Bartolomeo di Rinonico (or di Pisa)

BARTOLOMEO DI RINONICO (or di Pisa). - Friar Minor, b. at Pisa, d. there ca. the year 1401. He was confused by Mariano da Firenze, Marco da Lisbona, Wadding, etc. with the Franciscan Bartolomeo Albisi; by others with the Dominican Bartolomeo da S. Concordio or with Bartolomeo the Pisan physician. B., already a friar in 1352, was a master in theology and a distinguished preacher, and among his writings the De conformitate vitae b. Francisci ad vitam Domini Iesu, which he composed between 1385 and 1390, is famous.

The informing idea of the book, which B. perhaps drew from the Lignum vitae of St. Bonaventure or from a book that Salimbene asserts (Cronica, ed. O. Holder-Egger, p. 193) he composed on the same subject, is to show how Christ made Francis like himself. It is therefore a glorification of grace rather than, as some would have it, an exaltation of the poor little man of Assisi. The treatment, divided into 40 Conformities, rich in erudition, is very useful for Franciscan history even if at times embellished with fantastic legends.

The De conformitate found a harsh adversary in the Alcoranum Franciscanorum of Erasmus Alber with a preface by Luther, but it had apologists among whom was E. Sedulio. Printed at Milan in 1510 and at Bologna in 1599, it received a critical edition at Quaracchi. B. had many imitators, among whom were G. Oddi, Mariano da Firenze, Pelbarto da Temesvar, P. Alva y Astorga, V. Marce.

Many other works were attributed to B., among which those critically authentic are: De vita et laudibus B. Mariae Virginis libri sex (Venice 1596), which has many points of contact with his major work, Quadragesimale de contemptu mundi (Milan 1498); Sermones lucidissimi et insignes dubiorum et casuum conscientialium contemptivi et elucidati super evangelis quadragesimalibus (Lyons 1519).

Felicissimo Tinivella