AVANCINI, NICOLA. - Jesuit writer, born in Val di Non (Trento) in 1611, died in Rome on 6 Dec. 1686. Learned in various disciplines, he held chairs of letters at Trieste, Ljubljana, and Vienna, of philosophy at Graz, and of theology at Vienna. He was rector of the colleges of Passau, Vienna, and Graz; later he was visitor of Bohemia, provincial of Austria, and finally assistant for Germany in the General Curia in Rome.
Before entering public office, he published various literary, philosophical, theological, and ascetical works, but none attained the fame of the meditations published under the title Vita et doctrina Iesu Christi (1665), which were translated into all the principal European languages and reprinted many times, sometimes with further developments; although very concise and somewhat dry, they are still useful to many for the daily practice of prayer (Turin reprint, 1938). He also published sermons, Latin poems, and especially dramas for the youth of the colleges: Hecatombe odarum (Vienna 1651); Poëis dramatica, in 5 parts (ibid. 1653); Poëis lyrica, in 5 books (ibid. 1659); Orationes (3 vols., ibid. 1656-60).