Capucciatis

CAPUCCIATIS. - Members of an association of laymen, of a religious-social character, founded on the initiative of a carpenter, Duranto Chaduiz, in Auvergne ca. 1182, around the sanctuary of Our Lady of Puy-en-Velay. They proposed to fight, even with arms, against the enemies of peace, and especially against the numerous bands of highwaymen and adventurers who were oppressing peaceful people in various provinces of France. They were called C. because they wore a white hood with the image or the medal of the Virgin and Child with the inscription: "Ecce Agnus Dei". They had considerable growth, but accused of heterodoxy, they were fought precisely by those who had at first protected them.

Toward the end of the 14th century, Wycliff's Lollards were also designated by the name of C., because they refused, out of sectarian spirit, to remove their hood before the Most Holy Sacrament.

Giovanni di Guadalupe, a disciple of Giovanni della Puebla, wishing to introduce into the Franciscan Order an observance even stricter than the Italian one, obtained in 1496 a brief from Pope Alexander VI by which he was permitted to live with six confreres in a hermitage near Granada, observing the Rule of St. Francis literally. He and his followers changed the Minorite habit, using a shorter mantle and a pyramidal hood, and they walked completely barefoot. Therefore the people called them Discalced or C., or also Brothers of the Holy Gospel.

Lucchesis Spätling