Oddinus Barottus

ON BLESSED ODDINUS BAROTTUS

AT FOSSANO IN PIEDMONT.

In the year 1400.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Of some cult, from the processes and Acts.

Oddinus Barottus, at Fossano in Piedmont (B.)

Of the city of Fossano it had to be treated at length once in this work, on the occasion of St. Juvenal of Narni, bishop, worshiped there as patron of the city (at least as it was then reported), whom Papebroch judged rather to have been another Saint, though synonymous, distinct from the mitred martyr of Narni, Celebrated only among his countrymen in the Commentary composed on his Acts in volume 1 of May from page 406, where various instruments are reported, transmitted to our Elders from Fossano and Turin, both printed and manuscript, in which nothing is passed over which can in any way conduce to the splendor of the affairs of Fossano, so that, those matters being there abundantly explained, they need not be produced again in this place; the notice there given of Fossano certainly suffices. Furthermore those instruments are such that they everywhere have annexed, among the Saints or at least other illustrious men of Fossano, this Oddinus too, surnamed Barottus, whom they constantly proclaim blessed, once provost of the chief church, then collegiate, now cathedral, and celebrated among his countrymen in the small number of those renowned for illustrious deeds, virtues, and miracles.

[2] For my part I will confess that I have more than once wished for somewhat more illustrious indications of a legitimate cult than are those which are adduced in the monuments of the people of Fossano, and this indeed all the more, because by Ferrarius, a collector of popular Saints by no means sparing, and one who scrutinized all the Saints and Blessed of Italy with such diligence, and who reports St. Juvenal of Fossano so distinctly, I observed no mention anywhere made even by a word of that blessed Oddinus; he is there adorned with the title of Blessed, so that consequently his memory occurs in no sacred Fasti anywhere, however recent, so that you may easily perceive that it did not pass beyond the walls of Fossano before the seventeenth century, being in a manner buried for two whole hundred years, until in the year 1608, chiefly by the effort of his kinsmen, the testimonies of various inhabitants began to be collected, by which the fame of his notable deeds, more illustrious virtues, miracles, and some cult might be established, at least in such a way that the people of Fossano brought their Oddinus very near to the altars.

[3] About sixty years ago, namely in the year 1667, there was sent to our Elders a little Italian work of John Niger, canon and penitentiary of the aforesaid church of Fossano, whom our Elders acknowledged, printed at Turin in Italian in the year 1650 under the title of the Life and miracles of the glorious St. Juvenal, etc., of which we have shown that enough was already said at May 3; with which, since Papebroch did not altogether acquiesce, the matter was brought to this, that at last the very manuscript instruments were procured, from which the praised Niger had collected all his own. These are a manuscript codex of thirty and more whole leaves of paper, or more than one hundred and twenty pages in folio, from which the things pertaining to St. Juvenal have already been given, the rest are referred chiefly to Blessed Oddinus, and Papebroch judged them such that of the whole instrument at page 409 he wrote in this manner: And so the whole instrument, or rather the most faithful collection of several instruments, is concluded, and confirmed by the impression of the episcopal seal, in such wise as it is kept in our Museum for the memory of posterity, and the use also of other times, when it must be treated of Blessed Oddinus in July.

[4] Papebroch therefore judged that the testimonies of many there reported were of such a kind that he did not at all doubt that this Blessed one should here be treated; in which I not unwillingly subscribe to him, although the signs do not seem illustrious enough. although, as I was just now saying, I could wish for somewhat more urgent documents of a true and legitimate cult; whether those which we have are such, will presently become more manifest, when from Niger's own autograph letters it shall have appeared that after the Life published by him not a jot of celebrity accrued. Thus he himself writes to Papebroch on April 8, 1675: To the cult of blessed Oddinus Barottus nothing has accrued since the year 1650, except certain ornaments about his image existing at the side of the choir. But that cult is bestowed which was exhibited before a hundred years ago. Namely private prayers and vows are made; he is painted with rays, and publicly worshiped; yet no altar is set up, nor is sacrifice made, nor are lights hung up, even on June 22 (read July 21) his feast, but those are kindled at the high altar. It has pleased here to attach his effigy, as also that of St. Juvenal, which, from the devotion of the people, after others already printed, are circulated.

[5] I marvel indeed that a man otherwise accurate should have been mistaken about the day of death, which he had so clearly expressed in the Life or eulogy published by him, The Life is taken from the processes where he is said to have died not on June 22 but on this July 21, and to have been buried on the following day, that is, the 22nd. Furthermore the process already mentioned, or collection of testimonies, in the manuscript begins at folio 27, where is premised the common or general deposition of the whole city, gathered in its chief men or councillors, who in great number, at the instance of the Reverend Lord Peter Antony Barottus, proclaim as true all those things which in the following instrument and in the rest of the depositions are deduced far more fully and severally, and which are the very heads from which the praised John Niger neatly collected and adorned his Life, translated by us into Latin, so that there is plainly no need to render the long process into Latin, or here with wholly useless labor to describe the whole, extended to almost a hundred pages. The title of the Latin institution is conceived in this manner: Testimonials of the requisition, exhibition, supplication, and of the books and of the swearing of oaths and informations. Behold now the instrument itself, here and there contracted.

[6] whose chief substance, In the year of the Lord 1608, on the 6th day of June, at Fossano, judicially before the most illustrious and most reverend Lord Thomas, by the grace of God and of the Apostolic See bishop of Paphos, coadjutor of Fossano, appeared the Reverend Lord Peter Antony Barottus, in his own name and that of the others of the Barottus family, exhibiting the aforesaid supplication, beginning: The aforewritten nobles set forth … and he asks that informations be taken, and witnesses examined, for the eternal memory of the matter, of and upon the things contained in it, and first that in the year of the Lord 1400 and about that time there was among the living the very Reverend Lord Oddinus, of the same family of the Barottus, provost, while he lived, of the church of SS. Mary and Juvenal … Likewise he asks that informations be taken from the witnesses to be presented, insofar as they depose upon the voice and fame, and that they themselves know that the said blessed Oddinus first, while he lived, was provost … Likewise that the aforesaid blessed Oddinus, on account of the sanctity of his life and notable works of piety while living, and at last dying, the divine clemency permitting, obtained the name of Blessed, as even to these times his painted images endure, and that they know these things from their elders, the voice and fame and other aids concurring …

[7] set forth at length in the manuscript instrument, Likewise of the state and how his painted images remain. Likewise where the relics of his body were reposited, and how they now lie and are found, and of their state. Likewise that the said blessed Oddinus at his own expense ordered rural chapels to be built … Likewise of the pious devotion of the people toward the said blessed Oddinus, and that he is and has been reputed for blessed. Likewise that his image too was painted with the inscription of his name, before the walls of the old choir were destroyed. Likewise that in the year 1368 he had the care of souls … Likewise he was elected penitentiary with the very authority of absolving which the penitentiaries at Rome enjoy … Likewise of the many authorities granted to him … Likewise of the many miracles, as the witnesses to be examined shall have said. Likewise that in the year of the Lord 1376 he went to Jerusalem for the sake of visiting the sepulcher of our Lord Jesus Christ … Which being heard, the aforesaid most illustrious and most reverend bishop coadjutor and vicar general, having seen and diligently inspected … ordained that the requisite informations were to be taken from the witnesses to be presented, which were thence taken, etc.

[8] is briefly set forth; There is subjoined a copy of the sayings and depositions of the witnesses examined, upon the life, morals, and acts of the late very Reverend Father blessed Oddinus Barottus, and of the things contained in the aforewritten requisition. But then, in order, the testimonies of twenty and more witnesses are reported, sought out under a Latin formula which is repeated for each, the rest of the context being deduced in Italian. Behold the first witness, folio 29 verso. And first the noble lord Michael Cuneo, upon the things contained in the aforewritten exposition of those of the Barottus family, informing with an oath, the Scriptures being touched, as above, deposed that he knew and it was known to him, that as long as he the witness was an adolescent, etc. And these same things throughout the whole rest of the codex are accurately premised for each witness, and the testimonies of all are agreeing enough, although not all the articles are arranged in the same order for each witness in altogether the same series: let it suffice that already then in the year 1608 there was a constant tradition, received through that time from elders, fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, concerning the life, morals, and acts of the blessed Oddinus Barottus of whom we speak, whose rayed old effigy, transmitted hither by Niger, we took care to have engraved in bronze, but the whole eulogy we translated from Italian into Latin, and subjoin it.

BLESSED ODDINUS BAROTTUS

Provost of the church of Fossano, died in the year 1400, July 21, aged 56, by permission from above.

[9] For the explanation of the exhibited image it is to be observed in a few words that it is asserted everywhere in the praised processes or testimonies, and very often inculcated, and the depicted image is explained. that Christ the Savior appeared to Blessed Oddinus, as in the pictures it is eagerly expressed, as the author of the eulogy also narrates below at number 12. And these are the things which concerning Blessed Oddinus could hitherto be obtained. In vain I insisted by various letters for a whole year and more, that clearer and more solid arguments of a persevering cult be suggested to me; it was permitted to obtain no answer, so that I easily understood that the whole matter persists in its ancient state, and that consequently the people of Fossano are not today greatly solicitous about the cult being approved at Rome. Nor indeed do we wish anything to be added to the veneration by our reckoning, since by the common and usual appellation there, doubtless tolerated by the Ordinary

—at least permitted, if not approved—we have called Oddinus blessed: let him be called merely venerable, or by any other name whatever: certainly his virtues and singular documents of ecclesiastical perfection and sanctity we judge to be such as may deservedly be proposed to all clerics for an example. And indeed that the received opinion of Blessed Oddinus's sanctity long ago prevailed, Ughellus too is witness, volume 4, column 1512, when he thus writes: The cathedral is of ancient but elegant architecture, where, besides the bodies of the holy Alverius and Sebastian, martyrs of the Theban legion, and of blessed Oddinus, provost of that church, deceased in the year 1400, the relics of St. Juvenal … rest. Behold now the compendium of the Life, which we said was very lately rendered from the native tongue into Latin.

LIFE

Or rather eulogy

Translated from the Italian of John Niger into Latin.

Oddinus Barottus, at Fossano in Piedmont (B.)

from the Italian of J. Niger.

As a youth enrolled in the clerical warfare, Blessed Oddinus was born at Fossano in the year 1334, his father Jacob, his mother Catharine, spouses, of the conspicuous and ancient family of the Barottus, which, since it for three centuries back has always produced upright men endowed with the fear of God, these have not obscurely shown that they were not unlike the progenitors of the Blessed one himself, and that they consequently obtained singular favors from God by his merits and patronage. Piously therefore and laudably educated, giving indications of a docile and easy disposition, he was presently applied to the thorough learning of letters, in which how much he profited, from the offices of which he was held worthy, one may manifestly conjecture: but since by his nature he inclined more to the offices of piety, being enrolled in the clerical warfare, he thus shone more and more day by day in virtues and good morals, and so pleased in administering ecclesiastical affairs, that he was called to govern churches and undertake the care of souls, before he had attained the age at which he might be promoted to the priesthood.

[2] presently applied to pastoral care, Impelled by this fame, the bishop of Turin at that time, his ordinary, the defect of one year being graciously supplied, ordained him a presbyter, that he might be rendered capable of governing the parish church of St. John the Baptist, nearly the chief of the diocese, which the family of the Operti, its patron, of their own accord offered to him. Having obtained this, he spread the sails of his pastoral zeal, both in expounding the word of God, and in administering the Sacraments, and indeed in other exercises of the spirit and in the offices of charity; and so for some years he presided over the aforesaid church, that even then he conciliated veneration to himself, especially in that he inflamed the exterior ministries with the inward sense of a devout mind, assiduously intent on prayer, vigils, and fasts, so that very often he fed on herbs and vegetables alone.

[3] he shone in all virtues, and set out for Jerusalem. But that he might make plain how abjectly and humbly he thought of himself, about the year 1376 he clothed himself in a coarse and rude habit, plainly of that form in which those go about who profess the third rule of St. Francis, macerating himself with many and hard penances; but since he was borne with a singular ardor to contemplating the passion of our Savior Jesus Christ, he was thence kindled with so great an affection, and conceived in his mind so great a fire of love, that he could no longer be restrained from visiting those sacred places where both the theater of the aforesaid Passion of the Lord had been, and the traces remain. That therefore he might more nearly commune with the pains and torments of his Redeemer, in about the same year, furnished with the due faculties and letters, he undertook the pilgrimage to Jerusalem, being made possessed of his vows, not without desire of martyrdom, God permitting that he should fall into the captivity of the Turks, with his companion Jerome Mareneus of Fossano, to whom, when he had foretold the day of future deliverance, he returned with the same into his homeland.

[4] But then, being well instructed in the discipline of penance, Raging rigidly against himself, he provides for the poor; he did not cease to exhibit continual documents of it, both by his frequent sermons, and by the parsimony of his clothing and food, using a frugal, nay a poor table, that he might succor the needy; content with almost Lenten foods, he distributed the rest to beggars: and if ever any flesh was set on his table, to send it away to the poor sick was his daily custom; of which thing a singular example did not lack a miracle. There was one who ordered a capon to be set before the blessed Man on the Christmas feast, but he himself enjoined his cleric to carry it at once to a poor sick woman; who answering that he did not know where that woman dwelt, in this way he showed him the road: Go, he says, the Lord will show you the door. The cleric therefore, proceeding at random, when he came opposite the door of a house, felt the dish in a manner snatched from his hands, and, entering by this indication, consoled the sick woman. There are those who relate that the Blessed one said to the cleric: Go, here this dog will lead you in to the sick woman; and that the dog, obeying, followed the cleric, until it stayed its step near the sick woman.

[5] He was held by so great a zeal for the welfare of souls and the conversion of sinners, that, to excite them with a more powerful goad to penance and confession, and wont to perform various offices alone, he obtained from Pope Urban VI the faculties of an Apostolic penitentiary, and from the bishop of Turin licence to absolve from reserved cases, as is clear from the patent letters given to that end on July 7 in the year 1374. Furthermore, on account of that supreme esteem which the prelates his superiors had conceived of him, delegations and businesses concerning ecclesiastical matters were more often committed to him throughout all the neighborhood of the territory of Fossano; and there was granted to him by the aforesaid bishop the power of exacting restitutions due to uncertain persons, of distributing them to pious uses, nay and of commuting vows. But when various people of Fossano desired to visit the sacred places of Rome and Loreto, he himself was chosen as leader and director of the journey; wherefore, that he might be a greater solace to the pious pilgrims and be able to administer the Sacraments, he obtained a portable altar, as they call it, from the Apostolic Legate of Turin by letters given on the tenth of December 1380.

[6] Singular indeed was this Servant of God's mercy toward the poor, he builds a hospital and erects various chapels. and no less memorable his zeal toward pious places, in which he was intent with perpetual care to bestow and procure aids for the needy; but among his other works more illustrious is this, that in the year 1382 he undertook the erection and construction of the greater hospital, for which thing he collected so many alms and legacies, and contributed so much of his own, that from a narrow house and cramped lodging of pilgrims he brought it into such a state that it could both receive the poor sick and sustain them. Tradition also bears that four chapels were founded by him in honor of the holy Peter the Apostle, Stephen, Bernard, and Lazarus the beggar, not far from the suburbs of the town, disposed in a manner in the form of a quadrangle, as it were spiritual bulwarks or stations of the pilgrim townsfolk, such as were sometimes granted by the chapter, endowed with some endowments.

[7] Raised to the provostship of the church Pious procurations of this kind, to which he assiduously applied himself, conciliated to him so great esteem and veneration that, the provostship being vacant in November of the year 1389—that is, the first and chief dignity of the then collegiate church of Fossano—the most pious Priest was by the common votes of all acclaimed successor, and by the chapter itself, with a most sweet contention, induced to accept the dignity. But when he perceived himself the head of the church, he conceived greater spirits for making progress, and courage for attempting greater things, presently conferring counsel with the canons and people about enlarging the church, and about erecting a tower; and he applied himself to this thing with such great zeal and ardor that it most happily befell him to behold the very work consummated in the year 1397.

[8] he restores the church anew, And certainly a thing plainly to be marveled at, that with aids not stable but plainly uncertain he could build the middle part of so great an edifice, with the frontispiece and that great mass of the bell-tower. But his assiduous care and diligence was the treasury for the meditated work, since, besides the contributions, alms, and legacies which with singular dexterity he knew how to extract, from Amadeus VII, first duke of Savoy, he obtained the faculty of freely selling grains for the increase of the building, and brought it about that the bishop of Turin remitted that part of the tithes which belonged to him in the territory of Fossano; as even today from the codices of the cathedral archive appears the whole economy of the Servant of God, not only in order to the building of the church but also of the hospital. Nor indeed did the Lord leave that fervent zeal of his worship unrewarded, as from two miraculous prodigies was made manifest.

[9] Of the first they thus record: While a rather large beam was being drawn for the fabric of the church, not without various prodigies; the wheels of the wagon were so fixed in the mud that, although three pairs of oxen had been yoked, it could not be moved from its place, until blessed Oddinus, running up, gave courage to the drivers; and, four oxen being dismissed, he applied only two to the yoke, and, having imparted a blessing to them, seizing the pole with one hand, wielding the goad with the other, Come, he says, proceed in the name of the Lord and of holy Juvenal; and behold at once, not without the amazement of the bystanders, the two oxen most conveniently drew the beam to the church. The other was, that a mason fell from the top of the tower while blessed Oddinus was in the church, who, warned by the noise and cries of the unhappy fall, with tears poured out, and a brief prayer premised, came to the mason lying and held for dead, and, addressing him by name and taking his hand, confidently said: Fear not, no evil has happened to you; return to your work: and he, as though roused from sleep, raised himself on his feet, and again ascended the tower.

[10] But with how great zeal and love he was borne toward his fellow-citizens and countrymen, in that same year 1397 it especially appeared: and averts calamity from the fields. for when he had observed the fruits of the neighboring fields miserably laid low nearly every year both by hail and by other intemperance of the air, he induced the community to appoint by a particular statute the feast of St. Bridget the virgin to be kept, whom they also chose as co-patron and protectress, and there followed afterward a perpetual and constant observance of the same festivity. I think here is indicated that Irish virgin Bridget who is celebrated among the people of Fiesole, as being more known to the Italians than the other much older St. Bridget the wonder-worker, likewise Irish. Of both it is treated on the same day, February 1; which I wished to be here noted in passing. The writer of the eulogy proceeds:

[11] The good Servant of God made an end of living in the 66th year of his age, on July 21, in the year 1400, and was laid in the common sepulcher of the canons: He dies with great opinion of sanctity, but the Lord would not that the glory of his merits should remain buried also; for soon after his death he more than once appeared with a resplendent body, on bended knees before the high altar, and so was seen by the sacristan, about to give the signal with the bell for Matins. But when this was reported to the bishop of Turin, a faithful examination being premised, both concerning the aforesaid apparitions, and concerning his virtues and miracles, he ordered the body, still entire, clothed in white, to be placed in the wall of the choir on the side of the Gospel, in a raised place between three longer stones, so that through a little window, closed with an iron grating, the body could be beheld, on the following

distich written below:

Here lie the venerable limbs of Oddinus Barottus, / whom a pious life gave as provost of the temple.

[12] The upper part of that sepulcher was occupied by the painted effigy of the Saint, and is honorably buried. with rayed head, in the canonical habit, kneeling before the image of the Savior set forth in a cloud, in that manner in which he had once appeared to him; this epitaph being subscribed:

Jesus Mary. Blessed Oddinus Barottus, PROVOST OF THIS CHURCH, IN THE YEAR OF THE LORD 1400, IN THE EIGHTH INDICTION, ON THE 22nd DAY OF THE MONTH OF JULY, WAS BURIED. HE WAS PIOUS, PRUDENT, HUMBLE, SOBER, CHASTE, AND QUIET, WHILE THE PRESENT LIFE QUICKENED THE LIMBS OF HIS BODY.

[13] His relics are visited, While the relics remained in this state, they were visited by Jerome della Rovere archbishop of Turin in the year 1566; then indeed by Jerome Scarampo bishop of Campagna and Apostolic visitor in the year 1583, and by them were shown with the utmost veneration to their familiars and to strangers who then happened to be present. But so greatly did the fame of the Servant of God's sanctity increase, together with the people's confidence in him, on account of the singular graces which after his death were obtained, that in various churches and other places his effigies were represented, all rayed, with the title of Blessed, but especially in those of St. Juvenal, St. John the Baptist, St. Francis, St. George, and also in the frontispiece of the hospital, which appear even today.

[14] and other signs of veneration are added. It must be confessed, however, that by the ignorance of men and the iniquity of the times (as happens also in other matters) the care of entering the received benefits into the tables was neglected, which, as tradition bears, were very many, and among them that memorable one, that those afflicted with headache, when they applied it to the tomb of the Blessed one, departed thence forthwith free from all sense of pain: many besides have attested that by his merits and intercession they dispelled tertian and quartan fevers; whence at his sepulcher and at his picture frequent votive offerings were seen, so that in the opinion of men he was ever held and believed Blessed. But it happened that the deposit of his body, since it impeded the construction of the new choir, was translated by the first bishop of Fossano, Camillus Daddeus, into a becoming chest, on April 4, 1595, but in the year 1608 it was again placed on the right side, among those ornaments of the sculptor's art which are still beheld, by the zeal and munificence of the priest Peter Antony, kinsman of blessed Oddinus; by whose care and zeal, namely, the processes cited above in the commentary were instituted, and so the veneration toward the Blessed one was confirmed.