar itself erected to him,
in the church of St. Peter Major of the nuns of the Order of St. Benedict, mentioned above, in the left nave, whose likeness we here set before the eyes. On the horn of the Gospel left side is to be read this inscription: "Tomb of Bl. John of Vespignano, who died A.D. 1301 read 1331, distinguished by miracles and holiness; almost consumed by age, Sebastiano Sandrio of Pescia, prelate of this temple, restored [it], in the year of salvation 1594." Below are the arms of a creeping Lion. On the other side is: "The bones of Bl. John of Vespignano, to excite piety, from the opposite and lower place, Domenico Brunaccio, prelate of the shrine, placed more loftily in a sepulchral chest. A.D. 1621." The arms represent a crab with two stars. This Blessed is venerated neither by ecclesiastical office nor by Mass, yet up to the present day his festivity is held on the Sunday within the octave of St. Peter the Apostle, when, the front part of the chest which is set upon the altar being removed, the relics are exhibited to the veneration of the people. Whether he was sprung from the destroyed castle of Vespignano, or from the Bruni family, there is nothing whence you may certainly gather: he is depicted bearded, an old man, and in the red senatorial habit; which and other things, since nothing more accurate could be obtained from Florence for explaining them, let the commentary here have its end.