Angelina da Marsciano, Blessed

ANGELINA da MARSCIANO, blessed. - Franciscan, born in the castle of Montegiove, near Orvieto, about 1377, to Giacomo, count of Marsciano, and Anna of the counts of Corbara; died in Foligno on 14 July 1435. In 1393 she married Giovanni, count of Civitella d'Abruzzo, with whom she is said to have lived in continence. Widowed in 1395, she devoted herself to an austere life of piety, becoming a Franciscan tertiary and giving away a large part of her possessions. Accused of sorcery before Ladislao, king of Naples, whose vassal she was, she cleared herself in his presence; yet some time later she was nevertheless banished from the kingdom. In the company of other young women drawn by her example, she made a pilgrimage to Assisi for the feast of the Pardon in 1395. From there she went to Foligno, where she founded a convent of enclosed Franciscan tertiaries, known as that of S. Anna (1397). Because of the number of women coming to it from Umbria and various regions of Italy, a second was added in Foligno and others in Assisi (S. Quirico), Florence (S. Onofrio), Viterbo (S. Agnese), and in eleven other places during the lifetime of the blessed, who governed them all as minister general. She was buried in the church of S. Francesco in Foligno. In 1825 Leo XII confirmed her cult. She is commemorated on 15 July.