Fedele da Fanna

FEDELE DA FANNA. - Friar Minor, b. at Fanna in Friuli on 24 Dec. 1838, d. at Quaracchi on 12 Aug. 1881. He was the originator and the most active collaborator of the critical edition of the works of St. Bonaventure of Bagnoregio. The preparatory work lasted 10 years (1870-80), during which Fr. F. visited the principal libraries of Europe, gathering precious material, as is evident from the 21 autograph registers (ms. Bibl. of Quaracchi).

Having joined with various collaborators, he settled in an old villa of the Rucellai at Quaracchi (Florence), where the international College of St. Bonaventure was formed, with scholarly aims. Worn out by tuberculosis, contracted through intense work, he died without having been able to see the printing of the work, which was completed in the institute's internal printing house in the years 1882-1902. The guiding criteria of the critical edition were made known by him in the Ratio novae collectionis operum omnium sive editorum sive anecdotorum seraphici Eccl. doctoris sancti Bonaventurae (Turin 1874), while in other works he illustrated the doctrine of St. Bonaventure: Commentarium in Breviloquium (ms. Bibl. of Quaracchi); Seraphici doctoris Bonaventurae doctrina de Romani Pontificis primatu et infallibilitate (Turin 1870); De ratione cognoscendi seu utrum quidquid certitudinaliter cognoscitur a nobis cognoscatur in rationibus aeternis (ibid. 1874).

Gaudencio Melani