COLLEGE OF SAN PIETRO IN MONTO RIO. - Founded by Fr. Tommaso Obicini of Novara. He had spent 10 years in Palestine as a missionary and was well aware of the need for missionaries to know Arabic. Coming to Rome in 1621, he proposed to the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide the establishment of a study of that language for the Franciscan friars of the convent of S. Pietro in Montorio. Upon receiving approval, the study was instituted on 3 June 1622 at the said convent, with the same father placed in charge.
Initially, the purpose of the study was twofold: to train professors of Arabic and to teach the language to future missionaries. In 1668, the study was confirmed by Clement IX with the brief *Crediti nobis* and placed under the jurisdiction of the Congregation of Propaganda. The brief added to the study of Arabic that of controversies regarding the faith, i.e., the Catholic doctrines from which Eastern Christians had strayed; a subject that, moreover, had already been taught there previously. In 1762, Arabic was replaced by Albanian, as many fathers were then sent as missionaries to Albania, Macedonia, and Serbia, while the College of S. Bartolomeo on the island provided for the East. The study of Arabic was resumed only in the 19th century after the upheavals of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. In 1722, the study of moral theology was also prescribed.
Temporarily, other disciplines were also taught, such as Syriac, Ethiopic, Coptic, Greek, and Chinese, according to the needs of the missionaries. For the latter, however, students attended classes at the College of Propaganda. Mathematics and geography were also taught temporarily, and to acquire some knowledge of medicine, students practiced in the hospitals of Rome.
The lecturers or professors were proposed by the Minister General of the Order and appointed following an examination in the presence of the Secretary of Propaganda, which sent students on missions. Special mention should be made of the public disputations held in the church of the convent and almost all printed in the printing house of Propaganda.
By order of the same Congregation, canonical visits were periodically carried out. The duration of the study was two years, but it was often shortened due to the needs of the missions. Until 1706, a certificate from the superiors was sufficient to be sent on missions, but from that year, students had to undergo an examination before their lecturers, with the assistance of a delegate from Propaganda.
The college lasted until 1870. The teaching lecturers numbered about 70, and the students about 1,000. Among the former, several distinguished themselves through their published works, such as for Arabic: Fr. Obicini, Fr. Domenico Germano della Sesia, an excellent scholar and translator of the Qur’an, Alessio da Todi, Antonio da Aquila, and Marco da Lucca. Among the lecturers of Albanian, Fr. Francesco Rossi of Montalto stood out for the grammar and dictionary he published in that language. Works on controversies were published by Fr. Carlo Francesco Fraida of Varese: *Selections huius temporis controversiae dogmaticae* (Rome 1688) and *Promptuarium Scoticum* (ibid. 1690), and especially by Fr. Carlo Francesco Camozzi of Breno with his *Manuale missionariorum Orientalium* (2 vols., Venice 1726).
The students went as missionaries to Albania, the Val di Lucerna, Egypt, Ethiopia, Constantinople, Asia Minor, the Holy Land, Tripoli in Barbary, China, and even South America. Among them were some martyrs of the faith, such as Fr. Giuseppe d’Atina, Fr. Felice da S. Severino, Francesco da Mistretta, Ludovico da Laurenzana, and Clemente Raiffer. Many were appointed apostolic vicars and bishops in the missions, among whom Daniele Duranti of Arezzo, Giuseppe Rizzolati of Clauzetto, Alessio Filippi, Eusebio Semprini, Celestino Spelta, Ezechia Banci, and Eustachio Zanoli distinguished themselves. Some of them also published grammars, such as Fr. Agapito Daprà of Val di Fiemme: *Flores grammaticales Arabici idiomatis* (Padua 1687), which was of special value because, in addition to classical Arabic, it also treated the vernacular and was therefore widely used by missionaries. It remained in use at the seminary of Padua until the 19th century, and when the grammar of Erpenius was to be reprinted for the College of Propaganda in 1845, that of Fr. Agapito was reprinted instead because of its practicality. Francesco Maria of Lecce composed the first Albanian grammar: *Osservazioni grammaticali nella lingua albanese* (Rome 1716) and a dictionary.