ON S. UBALDESCA VIRGIN, OF THE ORDER OF S. JOHN OF JERUSALEM,
AT PISA IN ETRURIA.
IN THE YEAR 1206
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Concerning her cult, and concerning the original text of the Life lost, but somehow restored from the Italian version.
Ubaldesca, Virgin of the Order of S. John of Jerusalem, at Pisa in Etruria (S.)
D. P.
The sacred, and, the title of appellation being increased by Urban VIII, Most Eminent Religion of the Hospitaller Knights of S. John of Jerusalem, two Saints of this Order, whom from the possession of the island of Malta gained about the year 1530 we call Maltese, many distinguished Heroes illustrated with military exploits and notable triumphs in the East; but in the West they adorned their Religion with a certain rare sanctity, not only some men to be commemorated in their time; but also from the weaker sex some Nuns of the same profession, of whom in Italy I find two, venerated absolutely as Saints, from these Tuscana at Verona on the 14th of July, namely Ubaldesca and Tuscana: this latter a Widow at Verona in Emilia, concerning whom it will be treated on the 14th of July; the former a Virgin at Pisa in Etruria, where equally as at Malta, the Office to be performed under the rite of a Double, she is venerated on this 28th of May; on which day, and indeed falling on the Sunday of the Trinity or the octave of Pentecost, she died, in the year 1206, when, the cycle of the Sun being 11, of the Moon 10, the Dominical letter A, Easter had been celebrated on the 2nd of April; although the Pisans, anticipating the beginning of the common year by nine months, number that year 1207.
[2] Philip Ferrarius makes mention of S. Ubaldesca in each Catalogue, both of the Saints of Italy, Ubaldesca is venerated at Pisa on the 28th of May, with a more prolix elogium; and of those who are not in the Roman Martyrology, under this formula, At Pisa in Tuscia S. Ubaldesca Virgin. Ferrarius was followed in the sacred Gynaeceum by Arthur of the monastery: but if he had read him more attentively, and noted that she is said to have been born of humble parents in the Pisan field, and to have doubted concerning obtaining entrance into the monastery, since she said she had no dowry; and so he would rather have proposed to himself that she should be praised from another source, than from the despised delights and glory of the world. Ferrarius alleges in both places a MS. Life which is kept among the Nuns of S. John: and I should believe that he had altogether seen and had a copy of it; for he had it, and, very many miracles being omitted, published it in Italian, with the sole title of Blessed, among the Lives of the Saints and Blessed of Tuscia, Silvanus Razzi; from whom we are compelled to make the same again Latin, since the old and original context no diligence of friends has hitherto been able to find.
[3] The Knight Ceffini sought it very solicitously, when he procured for us the Life of B. Clara de Gambacorta, the Life, the original Latin being lost, illustrated on the 17th of April; and the Life of B. Bona, likewise of Pisa, to be given on the 29th of this May: but in vain he sought it. There sought afterward, but with equal success, the most Reverend Tortus, Provicar of the Archbishop of Pisa and Rector of the Nuns of S. John. Finally Doctor Pagni, public Professor of Medicine, with whom, while endeavoring to write the Affairs of the Pisans, as many ancient monuments as could be found were said to be collected: who, interrogated concerning that Life, exhibited indeed an ancient codex, in which the Lives of BB. Bona and Gherardesca of Pisa were read, but denied that there was with him any word concerning B. Ubaldesca, except in the books of Razzi, Ferrarius, and Bosio: but this latter in the Histories of his Order makes mention of the same at length from Razzi, it is given from the Italian of Razzi, as also the epitomizer of Bosio, Francis Truglinus. And so by all that diligence nothing else was gained, than that B. Gherardesca became known to us, not even known by name before, concerning whom after the Life of B. Bona we shall treat. We nevertheless continue to wish, that the original Life of B. Ubaldesca may from another source come to light, to have a place in the Supplement of the first Semester, to be composed after June is completed.
[4] Concerning her cult, first with the movable feast of the Trinity, then by Pontifical authority bound to this 28th of May, there is no need to preface much: with the proof of the cult also at Malta. that matter will be plain at the end of the Life from Razzi and Bosio; as also in what manner the bones of the holy body,
were translated from the Hospital of S. John to the church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Head being excepted (which remained there); and how, together with a part of the Relics, in the preceding century the veneration of Ubaldesca was propagated; increased also in this very century, by a Rectoral church, built under her invocation in sight of the new city of Malta, by the Grand Master of the Order Paula. The native place of the Saint was the castle of Calcinaia, looking upon the left bank of the river Arno, midway between Pisa and the town of S. Miniato, by an interval almost equal on either side of 24 miles. There is nothing else which it is fitting that the reader be taught beforehand: wherefore let us pass to the Life, such as Razzi furnishes, needing no further light.
LIFE
From the Italian of Silvanus Razzi.
Ubaldesca, Virgin of the Order of S. John of Jerusalem, at Pisa in Etruria (S.)
FROM THE ITALIAN OF RAZZI.
[1] Ubaldesca was born at Calcinaia, a castle of the diocese and territory of Pisa, of humble and simple parents, Born at Calcinaia of rustic but pious stock, but good and fearing God, about the year of our salvation 1136: who although they sustained life by agriculture, yet omitted nothing by which they might instill Christian virtue into this their most beloved little daughter, so much the more readily, as she herself the more, as if by nature, seemed to be borne to the same, since in all her actions sincere humility and prompt obedience shone forth. To these virtues there was added also the highest sparingness of words, a notable indication indeed, both in all men, and chiefly in young virgins, of goodness and prudence. Whatever of time remained to her over from the ministries imposed by her parents of the household, all that she expended on prayer and reciting the Crowns, from childhood she excels in virtue: asking God that he would direct her life into the way of salvation: nay even while laboring with her hands at home and abroad she prayed, as she could, if not with the voice, at least with the mind elevated to God. Her body also, innocent though and most pure, she macerated with fasts and vigils. She so exercised charity toward the poor, that she suffered no one to depart from the threshold of the house without solace: for although her parents were husbandmen and not wealthy, yet the farm which they cultivated was their own, and afforded somewhat whence they could give something even to those bearing necessity.
[2] But because, as I said, she asked of God to be directed into the way of salvation, He who is accustomed to hear the prayers of those asking just things, at fifteen she is bidden by an Angel to become a nun, gave also to this little girl praying a benign ear, and fulfilled her desire in this manner which follows. When she was in the fifteenth year of her age, all the household being occupied in the field, she alone had remained by the oven, putting in the loaves to be baked there; and behold an Angel of the Lord appeared to her, and said: Hear, Ubaldesca, since thou hast always asked of God, that he would show thee the way by which thou mayest be saved; I am present, in his name commanding, that without delay thou betake thyself to Pisa, and enter the Hospital of S. John, and with the Mothers dwelling there live in penitence, and in the service of God and his poor. To whom she: Indeed most gladly will I do it: to be received even without a dowry. but they will refuse to receive me without a dowry, nor can my parents exhibit the required dowry. But the Angel, Let not this solicit thee, he said, for those Mothers regard not so much the dowry as virtue. But I, she rejoins, if I am destitute even of this, how shall I be able to be admitted? And the Angel: The Holy Spirit will supply what is lacking, by whom illumined thou shalt be filled with so great graces, as none of the women of Pisa has obtained, and the city itself by thy merits shall be freed from the greatest perils.
[3] These things said the Angel departed: but Ubaldesca, the loaves being left in the oven, ran to the field, where her father and mother were; When her parents and what the Angel had said to her she narrated in order, insisting and supplicating, that on that very day she should be led to the Hospital. Coming therefore into the city, after they had been cheerfully saluted by all, who dwelt in the lane called of Gonella; they found the Abbess with the Nuns about forty, awaiting at the gate of the Hospital, had given her to the Hospital, to receive her, of whose coming they themselves also had been forewarned by an Angel through the night. Hence she was led into the church, and with the accustomed ceremonies clothed with the habit of Religion; all rejoicing, that they had received such a gift divinely; but the parents, when they saw her vested, departing, and doubtful between gladness and grief, that without her they returned whom they loved most tenderly. They were therefore for so unexpected an event as if rapt out of themselves, nor until the following day did they remember the loaves, which they had commended to their daughter to be put in the oven. they find the loaves left in the oven whole. Then indeed coming thither, where they believed they would find only ashes, or crusts hardened into coal; they drew out the loaves so fittingly baked, as if they seemed to have suffered nothing from a longer stay in the oven, but to have remained there only a just space: wherefore running back into the city, from those same loaves they brought to the Sisters, narrating all things which had happened with thanksgiving.
[4] Instituting her Life religiously and severely, But as much as at these things heard the Abbess and all the Nuns exulted, so much did she humble herself, fleeing boasting, and thinking of nothing more solicitously than how she might more lower herself. Yet there shone forth especially her singular charity, both toward all the Sisters, and toward the sick, lest even the least thing should be lacking to them she busied herself with all solicitude and industry and promptitude. But to others affable and meek, toward herself she was severe and rigid, wearing a hair-shirt next to her flesh, and sleeping little, not in a bed but upon bundles of vine-twigs, which she strewed under her wearied body. Concerning her fasts and abstinence what shall I say? For content with bread alone and the draught of cold water, and that only on the second or third day taken; whence wholly emaciated, she seemed to consist of nothing but bones clothed with skin; yet with a countenance always glad and cheerful, as one who, continually intent in spirit upon God, seemed with her Spouse Christ and his Mother and the choirs of the Saints, to enjoy the delights of the heavenly paradise.
[5] she seeks alms throughout the city, Amid these things having advanced to a riper age, when she perceived that the monastery was pressed by great penury, she asked faculty from the Abbess and Sisters to go out through the city, and to gather alms, by which both their own and chiefly the necessities of the sick might be succored: which she also did with fruit, not only of the monastery, for the alms; but also of the whole city, for the example of virtue. Thus she passed many years, when God, wishing to make her more illustrious and to exercise her patience, disposed that to her passing through the bridge of the Thorn (so called from one Thorn of the Lord's crown, grievously wounded she refuses to be cured: there most religiously preserved) from a house which was being built there, a stone came upon her head, and struck it with a most grievous wound. The Sisters wished a remedy to be made for her as diligently as possible: but Ubaldesca refused, nay rather, turned to her Jesus, she besought him, that thenceforth bearing the pain for all the rest of the time of her life, she might carry with her a perpetual memory of the human condition: and having obtained her wish she carried that plague with her into the sepulchre, always withered and purulent, and teeming with worms; with so great, I do not say patience, but gladness, as worldly women are not wont to behold themselves adorned with gems and necklaces.
[6] she turns water into wine, Moreover in the space of seventy years, in which Ubaldesca lived in this world, God wrought many miracles through her, of which for the sake of brevity I shall here relate only a few. On a certain Friday of the Great week, when some devout women were coming from the chapel of S. Martin in Chiazica, they fell in with B. Ubaldesca, then by chance occupied in drawing water from a well; and they asked her, that she would furnish them a drink. And when she handed them the bucket full of water, the same asked, knowing how efficacious her prayer was, that she would bless it, the sign of the Cross being imposed. Ubaldesca did what was asked: and behold while they drank, not water, but the best wine was tasted; nor yet perceiving that this was done by miracle, Ah, said they, what doest thou, Sister Ubaldesca? we asked water of thee, and thou on the day of holy Good Friday givest wine, contrary to what our purpose of abstinence bears? Scarcely had they said these or similar things, when they recognized what had happened, and began to praise and proclaim her: who, most fleeing of human praise, compelled them to be silent, and adjured them, that as long as she lived they should manifest the matter to no man.
[7] and in her 70th year sick, Not long after, fallen into her last sickness, there visited her a certain Father, called F. Doctus de Oculis, having professed the order of S. John of Jerusalem, who in the chapel of the holy Sepulchre had the cure of souls, and perhaps also of the aforesaid Sisters, a man of approved sanctity: who having seen her, as one to whom he was much affected, said to the Nuns, Shortly you will be deprived of your Sister Ubaldesca: yet I ask you, that whether by day or by night it happen that she die, you make me to be present. These words hearing in spirit she; she foreknows the manner of her death. Father, she said, thou wilt not be able to be present in time. And so it happened: for when he had at some time visited her, now fortified by herself with the last Sacraments, and had departed; Ubaldesca closed her eyes in death, and ceased to live on earth, in the year 1207, on the 28th day of May, then falling on the feast of the most holy Trinity. The Abbess saw, the Sisters saw, the soul of the deceased led into heaven, by a multitude of Angels applauding around, and singing these words, Come spouse of Christ, receive the crown, which God hath prepared for thee from the origin of the world. Seen to be led into heaven by Angels, But soon, when the fame of this death was spread through the city, there was a concourse from every side to venerate the body, which had been the habitation of so holy a soul; whom they doubted not, enjoying heavenly glory, to have as their patroness with God, both each one persuaded by his own experience, and by the asseveration of the Sisters, relating what was beheld with their eyes at her departure.
[8] seven days after she is shown glorious also to her Confessor. But after satisfaction was made to the devotion of all, desiring to see and touch her, the burial was conducted very honorably; as both her merits required, and the Mother Abbess had disposed, with the aforesaid Priest Doctus. He indeed, as devoutly as he had stood by her living, so constantly clung to the sepulchre of the dead, for whole seven days not departing from it, except as much as the necessity of taking corporal refection required; for he hoped that her glory would be manifested to him by some sign; as also it was done on the seventh day in the morning, when he saw the Blessed one between two fiery chariots carried to heaven, the Angels thronging and praising God glorious in his Saints. This glorious vision excited that pious Priest, now certain of her beatitude, She is translated once, to take care that the body should be elevated from the earth and placed in a more honored tomb: which when it was divulged through the city, to this act there ran together a great multitude of people,
and with others also twenty-two sick, afflicted with long-lasting diseases, who all on that day were healed, through the faith placed in her merits.
[9] and again the body, But neither in this new sepulchre did the holy Relics long rest: for when Fr. Bartolus de Palmeriis of Cascina, Prior of the church of the holy Sepulchre at Pisa, of the same Order of S. John of Jerusalem, was by the Master of the Order, with his own not slight confusion, removed from his place; humbly commending himself to B. Ubaldesca, he vowed, that if he should be restored to his dignity, he would take care that her feast should be annually celebrated on the day of the most holy Trinity: but the following night the Blessed one appeared to him, and said, Go and dispose whatever pertains to my feast, for I will be present to thee as helper. Nor was the promise vain: for soon received by the Master into grace, he recovered also his Priorate; and thence began to celebrate her feast most solemnly every year, as up to now it is celebrated in honor of the most holy Trinity and B. Ubaldesca. Nor content with this, and the feast is instituted. he caused also the sacred body to be raised from the sepulchre, and the bones to be composed within a beautiful chest: and the head of the Blessed one being left with the Mothers of S. John (as was just) he placed her upon the altar, in his church of the holy Sepulchre; where thenceforth she is kept and reverently visited by all, on account of the many graces, which are obtained by her merits, of which it may be enough to have here narrated one, the rest being for the sake of compendium omitted.
[10] growing renowned by miracles she heals a wounded hand. A certain Mintmaster, hiring his labor to the city of Pisa in coining money for public uses, while on one of the days he was intent on his labor, by a vehement stroke of the wandering hammer drove a certain little coin so deeply into his hand, between the sinew and the flesh, that no industry could draw it out thence. When therefore day and night he had no space free from torment, frequently suffering also convulsions and spasms; all things being tried in vain both at Florence, whither for the sake of remedy he had also betaken himself, and at Pisa; he remembered B. Ubaldesca, by whose intercession so many had been aided. Therefore before the sepulchre, his knee bent, with great affection he commended himself to her: which done he suddenly felt himself fully healed, that little coin coming forth of itself, and leaving the hand free for its former uses. Whence the notice of so desperate a cure being carried in every direction, more and more was kindled the devotion even of the neighboring peoples, toward this holy handmaid of God; those esteeming themselves happy, who could obtain any of her Relics. Thus far Razzi.
[11] Her images, Jacobus Bosius, in the History of the Order, described in Italian in three Volumes and edited at Rome in the year 1594, touches the same things more briefly; and again in a little book of Images extracted thence; where with a twin image he represents the Saint from ancient and modern pictures. The modern ones exhibit her plainly as the Nuns are now clothed, namely with a scapular and a linen gorget for covering the neck; but the mantle so high gathered to the breast, that no part of the girdle can be seen, which otherwise also the scapular covers. The more ancient ones represent the habit and the form of the Cross proper to the Order far simpler than it now is, wherefore it seems worthwhile, to represent both images here. Bosius notes further, that the Bucket is commemorated in that image, and her other monuments reverently held. with which the drawn water is recorded to have been turned into wine in number 6, and which even today the Nuns of S. John keeping, are wont out of charity to send full of water of the same well to the feverish, often with happy success. The Palm in the more ancient picture the same Bosius thinks signifies the merit of patience, exercised in the last sickness. He adds, that one of the wells, whence the Saint was wont to draw water, is with the aforesaid Nuns; another, at the holy Sepulchre; and that from this the people are wont devoutly to drink on the day of her feast. Likewise that the chambers, formerly assigned to the habitation of the Saint, are today kept entire, but deputed to the uses of the Nuns, except one little cell, reduced into the form of a chapel. Finally, that around the walls of the monastery, are found several little Crosses carved, at which the Saint was accustomed to make her stations, being prohibited from going out; and that those kissing the same testify, that something of a most sweet odor is breathed thence upon them.
[12] Concerning the translation of the holy bones to Malta Razzi also treats: a part of the Reliquary translated to Malta in the year 1626 but let it please the reader to hear the more accurate series of the matter done from Bosius, part I book 7 toward the end thus speaking: In each place, namely in the Hospital of S. John and the church of the Sepulchre, God works many miracles through the intercession of this his Blessed one, moved by which the most Illustrious Cardinal and Grand Master of the Order Fr. Hugo de Loubenx Verdala, for his singular devotion toward B. Ubaldesca, mature deliberation being premised, in our times commanded the Knight Fr. Julius Zanchini de Castiglionchio, a Noble Florentine, Lieutenant of the Pisan Prior, that, license being first had of the Grand Duke Francis, he should open the aforesaid chest, about to take out thence a part, which could be translated to the first church of the whole Order, within the island of Malta. He did what he had been commanded, with the feast and indulgence of the 28th of May, before the Lord Archiepiscopal Vicar and Commissary of the city John Baptist Gianfigliazzi a Florentine Senator; and the part taken thence he sent to the Master: who took care that it should be carried to the Conventual church of S. John the Baptist, a Brief being first obtained from Pope Sixtus V, under the date of the year 1586 the 20th day of November, by which he commands, that after the translation of the aforesaid Relic into the new Maltese city, every year the feast be celebrated on the 28th of May in honor of B. Ubaldesca, by the same rite and office, that is a Double, by which it is wont to be celebrated in the Metropolitan church of the city of Pisa; granting a plenary Indulgence, to last in perpetual future times, for all the faithful of Christ, who on the day of the aforesaid Translation, made in the year 1586 on the 28th day of May in the church of S. John at Malta, shall visit that sacred Relic.
[13] Fr. Antonius de Paula, a Vasconian, in the year 1623 elected Grand Master of the Order (in which grade he lived up to the year 1636) of his own name built a Hamlet, in the year 1636 a church erected there, in a property pertaining to the fief of Marsa, in the year 1626; whose houses and gardens all pay a tax to the Rectoral church of S. Ubaldesca, erected by the same Grand Master, by an Apostolic Bull of the Right of patronage annexed to the Mastership itself, for one Chaplain of the same Religion, and the obligation of providing there Mass every feast day, and also on the solemnity of that Saint, which is celebrated on the 28th of May with Vespers; and of twenty scudi, annually to be paid to the Master himself, as is more fully contained in the Bull, given at Rome on the last day of July of the year 1629. But the aforesaid Hamlet Paula contains about fifty houses, and souls of the inhabitants a hundred and sixty. Thus the Commendator John Francis de Abela Vicechancellor, in the description of the Island of Malta printed there in the year 1647 page 94 and 296, with a Topography of the whole island, marking Casal Paula on the southern side of the new city, toward the inland parts, at an interval of scarcely one Italian mile, as also the Maritime World of Jansson exhibits it.