ON BL. LUCIA OF SETTEFONTI, VIRGIN OF THE CAMALDOLESE ORDER,
TWELFTH CENTURY?
CommentaryLucia of Settefonti, virgin of the Camaldolese Order. (B.)
BY F. V. O.
§ I. The older monuments of the cult paid to Bl. Lucia.
[1] The church of the monastery of St. Christina at Settefonti At the place Septem Fontes, commonly Stifonte, about eight miles distant from the city of Bologna, there was raised in the year 1097, under the title of Saint Christina, a convent of nuns of the Camaldolese order Mittarelli, Annales Camaldulenses, vol. III, pp. 86 – 87.. Among whose first nurslings, at least from the fifteenth century, the report spread that there had been enrolled a certain virgin, renowned for the beauty of her body and the gifts of her soul, named Lucia, to whom thereafter, with popular veneration favouring it, the surname of Stifonte was attached. Indeed the people of the neighbourhood, in the course of time, even changed the ancient name of Saint Christina of the church of the monastery, in which her body is said to be buried, into the title of Blessed Lucia. This at least is established from the year 1508, in the year 1508 in which namely Francesco, of the Alidosi family, priest cardinal of the Holy Roman Church of Pavia, legate a latere of the Apostolic See in the city of Bologna, the exarchate of Ravenna and the whole province of Romagna, grants an indulgence of three hundred days to all the faithful who should visit and help both the church of Saint Christina situated at Bologna, to which the Camaldolese nuns had moved from the castle of Stifonte in the year 1247 Ibid., p. 346., it bore the name of St. Lucia, and the ancient church of Saint Lucia of the place Stifonte. And since this letter does very much to manifest the cult of the same blessed woman, it is helpful to report it in part: Desiring therefore, he says, that the church or monastery of Saint Christina de Fundatia Strada della Fondazza, the name of a certain crossroads of the city of Bologna. of Bologna, of the Camaldolese order, and also the church of Saint Lucia of Stiffunto of the diocese of Bologna, perpetually united to the same monastery, be duly repaired, preserved and maintained in their structures and buildings, and be more becomingly furnished with books, chalices, lights and other ecclesiastical ornaments for divine worship, and be continually venerated by Christ's faithful, and also be frequented with fitting honours, and that Christ's faithful may the more willingly flock to them for the sake of devotion, and the more promptly stretch out helping hands for their repair, preservation, maintenance and furnishing of this kind, the more they see themselves refreshed by this gift of heavenly grace; inclined by the humble supplications offered to us on the part of the abbess and nuns, beloved to us in Christ, of the said monastery of Saint Christina of Bologna of the Camaldolese order, to each and all of Christ's aforesaid faithful of either sex, truly penitent and confessed, who shall devoutly visit annually the said church of Saint Christina on the days of the festivals of the same saint and of Palm Sunday, and the aforesaid church of Saint Lucia on the days of the festivals of the same Saint Lucia, from first vespers until second vespers inclusive, and shall stretch out helping hands to the aforesaid things, for each of the days of the same festivals on which they do so, we impart three hundred days of the penances enjoined on them, by the apostolic authority committed to us [Mittarelli, l. c., vol. VII, Appendix, col. 284 "from the original in the archive of St. Christina of Bologna L. 37."]. Hence it is plain both that the church of Stifonte is sacred to Bl. Lucia and that her feast was celebrated every year, without the day on which this was done being definitely determined.
[2] whose body, as Ambrogio Traversari witnesses, Further, the change of title of this church had not yet been accomplished in the year 1433. For when Bl. Ambrogio Traversari, newly proclaimed abbot general of the Camaldolese monks, was going through all the houses of his order, having entered the district of Bologna: We saw, he says, a most pleasant region, and we beheld the old monastery of Saint Christina; rested there, there is laid the body of St. Lucia Hodoeporicon of Bl. Ambrose, p. 37.. What follows plainly shows that St. Lucia of Stifonte is meant. Besides, if it is right to believe the most diligent compilers of the Camaldolese Annals, there existed also a more ancient monument of that public veneration. For they report that there was seen by them in the monastery of Saint Christina at Bologna an image of that blessed woman, applied to a panel and, in the manner of the ancients, commonly "a tempera," and an image was painted in the fourteenth century expressed in colours, which in the opinion of experts has the character of the fourteenth century and is thought to be the work of Simone de' Avanzi, who flourished
about the year 1370. Letters in the common style namely Gothic at the edge of the panel have: "Beata Lucia de lordine de Sca Christina." Blessed Lucia of the order of St. Christina. The blessed woman stands there within her cell, in which two windows are seen… Her head is bound with a black veil and with a halo; she carries a lighted candle and a book in her right hand, and in her left a cross. Besides this old image others are seen in the same convent and elsewhere, but of a later age Mittarelli, l. c., vol. III, col. 347.. The ancient likeness is shown by the authors in the same place on the reverse side of the leaf. and in the sixteenth. There is also preserved at Bologna, in the church of the monastery of Saint Christina, another image, painted by Francesco Salviati before the year 1541, in the judgment of Vasari [Melloni, Atti o Memorie degli uomini illustri in santita, Cl. II, vol. I, p. 121, where other images of Bl. Lucia and small relics of her are treated.].
[3] Nothing older about her cult has been found. Besides the testimonies brought forward, nothing about the veneration paid of old to Bl. Lucia could be found either by Benedict XIV or by those who after him made new investigations, Mittarelli and Costadoni, as they themselves wrote to him on 1 December of the year 1753: Abbiamo minutamente osservato il confuso archivio delle monache di S. Christina di Bologna, con tutte le iscrizioni e le pitture di quel monastero, e quelle pure delle chiese di S. Andrea di Ozzano e della B. Lucia presso a Stifonte, ma nulla di più si è ritrovato, che non sia stato ottimamente scritto nell' immortale sua opera de Canonizatione lib. II cap. XVIII, n. XI ec. [We have minutely examined the confused archive of the nuns of St. Christina of Bologna, with all the inscriptions and paintings of that monastery, and those too of the churches of St. Andrew of Ozzano and of Bl. Lucia near Stifonte, but nothing more has been found that has not been excellently written in your immortal work De Canonizatione, book II, ch. XVIII, no. XI, etc.] [Autograph letter, Bologna, R. Biblioteca dell' Università, Ms. no. 52, III. 22. "Monumenta cultus B. Luciae de Stifonte ex Bibliotheca Benedicti XIV. P. M.". The 1st day of December is established from the letter which the supreme Pontiff wrote back on 22 December 1753, ed. in Annales Camaldulenses, vol. VIII, p. 693.]. Nor had the matter turned out more happily for Silvano Razzi, a Camaldolese monk, who in the year 1600, having undertaken to unfold the Life of Bl. Lucia from very barren material at hand, tries thus to excuse his poverty: Oltre che molte altre scritture già per un' incendio abruciarono, alcune memorie ancora, le quali erano inscritte nelle mura della detta chiesa di Santa Lucia, nel restaurarla, non sono molti anni passati, furono gittate per terra. In tanto che, ancorche detto Monsignor Illustrissimo namely the apostolic visitor mi habbia fatto in piu luoghi, dove si ricorda haverle vedute, scalcinare et scortecciare il muro, non però si è mai trovata alcuna cosa di buono [Besides the fact that many other writings were long since burned in a fire, some memorials too, which were inscribed on the walls of the said church of Santa Lucia, were thrown to the ground in restoring it, not many years ago. So much so that, although the said most illustrious Monsignor has had the wall unplastered and stripped for me in several places where he remembers having seen them, yet nothing of any good has ever been found] Le Vite de' Santi e Beati dell' Ordine di Camaldoni (Florence, 1600), f. 60v.. Nor did it fall to the very many authors from whose works were extracted the authentic Monumenta cultus B. Luciae de Stifonte Bononien. diocesis Virginis ordinis Camaldulensis Bologna, R. Biblioteca dell' Università, Ms. cit., so that it might be juridically demonstrated that it had flourished from time immemorial, to rescue anything new from oblivion.
§ II. On the translation and elevation of her relics celebrated in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
[4] At the exhortation of Gregory XIII, From the sixteenth century, however, the celebration of the feast and the liturgical honours conferred on Lucia lie in the open. And it is better that this, the principal part of our little treatise, the more so because her life is almost wholly unknown, should, since the treatment of it has been begun, be touched upon continuously. On 10 September 1572 Gregory XIII exhorted Gabriele Paleotti, cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, bishop of Bologna, to receive kindly the prayers offered to him about translating for just causes the bones of Bl. Lucia, as one reads in the apostolic brief: There have lately caused it to be set forth to us our beloved daughters in the Lord, the abbess and nuns of the monastery of Saint Christina de Fundatia, of the Camaldolese order, of Bologna, that, since the abbess and nuns themselves have, upon a certain rustic estate of theirs in the commune of Stifunti in the county of the same city, a certain old church and oratory under the title of Blessed Lucia, and ruinous from subterranean waters, commonly called lacunae, although repaired several times, so that in the judgment of anyone skilled in such an art it can no longer at all be refitted and maintained, as is gathered manifestly enough from the look of it… Therefore the abbess and nuns themselves would most greatly desire to destroy such church, which is without cure of souls and in a solitary place and exposed to dangers, and where from time beyond the memory of man no priest or chaplain has been accustomed to reside, but only on certain few days in the year, and especially on the day of Saint Lucia, the aforesaid abbess and nuns are wont to send priests to it to celebrate Masses, on which day so great a multitude of people flocks there with arms and arquebuses, not without scandal to Christ's faithful and hindrance of their devotion, so that it would be less scandal if such church or oratory were closed on that day; to destroy it, I say, in its older and more ruinous and dangerous part, and to repair and refit the remainder, as best and most safely can be done, with one altar, and to leave it so refitted and maintain it in perpetuity, and to carry the rubble and stones, if any remain (the said refitting having been done), to the church written below and for its service, and devoutly to translate the bones or relics existing in the said church of Blessed Lucia, in a place too unsightly and not well suited, to another church of the abbess and nuns themselves under the title of Saint Andrew, situated in the commune of upper Oggiano, not far distant from the same former church of Blessed Lucia, but safer and more frequented by persons, and where they may remain in perpetuity [Among the "Civil acts for the nuns of Saint Christina of Bologna and for the body of Bl. Lucia, nun, from the autograph of the same convent," ed. Annales Camaldulenses, Appendix to vol. VIII, pp. 157 – 58.].
[5] when it had been found that the church of Stifonte was foully neglected That this wish might be satisfied, an inquiry was held by the vicar general of Bologna, Angelo Perutio, and two witnesses were questioned, the one living at Stifonte, the other at Ozano. They declared among other things these things about the ruinous state of the church and the relics of Bl. Lucia kept there. The first witness: Detta chiesa è posta in loco solitario discosto dalle case, e li non gli è senon delle lavine e boschi, e più volte li banditi vi sono ad alloggiarvi per esser luogo securo ed esser la alla foresta. Ed io ho trovato suso il feno sotto la casa, alle volte di borselli con delli ballini da archibusi, ch' è segno gli erano stati li sgherri e banditi a dormire. [The said church is placed in a solitary spot far from the houses, and there is nothing there but landslides and woods, and many times the bandits have come to lodge there, because it is a safe place and lies out in the forest. And I have found up in the hay under the house, at times, purses with arquebus balls, which is a sign that the ruffians and bandits had been there to sleep.] And he said: A' miei di in detta chiesa e casa non gli è stato prete ad ufficiarla e dirli messa. Solo li vanno li preti il giorno di sancta Lucia a dirli messa. Ed in tal di vengono e sgherri e banditi in gran numero con arme ed archibusi e le portano in chiesa, di sorte che sono impedimento, e danno paura a chi gli va per divozione. E me ricordo che una volta il fattore delle sore in simil dì avea fatto fare da mangiare per li preti ch' erano stati li a dir messa; e li sgherri volsono e gli tolsono il desinare, e lo mangiorono per loro, e bisognò che il fattore avesse pazienza con li preti; e certo è più presto scandolo che divozione. [In my days there has been no priest in the said church and house to officiate in it and say Mass there. Only on the day of Saint Lucia do the priests go there to say Mass. And on that day there come both ruffians and bandits in great numbers with arms and arquebuses, and they carry them into the church, so that they are a hindrance and frighten whoever goes there for devotion. And I remember that once the steward of the sisters, on such a day, had had food made for the priests who had been there to say Mass; and the ruffians wanted it and took the dinner from them and ate it for themselves, and the steward had to have patience with the priests; and certainly it is rather a scandal than devotion.] And also, being questioned, he said: Signor si, and that the relics of Bl. Lucia, ch'è vero, che gli sono in detta chiesa delle reliquie, come si dice, di santa Lucia, ma in vero sono li in loco non convenevole, e non condecente a reliquie de' santi. E non se li tiene lume acceso, e non se gli fa, nè se gli ha ed usa reverenza alcuna, per esser li in abbandono, e in quella chiesa vecchia, e che non se gli va. [Yes, sir, it is true that there are in the said church relics, as is said, of Saint Lucia, but in truth they are there in a place not fitting and not becoming to the relics of saints. And no light is kept burning there, and no reverence at all is done, held or used toward them, because they are there abandoned, and in that old church, and no one goes there.] And he said: Chi levasse via quelle reliquie di quella chiesa, e le portasse alla chiesa di Sant' Andrea nel comune di Ozano, qual' è pure di dette sore, o le accomodasse in loco onesto e condecente, pare a me e così tengo che seria ben fatto, onesto e di più riverenza, perchè la chiesa di Sant' Andrea ha cura, e sempre gli sta il prete, e se gli tiene sempre il lume acceso, e se gli dice messa le feste ed anco delle volte in dì di lavoro… [Whoever should take away those relics from that church and carry them to the church of Sant' Andrea in the commune of Ozano, which also belongs to the said sisters, or should place them in a decent and becoming place, it seems to me, and so I hold, that it would be well done, decent and of more reverence, because the church of Sant' Andrea has cure of souls, and the priest always stays there, and a light is always kept burning there, and Mass is said there on feast days and also at times on working days…] And being questioned, he said: Io mai ho udito dire che a quella chiesa di poi che si partì le sore, CHE SONO PIÙ DI DUSENTO ANNI, gli sia stato prete alcuno ad ufficiarla, senon il di di santa Lucia. [I have never heard it said that at that church, since the sisters left, WHICH IS MORE THAN TWO HUNDRED YEARS, there has been any priest to officiate in it, except on the day of Saint Lucia.]
[6] and this had been confirmed again, The other witness, eighty-four years old, asserts these things: Possono esser cinquanta anni, che io so ed ho conoscenza della chiesa senza cura di Santa Lucia posta nel comune di Stifonte, conta di Bologna, la qual' è una chiesa vecchia, mal' andata e che sta per cascare… [It may be fifty years that I have known and had knowledge of the church without cure of souls of Santa Lucia, placed in the commune of Stifonte, county of Bologna, which is an old church, gone to ruin and about to fall…] And he said: Io per me non mi ricordo, nè manco mai ho udito dire chel 'l sia stato nè prete, nè frate alla detta chiesa di Santa Lucia. E ben vero, che le sore di Santa Cristina della Fondazza qui di Bologna, perchè detta chiesa è la soa, gli fanno il dì della festa di santa Lucia dire delle messe; mai per il resto dell' anno non se gli dice nè messa, nè uffizio. [For my part I do not remember, nor have I ever even heard it said, that there has been either priest or friar at the said church of Santa Lucia. It is indeed true that the sisters of Santa Cristina della Fondazza here in Bologna, because the said church is theirs, have Masses said there on the day of the feast of Saint Lucia; but for the rest of the year neither Mass nor office is ever said there.] And he said: In quel di della festa di santa Lucia gli concorre e gli viene tanta gente a detta chiesa, che l'è una compassione, e gli vengono de' sgherri et de banditi con arme ed archibusi, e le vogliono portare sino in chiesa e fanno tanto rumore e tanto insulto e furia, che quelli che gli vanno per divozione, più presto anno paura e se ne vanno, che stare alla perdonanza; quanto fariano, se non gli fosse quelli sgherri e banditi; [On that day of the feast of Saint Lucia so many people flock and come to the said church that it is a pity, and there come ruffians and bandits with arms and arquebuses, and they want to carry them even into the church, and they make so much noise and so much insolence and fury that those who go there for devotion are rather afraid and go away, than stay for the pardon; as they would do, if those ruffians and bandits were not there;]
[7] her body was translated in 1573 to the church of Ozano The longed-for translation to the church of Saint Andrew of Ozano was carried out on 7 November 1573 Annales Camaldulenses, vol. VIII, p. 141., the building at Stifonte was levelled to the ground, and in its place an oratory was erected. Above the altar of each shrine was painted an image of Bl. Lucia freeing a captive Ibid., vol. III, p. 347.. Of this likeness there will soon be talk again. And in what manner the sacred virgin's remains were laid up, Alfonso Paleotti, archbishop of Bologna, notes thus in the acts of the visitation which he held in the church of Saint Andrew of Ozano on 29 July 1599: Above the said altar there is a millstone sepulchre, in which they say rests the body of Blessed Lucia, nun of the Camaldolese order. Likewise in another visitation, on 21 September of the year 1631, the cardinal archbishop Girolamo Colonna: Likewise the body, as they say, of a certain Blessed Lucia, laid up in a wooden casket enclosed in a monument of millstone situated above the high altar Ibid., vol. VIII, p. 332.. And the sacred body remained in this place at the high altar until the church of Ozano itself was restored in the year 1639 Ibid., vol. III, p. 347.. Then beside it was built a certain chapel in honour of Bl. Lucia, and in 1642 laid up again in a new chapel. into which, on the 8th of June of the year 1642, under Dorothea Leonia, abbess of Saint Christina de Fundatia at Bologna, a new translation was carried out. On which occasion the monastery of Saint Christina at Bologna kept several bones for itself, where they were placed in the church with this inscription: Part of the body of Blessed Lucia, virgin of Stiphunto, from among the foremost of the first women Her veneration ever growing, who founded the Camaldolese nuns, 1642 Ibid., vol. VIII, pp. 331 – 32.. From which time public piety toward her has always grown. The monuments which still exist were collected Bologna, R. Biblioteca dell' Università, Ms. cit., so that a juridical decision might be made on confirming her cult. Of the various testimonies brought forward, which excel more in number than in weight, it is expedient to report the following, because from it a custom becomes known, perhaps fairly old, although indicated by no biographer: the devotion to the water of Bl. Lucia arose. A di 7 Gennaro 1754. Noi sottoscritte Badessa, Priora e Camerlinga del Monistero di Sa Cristina di Bologna giuridicamente attestiamo esser poco men che continuo il concorso delle persone di ogni grado e condizione, le quali vengono al Monistero nostro per avere dell' acqua della Beata Lucia, a motivo di esser liberati da vari malori, specialmente d'occhi. Si ha questa da una di quelle sette fonti, delle quali riceve la sua denominatione l'antico luogo di Stifonte. Ed è pure tradizione antica che, abitando la Beata ancor vivente nel sudetto sito, a cotesta privilegiata fonte accorresse ne' suoi bisogni. [On the 7th of January 1754. We the undersigned Abbess, Prioress and Chamberlain of the Monastery of St. Cristina of Bologna juridically attest that the concourse of persons of every rank and condition is little less than continual, who come to our Monastery to have some of the water of Blessed Lucia, for the purpose of being freed from various ailments, especially of the eyes. This is had from one of those seven springs from which the ancient place of Stifonte receives its name. And it is also an ancient tradition that the Blessed one, while still living and dwelling in the aforesaid site, had recourse to this privileged spring in her needs.] The names of the senders follow Autograph, ibid..
§ III. Confirmation of the cult; a certain kind of miracles performed by Bl. Lucia.
[8] Pius VI confirms her cult and appoints her feast on 7 Nov., At last Pius VI duly approved the requested confirmation of the cult on 24 March 1779, and bestowed a plenary indulgence of sins on each and all of Christ's faithful of either sex, truly penitent and confessed and refreshed with holy communion, who should devoutly visit each year any of the churches, both of monks and of nuns of the order of Saint Benedict of the Camaldolese congregation, wherever existing, on the seventh day of the month of November, from first vespers until sunset of that day.
[9] which was formerly celebrated on 13 December. Hence in the martyrology of the whole Camaldolese family the anniversary solemnity of Bl. Lucia was fixed to this day, on which, as we mentioned above, the first translation was carried out Page 6.. But previously another day, namely 13 December, on which Saint Lucy, virgin and martyr of Syracuse, is honoured with the highest devotion in the universal Church, was assigned for celebrating the feast of Blessed Lucia of Stifonte by Silvano Razzi Le Vite de' Santi e Beati dell' Ordine di Camaldoli, f. 60 (1600)., Gaspare Bombaci Bolognesi illustri per santità, f. 5 (1640)., Antonio di Paolo Masini Bologna perlustrata, third printing (Bologna, 1666), p. 556; cf. p. 512., Carlo Rabi [Among the annotations to Carlo Sigonio's work on the Bishops of Bologna (Opera omnia, vol. III, 1733, col. 421, annot. 73).], although they report the translation carried out on 7 November 1573. To produce one, Rabi has this: Her sacred ashes, in the reign of Gregory XIII, were translated from there Stifonte to the neighbouring church of St. Andrew of Ozano in the year 1573 on the 7th of November, and there the feast of this virgin is celebrated on 13 December. In altogether the same way the remaining authors note the same thing. Indeed it is also more probable that the cardinal of Pavia, who in the year 1508 granted an indulgence for the festal day of Bl. Lucia Cf. above, p. 618, no. 1., meant 13 December.
[10] Little by little Bl. Lucia was invoked Of miracles performed by Bl. Lucia in early times, if you except the youth loosed from his bonds, nothing has been handed down to posterity. The compilers of the Camaldolese Annals do note under the year 1620 that she shone with many miracles, "which through the negligence of the nuns of St. Christina were not written down" Annales Camaldulenses, vol. VIII, p. 259.. And they at once narrate, following the lead of the confessor of the nuns of Saint Christina, two healings of some sort, accomplished at this period, yet they do not explain the nature of the disease. for healing diseases of the eyes. But in the years 1634 and 1635 two blind men, as the same writers witness Ibid., p. 332., recovered their sight. This happened again, about the year 1732, three times, there being used, as is established from authentic documents Bologna, R. Biblioteca dell' Universita, Ms. cit., acqua di una fontana esistente nel comune di Stifonte della qual fontana era et è fama si servisse detta beata Lucia vivente, e dove è sempre stato et è tuttavia concorso di persone anche lontane ed estere, che prendono di quell' acqua per guarire dei mali d'occhi e se n'è veduto profitto [water of a spring existing in the commune of Stifonte, which spring the said blessed one Lucia, it was and is reported, used while she lived, and where there has always been and still is a concourse of persons, even distant and foreign, who take some of that water to be healed of diseases of the eyes, and benefit has been seen from it]. So the custom prevailed, from the eighteenth century at least, among the inhabitants of this region, di avere sempre in casa loro dell' acqua di detta fontana, dispensandone frequentemente a chi ne addimandi per guarire de mali degli ochi [of always having in their houses some of the water of the said spring, dispensing it frequently to whoever asks for it to be healed of diseases of the eyes]. Which usage we have already noted above to flourish also in the monastery of Saint Christina at Bologna Page 7.; and the authors praised above, relying perhaps on the same documents, declare: Near Stiffuntium a spring flows out, from which the people draw and drink for devotion's sake, and it is called the spring of Blessed Lucia Annales Camaldulenses, vol. III, p. 348.. Finally, among the many votive tablets which adorn the altars dedicated to Bl. Lucia, for the most part eyes of wax and silver stand out. Whence it is plain that the eminent virgin was invoked in the eighteenth century chiefly for healing diseases of the eyes [Melloni, Op. cit., Cl. I, vol. II (1788), p. 331. Cf. vol. I (1773), p. 119. It is expedient to consult this author, l. c., if anyone seeks detailed descriptions of the cult of Bl. Lucia.].
§ IV. In place of her wholly unknown Acts a tradition worthy of little credence has spread.
[11] While her life is wholly unknown, These are the things worth recording which we have been able, carefully sifted, to gather about the cult paid to this virgin. They are not at all doubtful, while her life is wrapped in thick darkness. Already it is wholly unknown in roughly what century she was born. She is indeed numbered among the first nuns who at the end of the eleventh century founded the Camaldolese monastery of Stifonte. And indeed it is drawn from the archive of the congregation of Saint Christina that there was formerly a certain abbess named Lucia, who presided over the monastery of Saint Christina for several years. indeed even the time in which she lived, For mention of her occurs in the acts of donations made in the years 1149, 1154, 1155 and 1156 Annales Camaldulenses, vol. III, Appendix, pp. 451, 470, 480 and 486.. But since in the year 1158 Adelasia is named abbess, it is easy to conclude that about that time Lucia, having discharged the same office, departed from among the living Ibid., vol. III, p. 345.. But whether this was one and the same nun as our blessed one, who holds a cult at Septem Fontes, at Ozano and at Bologna in the monastery of Saint Christina, is suggested by no argument at all, as the compilers of the Camaldolese Annals have already rightly seen. There was also another Lucia, an abbess, who governed the old convent of Saint Christina, transferred to Bologna in the year 1247 Ibid., p. 305.. Which happened too late for us to be able to recognize in her our blessed one of Stifonte. And so it is rashly asserted by Silvano Razzi, when he addresses the nuns of this convent, that Bl. Lucia was, "si come è certissimo, prima fondatrice del vostro hoggi si grande e si magnifico monasterio di Santa Christina" [as is most certain, the first foundress of your monastery of Santa Christina, today so great and so magnificent] Le Vite de' Santi e Beati dell' Ordine di Camaldoli, f. 59.. In vain
Giovanni Battista Melloni too tried to establish this Atti o memorie degli uomini illustri in santità, Cl. II vol. I, pp. 107 – 08..
[12] was spread about What, then, can be found out about our blessed one? It must be confessed, next to nothing, as was found by Benedict XIV himself, when he wrote back to the diligent investigators who were keenly pursuing her beatification: We take it ill that you have found little… As regards the office the liturgical one, which they were demanding, since it is a question of an unknown blessed one, something further is required besides the things which have been fished out here and there about the cult. The narrative of Bl. Ambrogio Traversari No differently was she unknown in the age of Bl. Ambrogio Traversari. For in the year 1433, in the month of August, having been brought to Stifonte to visit the old monastery of Saint Christina, and having been informed that the bones of Saint Lucia rested there, he asked in vain about her Acts: When we vehemently desired to read her Life, he says, we found that none was there in writing Annales Camaldulenses, vol. VIII, p. 693.. But the memory of at least one wondrous deed was spread abroad. Which he himself committed to writing thus: about a suitor This was her famous and widely known miracle. A young nobleman had fallen in love with her, since she was most beautiful, and he frequently came to the monastery for the sake of seeing her. For, since she was enclosed in a little cell joined to the church, she was accustomed to hear the solemnities of Masses through a window. The youth, seizing upon this hour, used to come there only for the sake of looking at her. When the most chaste virgin noticed this, she had the window blocked up and kept herself within the secret of her little cell, desiring to please the Father who sees in secret. Cf. Matt. 6, 4. The youth, drunk with love, when he saw that every hope of possessing her had been taken from him, overcome by despair, betook himself to more remote and barbarous nations. Meanwhile the happy virgin passed to the Lord. to a captive When the youth, captured by the Saracens, was being compelled to deny the faith or meet death, shut up in prison and bound with fetters, as vexation is wont to give understanding to the hearing, he remembered Lucia, the most holy virgin. Cf. Isa. 28, 19. freed by Bl. Lucia. And pierced in heart: "O Lucia," he said, "virgin of Christ, if you have any power with God, help me and free me from these necessities." In these words he is seized by sleep and, awaking near the monastery, about a stone's throw away, bound with fetters, he catches with his ears the sound of the customary bell. The virgin of Christ appeared to him in a vision. And he, marvelling at the sight of her: "Are you alive, Lucia?" he said. And she: "I live the true life," she said. "Go and carry those fetters to my tomb, and give thanks to God, who has freed you from imminent danger." He obeyed the commands. Those (sic) fetters we have seen; nor are there lacking those who assert that they could never in any way be moved from there. The writers of the Camaldolese Annals note moreover that not far from the site of the old monastery of Saint Christina, Which a column bore witness to on the road that leads to the castle of Septem Fontes, there rises a column, now crumbling and bereft of its cross, which the tradition of the townspeople holds was set up as a memorial of the spot to which the captive, made free and loosed by the merits of Blessed Lucia, was transported Annales Camaldulenses, vol. III, p. 348.. This tradition, passed over by Ambrose, about so far-off and obscure a portent, and one which left no trace in the development of the cult of Bl. Lucia, is very frail; nor would it be surprising if the literary monument of the celebrated abbot general of the Camaldolese had given occasion to this popular interpretation of the erected column.
[13] and it was inscribed in the liturgical office. For his narrative, recooked and worn down, enlarged or contracted, all who have written about Bl. Lucia have used, each in his own way; indeed her religious family inserted it word for word in the second nocturn of the liturgical office. Nor is that most upright man to be suspected of having either added or taken away anything on his own account; he surely reported the matter as it was spread abroad at Stifonte in his time, that is, three and more centuries after the beginnings of the monastery of Saint Christina. In the course of his account two parts, distinct enough, follow one another. The former treats of the way in which the blessed virgin, while she lived, guarded her chastity; the other of the portent by which, when dead, she provided for the safety of her lover. If these are examined more closely, few things remain which can win credence for themselves. These merit little credence. For over the later prodigy of the captive transported across immense spaces and loosed from his bonds in his homeland there is no reason for us to hesitate, since similar things are proclaimed everywhere and have the source of their invention, with at least the streams bent aside, in the Acts of the Apostles, where it is narrated how Peter was led out of Herod's prison Acts of the Apostles, XI, 1 – 11.. This exemplar surely shone forth, after which the other imitations of this kind were sketched. But the means by which Blessed Lucia warded off the importunate pursuits of her lover, namely by blocking up the little windows of her cell (in the painting which seems to belong to about the year 1370 the walls of her chamber are furnished with two little windows), has a certain affinity, as Théophile Raynaud has already noticed Hagiologium Lugdunense, Opera omnia, vol. VIII (1665), pp. 514 – 15., with a surely crueller means used by other virgins, who removed their suitors by tearing out their own eyes. Such things are read of St. Brigid († 523) in an Irish homily, very fabulous [Whitley Stokes, Three Middle-Irish Homilies on the Lives of saints Patrick, Brigit and Columba (Calcutta, 1877), p. 65.], and elsewhere, without the name of the virgin expressed, namely in John Moschus in his Spiritual Meadow, which, compiled in the seventh century, Ambrogio Traversari himself rendered into Latin Ch. 60; Vitae Patrum, ed. H. Rosweyde (Antwerp, 1615), p. 872., twice in Stephen of Bourbon [A. Lecoy de la Marche, Anecdotes historiques d'Étienne de Bourbon, p. 211 and p. 431 (nos. 211 and 500).] and in Vincent of Beauvais [Speculum morale, book I, part 3, dist. 96 and book III, part 1, dist. 4 (Venice, 1493, fol. 90 and fol. 150v). His twofold little story agrees word for word with the little stories of Stephen of Bourbon, but they are arranged in inverse order.] in the thirteenth century, and once in Jacques de Vitry [T. F. Crane, The Exempla of Jacques de Vitry (Folk-Lore Society, no. 26, 1890), p. 22, no. LVII.], in the same age. This virgin Rader, in his Viridarium sanctorum, part III, ch. 3, on blind saints, without any reason at all calls Bl. Lucia and ascribes to the religious order of St. Dominic P. 632 (Lyons, 1627).. Following him, Arthur du Moustier, at 3 December in his Sacrum Gynecaeum, adds also the region in which she lived: In Gaul, of Blessed Lucia, virgin, nursling of the order of Saint Dominic, who flourished with wondrous integrity of life and the praise of chastity. Among the Indians, moreover, a similar little story was already being told, as may be seen in the very ample work Kathá Sarit Ságara (Ocean of the rivers of story), where a most noble prince is presented who, driven to despair by a virgin whom he loved, left his kingdom and led the life of a wandering hermit [Clouston, Popular Tales and Fictions (Edinburgh, 1887), vol. I, p. 35, cited by Th. Crane, The Exempla of Jacques de Vitry, p. 158.]. Whatever it is, that this little fable, variously adapted, flourished with enormous popular favour in the Middle Ages is abundantly shown by the various collections of sacred sermons and exempla spread everywhere Crane, ibid. Cf. Introduction, pp. LIII – CXVI.. And it is customary for artists to represent St. Lucy, the virgin of Syracuse, carrying her dug-out eyes in her hand or on a dish Ch. Cahier, Caractèristiques des saints, vol. I, p. 105.. Under all these lies the same notion, [How far the cults of Bl. Lucia of Stifonte and of St. Lucy of Syracuse agree with each other.] namely, that by taking away the light one turns away doting suitors. Moreover, if we recall that the feast of Bl. Lucia of Stifonte was formerly wont to be kept on the same day on which St. Lucy of Syracuse is honoured by the universal Church Above, p. 620, no. 9., that the cult of both prevailed for begging the light of the eyes, that both are called by the same name, which displays light, that on both sides the same manner of healing is shown, namely the water of Saint Lucy Cahier, l. c. and cf. above, p. 620, no. 7., and that this became widespread for Lucia of Stifonte rather in a more recent age, one may rightly suppose that traditions pertaining to the cult of Saint Lucy, celebrated throughout the whole world, overflowed into the veneration of Blessed Lucia of Stifonte, contained within much narrower bounds.