Aldebrand

ON SAINT ALDEBRAND

BISHOP OF FOSSOMBRONE IN UMBRIA.

12TH CENTURY.

Aldebrand, Bishop of Fossombrone in Italy (St.)

D. P.

[1] Forum-Sempronii, an ancient municipality of the Romans, on the river Metaurus on the Flaminian way, commonly called Fossombrone, is distant from Urbino, (to whose Duchy it is reckoned) about eight miles, and from the times of Pope Symmachus, Although the series of Bishops uncertain, at the beginning of the sixth century, is known to have had its own Bishops, when Felicissimus and Innocentius Bishops of Fossombrone are found to have been present at three Roman Synods. The series thence is had neither continuous nor sufficiently certain. So that not even concerning St. Aldebrand, whom that Church venerates as Patron on these Kalends of May, is the time in which he sat found out. John Baptist Lando, created Bishop of Fossombrone in the year 1633, in the Catalogue which he submitted to Ferdinand Ughelli, to be inserted in volume 2 of Sacred Italy, places him and Richard in the 13th century, between Monaldus and Gentile: but by mere, as it appears, conjecture, and which it is not difficult, the calculations of Chronology being applied, to overthrow.

[2] There is extant a diploma of Pope Honorius III to Monaldus, and the autograph is kept in the archive of the Church, yet it is proved that Aldebrand is wrongly deferred to the 13th century, given in the 8th year of his Pontificate, which was of Christ 1224. There is extant to Gentile a Brief of Alexander IV given in his first year on the 2nd of the Ides of March, and so in the year of Christ 1255. How much before this one, how much after that one sat, is not known: yet it seems much if twelve or thirteen years by conjecture you interpose: but these as Richard could easily have filled, since he could not have been Bishop for a long time, whom most confess to have instituted his life from the order of St. Francis: so that they are too narrow for the Episcopate of St. Aldebrand we must necessarily confess, if we consider what in the Acts to be brought forth below in num. 4 is said, that, before he died, he had lived for the space of about a hundred years. It appears moreover from the same that he was elected in flourishing age, since he was Provost of Rimini and publicly preached to the people, in the square before the church, with so great freedom of speaking, that he had it necessary to withdraw himself from the eyes and hands of the raging crowd from the pulpit to the bell-tower of the church: which sufficiently argue a vigor of mind by no means senile, much less of decrepit age.

[3] Let us see therefore whether the light, which the people of Fossombrone deny, as he could have at the confine of the 11th and 12th century, we can find among the people of Rimini. Cesare Clementini, author of the History of Rimini book 3, thus writes of him. In the year one thousand one hundred nineteen Aldobrand, once Canon and Provost elected, according to the custom of the Chapter of Rimini, and afterward Bishop of Fossombrone, on the first day of May passing to the heavenly life, was enrolled among the Blessed. Thus he perhaps from the monuments of the church or city of Rimini itself: whom we can the more securely believe, the greater the gap at the confine of the 11th and 12th century the Catalogue of the people of Fossombrone exhibiting, affords a more convenient place for his however distant Episcopate. For between Fulcuinus, who in the year 1076 sent as legate to the Synod of Salona, there by the power made him by the Pontiff declared Demetrius King of Dalmatia and Croatia, as Baronius has; and Gualfridus, to whom Duke Guaimer gave four Castles in the year 1140, you will easily find forty years, which you may so attribute to St. Aldebrand, that elected about the year 1080, until 1119 he came: then either Gualfridus he had as successor, or some other before this one, whose name has fallen out.

[4] But if it is allowed to suspect, that Cesare, in noting the year, followed the somewhat older Rubeus author of the History of Ravenna, Rubeus from conjecture alone, from whom he seems to have borrowed the last lines, and corrected him in this only, that there he places his death, where Rubeus seems to place his election as Provost; and so this year you may say to be uncertain, you will be able to retain Aldebrand even for fifty and more years in the Episcopate. Rubeus certainly, for making in such a year mention of Aldebrand elected as Provost, nothing else moved, than the opportunity of the place, where he had described, how the order of the Canons of Porto Paschal II in the year 1114 confirmed, and four years after a Rule prescribed to the same by Peter of Ravenna: under which since the discipline of the new institution flourished, it was brought about that, adding him to the Porto Regulars, very many flowed together to the monastery of Porto, and gave themselves into the discipline of its Canons. But this when he had said, in the very year in which the founder Peter died 1119, he adds; Among these Aldobrand is read to have been, who born in the town Sorbetulo of Bolium or Galliata near Cesena, and instructed in Grammar, into the Porto monastery, that he might make greater progress in letters and piety, betook himself.

[5] But assuredly nowhere is it read in the Acts, that Aldebrand was among those, against the faith of the Acts, who held the form of life instituted by Peter; nor anywhere any mention of the monastery, but only is named, study in the Canonica of St. Mary in Porto, where then the seven liberal arts were taught. But this Canonica and the study in it could have been of a much earlier time; and to it afterward that Peter by a vow built a monastery, in which the old ones perhaps having lapsed, the new Canons, not in that secular form as before, but regularly should live; when now Aldebrand in his Episcopate of Fossombrone was passing about the ninetieth year of his age. Certainly there is no appearance of truth, that the Canons of Rimini, whom no one with foundation would say were Regulars, would have wished to seek for themselves a Provost from the Regulars: and if you should feign that they wished, they ought to have sought him from a Prior or Abbot, but not (as the Acts say) from the Lord Doctor of that place.

[6] I know that the Canons Regular of the Lateran Congregation in the past century obtained, that concerning him as their own, it gave them cause of venerating him as their own on the 10th of May. they could keep the Office on the 10th of May: because the monastery of Porto, in the year 1420 almost desolate, passed to the Canons of the rule of B. Augustine and of the Congregation and Religion of the monastery of St. Mary of Frisonaria, as the Bull has in Pennotto part 3 chapter 16, num. 4, of which Congregation the appellation at length ceased in the more splendid name of St. John Lateran. Nor do I wish to controvert that with the best right whatever Canons Regular, who lived in monasteries, afterward united to their Congregation, they number among their own. One thing I say, that for asking the Office for St. Aldebrand no other foundation is brought forth, than the authority of Rubeus; who after the Rule ordained by Peter, brings him into the monastery of Porto. But this foundation is none: because it fights with the Acts, of which Pennotto himself, Annotation 16 on the proper Offices of his Order, says, that the same distributed into three Lessons the people of Fossombrone use, in an idiom indeed less polished, but which by its barbarity savors much of antiquity: from which Acts we have now shown, that among the Bishops of that church no place is found for St. Aldebrand, if he be believed to have come forth from the institution of Peter of Porto, begun only in the 12th century; because thus he could not have lived a very long time in the Provostship and Episcopate, which yet the aforesaid Acts require.

[7] Nonetheless Pennotto insists in the aforesaid Annotation, and proposes an argument, and that from ancient pictures no better confirmed. which in his judgment removes wholly all doubt: There is extant, he says, even today in the citadel of the city of Fossombrone a most ancient chapel, preserved from the relics of the ancient church of Fossombrone: in which chapel the body of B. Aldobrand at first was buried. There is extant the life of the same Saint, painted on the walls of the same chapel in most ancient images, with the miracles wrought through him. But all the images present him with the inner habit white, and with a small and white biretta (which was the ancient habit of the Canons of Porto) even constituted in the Episcopal dignity, so that there is no more place for doubting, that he was truly a Professed Canon of the Monastery of Porto. But I from pictures of this kind understand nothing else, than that the Saint is expressed in that habit which at Rimini using he was Provost, perhaps also at Ravenna a Canon: which habit, even after the Rule prescribed by Peter, there preserved it is fair to believe. But just as the older Canons before Peter I will not say were therefore Regulars, because the succeeding Regulars retained that habit which they themselves had worn; so Aldebrand I will not believe by the indication of such a habit to be certainly claimed for the Regulars, while stronger reasons fight to the contrary and those inevitable; unless one wish to tear up the faith of the Acts, without which the assertions of later authors are of no faith.

[8] Ughelli published those Acts in volume 2 of Sacred Italy, and we give them from him: and at the same time we suggest that the ancient church, of which Pennotto makes mention, The body translated with the Cathedral in the year 1392. was begun to be built by St. Aldebrand himself, and afterward consummated by the Archpriest Thomas Accarigi: whose Archpriest's age, if it were demonstrated from elsewhere, would perhaps bring not a little light to this argument. Concerning this therefore from the people of Fossombrone themselves we shall await whether they can teach us, from the monuments of their Chapter, making some mention of that Archpriest. Meanwhile Ughelli says column 910, that the Canons of Fossombrone (who are eleven besides the provost) that ancient Cathedral, in the times of Boniface IX, while for the new city new defenses were prepared, demolished: and the church of St. Maurentius, which was in the Villages, they erected into a Cathedral: and to the same the monastery of St. Benedict, with a revenue which for the Episcopal

table would suffice, they annexed in the year 1392 on the Ides of January. and from his name called the Cathedral. On which occasion was translated also the body of St. Aldebrand; and from then or at least after the restoration of the said Maurentian church, made I know not when, it began to be called the Cathedral Church of SS. Maurentius and Aldebrand: and both to be reckoned by common right Patrons of it: in which also is celebrated the feast of St. Aldebrand translated on the 13th of March; but of St. Maurentius the Martyr, whose body is had there, on the 31st of August, according to Ferrarius in the Catalogue.

[9] The Acts when written. The Acts when they say, that Aldebrand himself the Provost therefore preached at Rimini, because then there were no Mendicant Orders, not only prove that he flourished before, but moreover demonstrate that they were not written before the beginning of the 13th century. But how long after the year 1200 they were written, who would say, unless he know, in what year the people of Fano occupied the city of Fossombrone, and thence carried off the bells as at the end of num. 7 is said? Meanwhile I would scarce doubt that all were written before the year 1300, of which an epitome you will find in Ferrarius in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, after the memory of St. Aldebrand, as Patron of Fossombrone, inserted in the general Catalogue of Saints, who are not in the Roman Martyrology.

ACTS

From ancient MSS. published by Ughelli.

Aldebrand, Bishop of Fossombrone in Italy (St.)

BHL Number: 0243

FROM FERD. UGHELLI.

[1] Saint Aldebrand, born in a certain castle, which is called Sorbetulo de Boybo a or de Galiata, of Romagna near Cesena; and instructed in grammar, went to the Study b in the Canonica of St. Mary of Porto of Ravenna, of the Province of Romagna, His studies at Ravenna being performed, where then the seven liberal arts were taught. And then the Canons of Rimini, lacking their Provost, did, as the other Chapters of the said province of Romagna, he is made Provost at Rimini; when they lacked their Prelates: and so they went to the aforesaid Canonica of Ravenna, and asked of the Lord Doctor of that place a man, fit and sufficient for their Provost. Counsel and deliberation being had, they gave them St. Aldebrand, knowing him to be holy and pious, and in sacred Theology and c in the Decretals found sufficiently skilled; and with devotion and reverence they received him as their Provost. And since this was, that then there were no Orders of Mendicants d, therefore he himself preached to his people of Rimini.

[2] where on account of his freedom of speaking imperiled of his life, And once preaching in the square before the church of the Canonica of Rimini itself (which today is called Alogia) and especially concerning the village of Pataranias, and that unjustly and undeservedly they detained the port of Rimini and part of the said square, which were goods of the said Chapter of Rimini; they rose up with fury unanimously, and wished to seize him: but he fleeing from the f gallery g recovered himself into the bell-tower of the said Chapter, in which he stood through the middle of the day. And seeing the people persevering wishing to slay him, fearing death he sought withdrawal from the city of Rimini. And going out of the city, he found in the street before the monastery h of St. Gaudentius messengers destined on the part of the Chapter i of Fossombrone and the people, and they knelt and presented to him the election of the Bishopric of Fossombrone. and thence going out he is sought for the Episcopate, But he first gave thanks to God, received and accepted the said postulation, with the intent of caring for the souls of this people, as he says: He who desires the Episcopate, desires a good work. 1. Tim. 3.

[3] And confirmed by the Pope k he disposed himself to work good: and then he began a great church, because before it was small, near the well of that church; which being accepted he builds the Cathedral, which great church he consummated with part of the roof; but the remainder with the walls consummated Lord Thomas Accarigi, Archpriest of the Chapter of Fossombrone l: and on account of his sanctity besides he granted to the Bishopric of Fossombrone the Mass estate of Sorbetulo. Among other things thus he acted: a beautiful little chamber in his room he had, and by night between the bed and the wall on a bench and twigs clothed he lay. he lives austerely, Flesh he did not eat, wine a little he did not taste, haircloth he wore, for the most part he fasted, and with cellar open for the poor he stood; to the houses of the poor he sent foods: on festival days to the people of Fossombrone he preached. And once preaching there were many swallows in the church singing, so that the people did not hear him preaching: he commanded that they be silent, and they were silent. to the noisy birds he commands silence, Once a day he gave audience, so that anyone could narrate his necessary affairs. A meek man he was and gracious.

[4] Afterward coming to the want of death, because he had lived for the space of about a hundred years, and because he tasted nothing, a certain partridge n cooked in two platters was presented that of it he might taste: but he looked upon it, and the cooked partridge he restored to life, and remembering that he was not accustomed to eat flesh, over it with his hand he made the sign of the Cross, and commanded that to the forest o it should return; and immediately it revived, and departed alive, flying before those present and standing by. And immediately he asked for fresh cherries, and they presented them to him. In the infirmity of his death and before living in sanctity, he frees demoniacs, there went to him demoniacs and those vexed by unclean spirits: and he looked upon them, and with a smile with the sign of the Cross signed them, on account of which God dismissed them unharmed. Many from Ancona and from other places, burdened with diverse infirmities, went to him, and freed they departed.

[5] At length rendering his soul to the Creator, on the night before, before the Kalends of May at the matutinal hour, dead he is illustrated with miracles: three bells, which were in the bell-tower of the church of the Bishopric of Fossombrone miraculously, no one touching them by themselves rang in chant, according to the custom for the dead. And in the morning his body was placed in the church, and raining it did not rain over the half of the church, which half was then uncovered and not consummated: and so on the Kalends of May he was buried: therefore on such a day his feast is celebrated. his wine by his merit is increased, And the body being buried, the Canons ordained that drink be given to many, who had come from the city of Urbino, Cagli, and their County: and from one vessel of wine of the capacity of four quarters there drank fully two thousand persons. And the wine of the said vessel not failing, a certain one from envy said: o devil! what is this, that this wine is not diminished? And then the wine in the said vessel began to fail.

[6] his sepulcher coruscates with heavenly light: Two years being passed the Sacristan coming to ring Matins, heard in the said church an Angelic chant, on account of which he feared: but going to the chamber of the Lord Archpriest, he called him, and he came leading with him the Canons: and standing before the door of the church they heard the divine chant, and great lights they saw in the said church over the sepulcher at the foot of the church of the said St. Aldebrand, over which sepulcher the roof of the church was not consummated. And entering the church they saw no one and further heard; but a great light stood over the said sepulcher, and they thought it was day: and the hour was matutinal. And no one of them spoke, so they stood astonished; and they stood until day.

[7] Afterward thinking over the matter of the miracle, they translated the body of Aldebrand into the altar of a chapel, those carrying off something of the relics are divinely struck, which was near the great chapel. And then Paganuccius Masculi received a relic of his finger: and tarrying in his house immediately he felt a great infirmity in his body. Thinking of the deed, he carried back the finger: and standing before the altar of him with knee bent, visibly the said relic withdrew from his hand to its place of the body. And a certain one of Gubbio by night went to the lamp of the said altar, and took oil from it: and he stood losing his light and sense, nor could he go out of the said church. In the morning the Canons placed him before the altar, and immediately he received the light of his eyes. The people p of Fano conquered the city of Fossombrone, the bells carried off from his temple give no sound elsewhere. and for contempt carried off two bells from the church of St. Aldebrand; and placed in the bell-tower of Fano they did not ring. Seeing the miracle they carried back the said bells to their former place, and when they were in the middle of the bridge q of St. Cyprian, those bells which were upon the cart, began to ring.

ANNOTATIONS.

p Fano a city on the Adriatic sea, between Pesaro and Senigallia: it is distant from Fossombrone, an inland city, about 20 miles.

q The bridge of St. Cyprian I judge to be called some one paved midway on the journey over one of the rivulets running into the river Metaurus from the western part.

ON BLESSED VIVALDUS

HERMIT OF THE THIRD ORDER OF ST. FRANCIS AT MONTAIONE IN ETRURIA.

AFTER THE YEAR 1300.

Vivaldus, of the third Order of St. Francis, of Montaione in Etruria (B.)

BY THE AUTHOR D. P.

[1] Montaione, a town in Etruria not ignoble, almost 30 miles distant from Florence toward the east-southeast across the river Elsa, but holding a middle place between the castle of San Miniato and the town of San Gimignano of the diocese of Volterra; The Patron of the place, rejoices in the patronage of B. Vivaldus (some call him Ubaldus) venerating his sacred body under the high altar of the parochial church: and at the distance of half a mile having his hermitage, which at length passed to the Friars Minor Observant, together with the Jaw of the Blessed one himself, as below it will be more fully narrated. His death or at least deposition fell on the first day of this month, he is venerated on the 1st of May, and by that name an Indulgence of seven years Leo X granted to those visiting on such a day the chapels arranged there according to the mysteries of the Passion; and Arthur du Monstier inserted the same on this day in the Franciscan Martyrology in these words: At Montaione in Etruria B. Ubaldus, Tertiary Confessor, a man of wondrous penance and sanctity.

[2] The same in the Annotations says, that he died in the year 1301; following no doubt in this Wadding, who in the year 1300 (when on the 13th of December died B. Bartolus of San Gimignano, dead after the year 1300 to whom in his last moments Vivaldus ministered before he withdrew to solitude) making mention of him too in num. 11, says that some months after the departure of Bartolus this his disciple died. But nowhere I think have I read this; and much more likely I believe it to be, that some years were passed by Vivaldus in solitary life. The year certainly none of the earlier writers' monuments which I have seen express: and Silvano Razzi, among the Lives of the Etruscan Saints and Blessed, relating that, which we shall soon give from its proper source; in marking the year, which nowhere he found, left an empty space: with whom also we prefer to confess ignorance of an uncertain matter. But before we come to the Life praised by Razzi, the words of Marianus of Florence are to be proposed, who brought forth the Fasciculus of the Chronicles of the Order in five books even to the year 1486. These at the end of book 3 are found, to be added to chapter 15, §. 27, containing a more ancient epitome of the life and benignly communicated by the Reverend Father Francis Harold, the most worthy successor of the Reverend Father Luke Wadding in writing the history of the Order. They are moreover these.

[3] a compendium of the Life from Marianus: After the departure of the most holy Bartholinus, a certain disciple and companion of his, a native of the same land, by name Vivaldus, who by his example and words had renounced the world, and the habit of the third Order of Blessed Francis, like him, had put on; in the Round-Wood near Camporena he chose a place for himself, at the eighth mile from the land of Gimignano: where he made himself a cell in the hollow of a chestnut, and the rest of the time of his life for the love of Christ in a strait and austere life, watching and praying, even to the end of his life he passed. Who at length called to the starry places, to receive the reward of his labors, on the first of May migrated to the Lord. At whose death the bells of the Castle of Montaione by themselves, no mortal drawing them, rang. Wherefore all not undeservedly astonished, there came a certain one of the same Castle relating, how being engaged in hunting, the barking dogs surrounded the chestnut of the Hermit: from whose excessive barking coming to the place, he found Friar Vivaldus with knees bent in the chestnut dead. Which being said the bells ceased from ringing. Then all the people running to the place, taking that corpse, in the church of the castle honorably handed it to burial. And in the place of his death by the devotion of the peoples the chestnut being uprooted, they constituted a small church in honor of B. Mary: where even to the present day by the merits of B. Vivaldus God grants to many the benefit of health.

[4] The same Razzi professes, that he followed the Life, which he found in a MS. book of the Reverend Sisters of the Monastery of St. Ursula of Florence; it being sought at Pisa and Florence, whose author alleges the Legend of the Saint himself, kept in the convent of the Carmelite Fathers at Pisa, which indeed he himself had not seen, but learned to be there from the mouth of Friar Andrew of Florence, a man more than a centenarian and blind, who remembered that he had read it, and as much as he recollected of it narrated. This indication being had, for the desire innate of reaching the first source, I had recourse to the prompt effort in such cases of the most Illustrious and most Erudite man Antonio Magliabechi; and asked, first that at Pisa he should cause the aforesaid Legend to be sought (for that at Montaione indeed it had also been, but had perished by fire, I had read) then that from the Monastery of St. Ursula he should take care to have described that which Razzi had had. At Pisa either found or obtained was nothing: if hereafter anything be brought, it, as it ought, to be proposed in the first place, will be represented at least in the Supplement. With the nuns of St. Ursula, who under the governance of the Friars Minor live, there inquired a man of great authority with them, for the merit of his singular virtue, the Reverend Father Seraphinus Tinghi, in the Observant Order a jubilate Lector.

[5] He the book, which with them was no longer found, having scrutinized everywhere, at length learned to be in the small convent of his Order of Jacherinum (Gonzaga calls it Cechrinum in the Province of Tuscany Convent 8) near Pistoia: it being found near Pistoia, whence a copy soon he obtained, from the faithful hand of the Reverend Father Francis Maria Novelli of Castel-Franco, his cousin. But that that book was the very one, which had been of the Sisters of St. Ursula, was established from a signature: but inscribed on the outside is the title, Lives of the Franciscan Saints and Blessed, of whom also to us a little index is promised. The author's name by the same chance was withdrawn from the eyes, by which the first several leaves of the book were taken away: but the author it was not difficult from elsewhere to know, Dionysius Polinari (or Apollinari) of Florence, who flourished at the beginning of the past century, and in the year 1525 was writing a Chronicle of the Minor Observants of the Province of Tuscany, described by Dionysius Polinari an Observant. kept at Florence in the Monastery of All Saints. For he in part 2 fol. 178 describing the Monastery of St. Ursula, and praising the life of Sister Benedicta de Bettinis, of himself and her in this manner speaks.

[6] This pious woman had the greatest desire of obtaining books, a translator into Italian of very many books, which should contain things regarding the Order, in that language which she herself could understand: and therefore me who write these things she induced, that from Latin into the vulgar I should convert the book of Conformities of Master Bartholomew of Pisa, also the life of B. Mary the Virgin written by the same Bartholomew, likewise Landulf on the life of Christ then not yet translated or vulgarly printed. These books therefore I wrote for her and so many others, that although they are scarcely the hundredth part of my writings, I myself am astonished seeing them (which I can with all truth assert) nor could I comprehend, by what reason I wrote them all, as many as are kept in my own cupboard. Thus far concerning himself Dionysius in Italian words, which if they had been indicated to Luke Wadding, collecting the Writers of the Order of Minors, and the author of the Chronicle of the Province of Tuscany. he could have praised Dionysius de Polinari (as he himself calls him) whom he simply says wrote the Chronicles of the Province of Tuscany, more prolixly and more distinctly: especially other places being collected from the same Chronicle, where the author speaks of himself: to whom as to the multitude of his writings attesting Seraphinus aforepraised, says, True things this Father narrates, because I saw all those books in folio manuscript, on occasion of inquiring the Life of St. Vivaldus. But this, although among them it no longer appears described, yet is from a book, which the more certainly it is known once to have been among those, the more firmly it can be believed to be by the same author.

LIFE

By the Author Dionysius Polinari of Florence.

from his Italian autograph, once kept with the Sisters of St. Ursula of Florence, now with the Observants of Jacherinum near Pistoia.

Vivaldus, of the third Order of St. Francis, of Montaione in Etruria (B.)

BY DION. POLINARI FROM MS.

[1] B. Vivaldus was of the castle of San Gimignano, a pious and devout man and in the charity of true friendship joined to B. Bartolus, a familiar of B. Bartolus, whose disciple and servant he made himself, in that his horrible a infirmity. Persuaded by his salutary exhortations Vivaldus, despised all earthly things, and the habit of the third Order being taken, which also he wore, so far joined himself to God, that after the happy passage of his master, bidding farewell to his country and all his kindred, he chose for himself a place to dwell in a certain valley, a solitary he lives in a hollow chestnut; in the midst of a dense and dark wood, near Camporena, whose name is the Round-Wood b, about eight miles distant from San Gimignano: where, all the time he survived, he persevered for the love of Jesus Christ in great abstinence of all things, only to fastings, vigils and prayers being free, and having a cell in the hollow of a certain very old chestnut, which scarcely could hold him kneeling.

[2] But when there came the time, in which the eternal God willed to remunerate his labors, he assumed him to the supernal choirs, on the first day of May: and willing that to the world should be manifested the lamp, which had been hitherto hidden under the chestnut; and him whom to heavenly glory he had raised, desiring also to be venerated by men on earth; at that very hour, in which the Saint is believed to have rendered his soul to the Creator, he caused by the hands of Angels to be rung the bells of the castle, and on the 1st of May he dies, the bells being rung at Montaione, of the said Montaione. At so manifest a miracle the whole people was astonished: and they doubting what by it God wished to be indicated, there came an inhabitant of the same town, who narrated, that he having gone out to hunt, the dogs which he was leading ran to a certain chestnut, and by continual barking indicated something wonderful there to lie hidden; to whose inspection running, he saw within it kneeling and dead the hermit. by the indication of a hunter carried to the church, After this indication the prodigious sound of the bells ceased: and all commonly going out to the place, took the holy body, and into the church of their town brought it and buried it; where even now within the high altar are preserved c his bones. But the fame of the new sanctity being spread in every direction, where even now he rests. and by the accession of miracles aggravated, moved the peoples that for the sake of devotion to that chestnut of the Blessed one they should run to see it. And because there to those praying many graces were granted, it indeed cut to pieces little by little vanished; but in its place a small shrine was erected sacred to the Mother of God; where then Hermits of the third Order even to our age dwelt.

[3] These things which I have written, I received all from Friar Andrew

of Florence of the Order of Carmelites, His Legend was once written and kept at Pisa, a man of laudable life and great devotion; who from his long age of about a hundred years had lost all use of his eyes, and said often that in the convent of his Order at Pisa he had read the Legend of that Blessed one, and from it had learned, how wondrous he was in his life, and with how many miracles after death he shone; but only those things which I have narrated to retain by memory. There is seen moreover the image of the same blessed man, and his image at Florence with the Carmelites. anciently painted in the habit of the third Franciscan Order, within the church of the Carmelites of Florence: and the people of Montaione assert also that with them the aforesaid Legend existed, but together with many writings of their Community was burned. There can moreover among the arguments of sanctity be referred also that wondrous manner, by which afterward at his hermitage there arose a convent of Friars Observant d and a church in honor of the Blessed one himself: who is always ready to succor all invoking his help. I of his many miracles will relate only two, certainly known to me.

[4] When upon John of Foligno, a citizen of Pisa, dwelling in the town of Cigoli certain of his enemies had leaped, and had afflicted him with many wounds, mortally wounded by enemies. and one among the rest mortal in the head, which they had cut even to the brain; and therefore after some days the physicians despaired of his life, and that very night he was believed about to expire; his wife, who was called Mona Tomasa, full of great sadness, because he had now even ceased to speak, cast herself on her knees at the side of the bed, and with God grievously began to complain, that he had permitted by her own carnal brother to be slain the first husband to whom as a girl she had been married, the second to be extinguished in prison, but now this third to perish by so miserable a death. But saying these things and poured out in laments, with all the affection of her mind she turned herself to St. Francis and St. Vivaldus, praying that for her husband they would obtain life from God. Wondrous thing! At that moment the woman lulled to sleep, where she was kneeling, and now about to expire, saw in sleep St. Francis stigmatized, and St. Vivaldus the Hermit girded with a cord, in that manner in which the Tertiaries are wont: who both kneeling before Jesus Christ, sitting upon a most beautiful throne, and surrounded with troops of Angels, asked the life of the aforesaid John at the instance of his grieving wife. Which easily obtained, on his feet rose St. Vivaldus, he being invoked and appearing he is healed. to whom she had more affectionately commended her husband; and approaching her, he seemed to awaken her and to say, Be glad, because for your husband we have obtained life. At these words awakened she all cheerful, heard the voice of her husband calling her: to whom she answered, that he should rise. But he, I seem, he said, to myself to be sound, because in a moment I am wholly relieved, nor do I feel any pain of the wounds. In the early morning the physicians come, thinking that they would find him dead; and with the greatest admiration the wounds being inspected, they see them very well disposed and clean, and the flesh begun to be restored. And so within a few days fully restored to health, from the town of Cigoli he came with his wife to St. Vivaldus, to render thanks for the benefit: where both having confessed to me their sins, first Mona Tomasa narrated the vision of SS. Francis and Vivaldus presented to her: then John her husband himself affirmed his miraculous healing, by the exhibition of the scar in his head, and of the cap cut by the striker.

[5] A certain Priest of Volterra, called Gabriel e Narducci, when he was at Cairo of Babylon Chaplain of the Genoese nation, and vehemently there and generally pestilence raged and extinguished many; he himself sick, another recovers from the pestilence of Cairo in Egypt. and having no hope of human help, turned himself with ardent prayer to invoking the aid of St. Vivaldus, and vowed to his hermitage for the adornment of the church to send two tapestries: and immediately he began to recover, and within a few days restored to full health, from Cairo even to the said place he sent those tapestries, with certain other things to serve for adorning the church, and letters affirming the grace done to him. And these two miracles happened in the year one thousand five hundred fifteen. But many other benefits and graces daily that Saint grants to those devoutly invoking him, to the praise of God and of the poor little Francis. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

e Razzi, Nalducci.

APPENDIX.

Concerning the church and convent of B. Vivaldus.

Vivaldus, of the third Order of St. Francis, of Montaione in Etruria (B.)

BY DION. POLINARI FROM MS.

[6] Dionysius Polinari aforepraised, in his Chronicle of the Province of Tuscany MS. fol. 328 sets forth those things which concerning the foundation of the said church and convent has Friar Marianus, who wholly intent on collecting, from the Chronicle of Dionysius Polinari it is had, especially within the borders of Italy, the monuments of his Order, deduced the history from the beginnings of the Religion even to his own times, in a rude style indeed, but with faithful narration in five books, whose title is, Fasciculus of the Chronicles of the Order of Minors, and whose autograph was once with Wadding, now is with his successors. Then the same Dionysius supplying those things which partly preceded the foundation and were not noted by Marianus, partly followed his death, in this manner proceeds. The place of St. Vivaldus was called once St. Mary of Caporena (elsewhere written Camporena) of the diocese of Volterra: that there before there was a church of St. Mary of Caporena, and the Friars of the holy Cross held it for many years, with all the possessions buildings and rights pertaining to it, concerning which there is extant a Bull of Urban III (and so before the year 1187, before the Order of Minors was instituted, so that these Friars of the holy Cross ought to be understood some secular Confraternity under that title instituted at Volterra) But they the aforesaid place with the goods regarding it relinquished in the year 1280 to the Bishop of Volterra, (Raynerius Ubertinus was this one) as goods of the Church: who the place and goods leased to a certain Lord Chiusa, parish-priest of the parish of Arviano in perpetuity.

[7] This narration, supported by public instruments, with which conformably proceed others soon to be indicated, where the said church of St. Mary is called the church of St. Vivaldus, with the annexed lands and rights, concerning his familiarity with B. Bartolus, and the death he met after him, (as is narrated in the life) might render the reader doubtful; unless mention were made of the possessions and rights, which sufficiently indicate that it is treated not of the church, which after the death of St. Vivaldus, in that place where his chestnut had stood, was built; but of that very one which formerly was there, when in its vicinity Vivaldus chose a habitation for himself, and which in the succession of times desolate and destroyed survived in name only, by reason of the lands and rights depending on it; but in the year 1440 was restored, either in its former place or rather at the cave, which near the place of the cut chestnut, for it had retained the name of St. Vivaldus, and perhaps had first invited a hermit to dwell there by its convenience and ancient celebrity, for which it seemed congruous that a little oratory be built.

[8] For in the year 1320 the Bishop of Volterra, Raynerius de Belfortis, which in the year 1320 leased by the Bishop of Volterra, leased the same goods, and thence even to the year 1440 the same claimed for themselves the people of Montaione and certain Florentine citizens possessed and disposed of them, until the oratory which survived in the year 1350, with its rights such as they now were, he leased to a certain man of San Miniato, whose name was Tedaldus Civione for 29 years; which being elapsed, the people of San Miniato subjected themselves to the rule of the Florentines. But against these because Tedaldus had rebelled, who still possessed the church of St. Vivaldus with its rights, the Captains of the Guelf party claimed it for themselves, they passed to the Guelfs, and over the principal door of the church placed their insignia, which there remained until the year 1500; when the inhabitants of the Florentine Castle removed them, theirs being placed in their stead: but these the year 27 after, were cast down by the Guelfs, restoring theirs, as they are still seen. Meanwhile the Syndics of Montaione and Fondi attesting it was judged in the year 1369 and 89, and again 1406 that the goods of that church pertained to the right of the people of San Miniato.

[9] Further in the year 1440 the people of Montaione restored the church of St. Vivaldus; and to it and its goods pretending for themselves the right of patronage (which yet in the sixth year after by the Captains of the Guelf party was adjudged to the people of San Miniato) leased it to a certain hermit; the oratory afterward restored by the people of Montaione in the year 1440. to whom also in the year 1458 they assigned so much land around the same church, as a bow can shoot an arrow. Then a suit arose over the same goods between the communities of the Florentine Castle and of San Miniato in the year 1467, it is leased to a hermit under an annual census. and their half part was adjudged to each party, because they were not known to be the church's; for which the people of Montaione standing from a pretended right before, between these and the inhabitants of the Florentine Castle by compromise the suit was decided. Meanwhile he who possessed the place by the grant of the people of Montaione a hermit, even from the year 1440, was obliged to an annual census to be paid to the Bishop of Volterra: which he did, until 1477: for thence, the Communities usurping Episcopal censuses of this kind, to the same the hermit was compelled to pay: and in that state the matter remained, until the people of Montaione in the year 1498 decreed to offer the church and hermitage to the Friars of the observance of St. Francis.

[10] How this was done, rather than from the Italian of Dionysius I should render it in Latin, I preferred to exhibit in the original phrase of Marianus himself, to be sought from Harold the successor of Wadding. But Harold answered, that the Fasciculus of Chronicles which is with him does not extend beyond the year 1486, and so from it is not to be hoped for notice of the possession, entered only in the year 1499; yet he transcribed the words of Marianus proposed at the beginning. Either therefore another copy, further produced, Dionysius had; or of another

hand he believed the Appendix to be Marianus's: which since it is not found in Latin, this too here receive from the Italian, as it under the name of Marianus Dionysius has:

[11] In the year 1499 was celebrated the Provincial Chapter at Poggibonsi, and in the year 1499 it is accepted by the Observants: by Friar Bernardinus de Vecchio, of Siena, Commissary of the Province; and its Vicar was again elected Friar John the Teuton: and by the Chapter was accepted the forty-second place, namely the place of St. Vivaldus in the Round-Wood, near the town of Montaione. Of which place, immediately after the finished Chapter, the Friars entered possession processionally on the feast of SS. Philip and James. The year turning, on the same festivity, the Community of the Florentine Castle, in whose territory the place is, sent thither three men, who in the name of the Community exhibiting the right of Patronage in the same place, stipulated with Friar Cherubinus Conzi of Florence, who had accepted the place; and by a legitimate contract assigned to the same from that wood so much space round about, as for the Friars for necessary woodcutting was abundantly enough; on this law, that in acknowledgment of the Patronage, the Friars should be obliged to set forth in their church the images of SS. Laurence, Leonard and Verdiana, Patrons of that Community. Afterward, on a like day, the Community of Montaione, with a solemn procession carried thither some Relics of St. Vivaldus; promising all the other parts of the holy body then to be given, when the building of the place should be completed.

[12] who having obtained the hermitage of St. Vivaldus, In this hermitage long dwelt in strait penance a certain man of San Gimignano, Vivaldus by name, disciple and servant of B. Bartolus likewise of San Gimignano in his atrocious infirmity. He after the death of him, his country being left, under the same habit and rule, that is of the Tertiaries of St. Francis, what remained of his life he passed in the aforesaid wood, for the love of Jesus Christ, with the glory of miracles. The fame moreover of so great sanctity through that region divulged, the peoples running together from everywhere always held his hermitage in veneration, even to these our times devoutly and frequently visiting it. But hitherto in it had dwelt Hermits of the third Order: but now by the care of Friar Cherubinus the place was accepted, and from the foundations built, in honor of the Assumption of our Lady and of our blessed Father St. Francis, not without the admiration of all, ascribing the matter to a miracle, they build a church and convent from the foundations, because all necessaries there were lacking except wood: nor were impediments lacking on the part of the Vicar both General and Provincial: and lacking were both stones and sand fit for building.

[13] Yet God so willing, the building was forthwith promoted, and within thirteen years finished, the Florentine Friars helping most willingly, aided by the wondrous alacrity of the faithful. and from Florence sending whatever they could. Very much moreover the devotion of the peoples themselves contributed thereto: for Friar Cherubinus preaching on the greater solemnities, there are believed to have run together three thousand men: who all from greatest to least, the preaching finished, accompanied the sacred orator, to the river which is called Evola, distant one mile; where each took one or another stone or wood, and carried it to the place, not even the nobles and officials themselves esteeming this service unworthy of their rank. For it happened sometimes that there were present there the Lord Vicars of the towns of Certaldo and San Miniato al Tedesco, likewise the Lord Podestàs of the towns of San Gimignano, Florentine Castle, Peccioli and Palaia, with many citizens and a frequent crowd; and all together to go to the river to seek stones. Whence a custom arose there, that whoever comes to the place, believes it nefarious to come without a stone there to be offered; which to the present day is observed. After Friar Cherubinus the holy Friar Thomas of Florence loved this place, and much labor there he drained out, and in the wood built most devout chapels and oratories, after the likeness of the sacred places of the holy city Jerusalem, where are seen all the mysteries of the Lord's Passion.

[14] Thus far, as is set forth, Marianus, without any mention of those contentions, which before concerning the place and its rights were; and which its new inhabitants, even after they had built the new church and convent with their own hands and labors, as we have now seen, long exercised. To set them forth proceeds Dionysius, in whom first Pope Clement VII, which Clement 7 confirms to them, in the year 1525 by an express Brief confirmed to the Friars the possession of the aforesaid church and its rights, constituting in his place their procurators and defenders the Lord Captains of the Guelf party: then in the 10th year of his Pontificate of Christ 1533 on the 22nd day of October, after many suits and controversies or testimonies heard thereupon, the Commissaries and Judges deputed by him, Lord John Stati Apostolic Protonotary, and Lord Philip Maneli Canon and citizen of Florence, gave a determinatory sentence of all the suits and controversies, [and the controversies with the Florentine Castle through Commissaries he settles.] which had been agitated between the Friars and the Community of the Florentine Castle, in this manner, that the Guardian and Friars of the Convent of St. Vivaldus should have the convent and garden, with all that which within the wider wall is contained, and outside it round about a space of three hundred arms of Florentine measure, yet without prejudice of a third party, who perhaps could prove his stronger rights in that place: but the rest of the part of that wood, the right of a third party likewise being safe, should remain to the aforesaid Community: yet so that it be lawful for the Guardian and Friars of St. Vivaldus, and their workmen and servants, under conditions advantageous to the Convent. from whatever place to dig and carry off sand and stones, even from the rest of the part of the wood assigned to the said Community, the consent of none thereupon being required, as much as is needful to them for buildings greater or lesser, within the church, convent, garden, and the whole circle of three hundred arms, to be restored or newly to be constructed. Then moreover in the year 1537 by the Guelf party and the said Community there was sent thither a measurer of limits, who should measure and mark the space of three hundred arms.

[15] In that convent of St. Vivaldus there are Indulgences, granted by Pope Leo X, Leo X adds Indulgences to those who at the single chapels one Pater-noster and Ave Maria recited on the Nativity of the Lord and the following two days, likewise at Pentecost and the two days likewise following, on the first of May the Feast of St. Vivaldus, on Good Friday, on the Feast of St. Francis, and all the festivities of the Holy Virgin: on which single days is granted an Indulgence of seven years. There are had there some, but small Relics. Among which conspicuous is the jaw of St. Vivaldus, There is had there the jaw of St. Vivaldus, whose remaining body at Montaione remained in the Parochial church, the people of Montaione not keeping the faith given to the Friars, of handing it over, as soon as the building of the place should be completed: for now for twenty and more years it has been completed, and yet the body is not had, nor probably will ever be had. Thus Dionysius, by these very words signifying, that he wrote these things about the year 1545. He adds then on the wall of the church this title written in Italian. In the year 1500, on the first day of May, was consigned to the poor Friars of St. Francis the cave or grotto or cavern of St. Vivaldus: with the title of the Foundation, and by the help of God, the sweat of the poor Friars, and the devotion of the peoples, miraculously from a small hermitage was built this so devout oratory, for praising God and praying for the peoples. This was the change of the right hand of the lofty and great God, to whom be honor and glory and to B. Vivaldus. Amen.

ON BLESSED PANACEA THE VIRGIN

D. P. OF QUARONA IN THE NOVARA DIOCESE OF ITALY.

THE YEAR 1383

Panacea the Virgin, of Quarona in the Novara diocese of Italy (B.)

BY THE AUTHOR D.P.

[1] Charles of Bascapè, a man endowed with exceptional learning and virtue, by Clement VIII was chosen in the year 1593 Bishop of Novara: who having discharged the office of an excellent Pastor, departed from the living in the year 1615, leaving illustrious monuments of his erudition, among which are two books concerning the Church of Novara, the first on places, the other on Bishops. Where in the first page 99 he describes the boundary of Romaniano, and asserts that toward the mountains is a region, which from Romaniano is called; and beside the same hill is Agamium, Sitianum, or Sirtianum, and Romanianum itself on the bank of the Sesia; where on the opposite, The site of Agamium, and Sitianum, which is of the Duke of Savoy, bank now mountains rise, and enclose Romanianum in a valley. In the letters of Innocent is named the parish of Agamium with its appurtenances, and in the same manner the parish of Sitianum: in each place, indeed ancient, the benefices are simple and there is a separate old baptistery; but at Agamium more entire and apt: but Agamium a much greater village. Hence we understand, since these two villages are near, that baptisteries and the parochial prerogative sometimes were given not for the cause of necessity but of dignity. These things concerning Agamium and Sitianum the villages, The time of the slaying and the veneration. celebrated for the birth and cult of B. Panacea. She died in the year 1383, and is venerated on the first Friday of the month of May, which in the said year fell on these Kalends of May. Meanwhile Ferrarius in the general Catalogue of the Saints for the sixth weekday, assumed the sixth day of May and so has: At Agamium in the territory of Novara B. Panacea Virgin and Martyr. Ferrarius is followed by Arthur du Monstier in the Sacred Gynaeceum. The Acts of her life, slaying and veneration the said Bishop Charles describes page 101 and the following, which from him we give.

[2] There is venerated in the church of Agamium the body of B. Panacea, in a chapel of her name, in a tomb fortified with iron gratings: she born of rustic parents and indeed with great and celebrated veneration of our people and of foreigners. This Virgin (as once Rochus the Presbyter, parish-priest of Quarona, is said to have written, and is handed down from the elders) is said to have been the daughter of a certain Lawrence of the Cillia from the Sesia valley, who born in the village called Domus-Rafaniorum afterward dwelt at Quarona, where from Mary of Agamium a wife married he received Panacea: and when she had died at Agamium, another he married. Who most hardly treated Panacea, committing to her flocks and beasts of burden to be pastured: wood too to be collected and brambles to be carried, and addicted to prayer and tasks daily she enjoined her, which she could not at all complete; for this reason chiefly that, intent on prayer, in the old church of St. John the Baptist, parochial of Quarona, situated on the mountain, whither she was wont to lead the flock, she was frequent, and to the prayer of the Crown assiduously gave her effort.

[3] But the stepmother, severely exacting the task, cruelly beat her, if she had effected anything less. The girl by the divine Spirit, by the stepmother exercising her patience who breathes where he wills, by no human discipline or document, instructed and confirmed, with wondrous patience bore all things: and besides endowed with other Christian virtues, an exquisite modesty in manners and in every action she displayed, but especially exceptional charity toward all. For when

she labored under the utmost want of all things, and scarcely received from the stepmother bread which would suffice for life, yet to the needy she took care always to impart something. But the stepmother seemed so much the more to be indignant and to rage, the greater the patience and virtue by which she saw her stepdaughter to profit, so that she even chastised things rightly and holily done; and that she might turn her away from prayer, impiously snatched away and destroyed her rosaries.

[4] But the Lord, for his immense benignity, unwilling to defer the reward of such virtue and piety, struck with a distaff she is slain: permitted the woman's anger and fury to proceed so far, that she should slay the innocent and pious girl, who was now fifteen years old; and that on account of her exceptional zeal for prayer. For on a certain day in the evening, when it was to be returned home, the beasts of burden she indeed began to drive thither; but about to take up a bundle of wood, going to the stone, where she was wont to pray, taken with the love of prayer, she so lingered, that the beasts of burden came to the stables without a keeper. At which thing angered the stepmother, coming to the pastures, struck the praying Virgin with a rude and mountain distaff so, and fixed the spindles in her head so, that she killed her: for which reason she is wont to be painted with the spindles themselves fixed in, often also with the stepmother striking.

[5] The matter being heard Lawrence the father, who had often in vain rebuked his wife, running up, the body is illustrated with miracles: is said to have found the bundle burning, nor to have been able to extinguish the fire or to move the body by any reason. The matter being divulged very many came together there: and so great was the approbation of the virtue of this Virgin and of the event of the matter, not only of the multitude, but also of the chief men, and even (as is narrated) of the Clergy of Novara itself, that, as partaker of the heavenly and eternal life and blessed, she began to be venerated and preached. For also certain miracles concerning her body, translated to Agamium during that time, they narrate; two oratories are founded and oratories were built in her name: one on that very mountain where she was struck, whose altar they say is placed over that very stone on which she prayed: the other in the valley near the river Sesia, in which the year is noted 1409, although she in the year 1383 departed from this life.

[6] The certain day of her death is not expressed: but on the sixth weekday, which first occurs in the month of May, the feast is wont to be venerated of this and of other peoples and of very many men with veneration, whether from free piety, the annual veneration on the first Friday of May: or from a vow. On which weekday it is wondrous what a multitude of men, even from the diocese of Vercelli, is wont to come together to Agamium; and with prayers, offerings and holy Sacrifices to be offered to God to venerate the memory of the Virgin. The people of Quarona on that day have a procession with their Parish-priest a way of ten miles to this church, and offer a taper, each father of a family conferring for it a certain sum: which the same other peoples have done and ought to do they relate. the remaining arguments of public cult, In that church not a chapel only, but also a benefice, for celebrating Masses, has been instituted: and in other churches everywhere through this diocese her images and altars are seen. She is wont to be invoked for the cause of the falling sickness; and many proclaim health obtained Panacea being invoked, which indeed is consonant to her salutary name.

[7] Of this ancient cult nothing has seemed to us to be changed: and the approbation. for all of it we believe by the divine will to have been attributed by the faithful to the exceptional virtue and beatitude of this happy girl. Thus far Charles, on whom from the office of his Episcopal rank it lay to examine the single things and to estimate by what faith they were supported, so that by his judgment it must wholly be stood. If the writings of Rochus the Presbyter still survive (whether Italian or Latin matters nothing) we ask that they be communicated with us, to be of use for the Supplement: for to delay the press for the cause of that matter, or to write many letters hither and thither on an uncertain event we did not think worth the trouble. One thing I add that what here always Quarona (nor do I doubt but rightly) is found written, Quarona where. seems to be that which the Topographical maps name Parona, a village of the Lomellina valley and the diocese of Pavia, between the rivers Terdoppio and Albonetum, distant as much from Novara on the one side, as Agamium is distant on the other part, that is five miles on each side.