Benedictine nuns, ancient and modern. No U.S. copies.
[Benedictine nuns]. Memorie Illustri Di alcune Sante, e Venerabili Serve di Dio dell’ Ordine Monastico del Patriarca S. Benedetto, Raccolte insieme a commodo delle Vergini Claustrali, e singolarmente per le Monache dello stesso Istituto Benedettino da N.N. Bologna: per il Longhi, 1719. 4to [30.5 x 15.3 cm], [3] ff., 196 pp., 120 pp., with woodcut initials and tail-pieces. Bound in contemporary marbled paper over cartone, blue sprinkled edges. Rubbing and edge wear to boards, a bit shaken. Internally with pale water staining, minor spotting and edge wear, and occasional minor toning.
Rare (no U.S. copies) first and only edition (1719) of this Bolognese volume of ‘Lives’ of Benedictine nuns collected by an anonymous author expressly for the use of nuns (“Raccolte insieme a commodo delle Vergini Claustrai, e singolarmente per le Monache dello stesso Istituto Benedettino”).
The first part presents the stories of the early female Benedictines (I stick with the Italian spellings here) Scolastica, Bianca, Ithe, Bathilde, Aldegonda, Hadeloge, Angadresime, Giuliana, Lurgarden, Digna, Aurea, Colomba, Eleonora, Geltrude, Mettilde, Fara or Burgundorfa, Raingarde, and Ilde.
The second section is dedicated to six recent (17th-century) nuns of varying sanctity, namely Anna Le Barbier, Maria di Beauvilliers, Margheritta di Arbouze, Louisa Dell’Ospital, Laurenza di Budos, and Maria di Lorena.
The book carries the inscription of a certain “Donna Ide,” but the ex-libris inscription of the Francesco Clodoveo Maria Pentolini shows that the work was of interest to more than just nuns. Pentolini was a Barnabite abbot and Arcadian Academician. He is best known now for his two-volume Le donne illustri canti dieci (1776-77), whose poems touch on hundreds of famous women, including some treated in our Memorie Illustri Di alcune Sante, e Venerabili Serve di Dio dell’ Ordine Monastico del Patriarca S. Benedetto.
OCLC, KVK and OPAC/SBN/ICCU locate no U.S. copies of this work.
*IT\ICCU\PARE\042153.