DIOCESE OF FIESOLE. - A city of Tuscany, a suffragan of Florence since 1420. Its territory is varied, vast and articulated; it extends over part of the valleys of the Sieve, in its lower course, of the Arno, in its middle course, and of the Pesa; it touches and crosses the passes of the Tusco-Romagnolo Apennines, embraces part of the Casentino, and insinuates itself among the slopes of Chianti. At one time it was even more vast; in 1502 certain peoples of Chianti and of the Valdelsa were dismembered from F. and assigned to the recently constituted diocese of Colle Valdelsa. Within its perimeter the diocese borders on the other dioceses of Florence, Modigliana, S. Sepolcro, Arezzo, Siena and Colle Valdelsa. It has a population of 180,000 inhabitants, distributed in 256 parishes and 20 forane vicariates. Priests 275. Male religious houses 19; female 61. It possesses two seminaries: the greater founded in F. in 1637 by Msgr. Lorenzo Della Robbia. It received notable enlargements through the work of the bishops F. M. Ginori, R. Mancini and G. B. Parretti. The lesser was opened at Strada in 1828-29 by Msgr. G. B. Parretti. The bishop bears the title of count of Turicchi. Patron of the city and diocese: St. Romulus bishop and martyr.
HISTORICAL NOTES
1. Civil history
F. arose on the crescent-shaped hill, a strong acropolis of the Etruscans, in view of the Arno, to watch over the roads by which the Etruscan cities on this side of the Apennines communicated with those beyond the Apennines. It is difficult to pinpoint the era of its origin; perhaps it goes back to the 8th or 9th century B.C. But it is not excluded that on the site where F. later arose there pre-existed an ancient Italic municipality. It is equally difficult to establish what part it played in the confederation of the ancient cities of Etruria. The oldest mention of F. is in the writers of the Greco-Roman period: Φαίπουλαι in Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Φαπόλα in Polybius. Its name is recalled for the first time at the coming of the Gauls into Italy; it cooperated in the resistance of the Roman armies against Hannibal, who, invading central Italy after the Ticino and the Trebbia, also moved in the direction of F. At Cannae the Fiesolan militias sustained, alongside the Roman ones, the onslaught of the Carthaginian: Silius Italicus recalls them in the Punica as skilled in haruspicy. By Sulla a military colony was sent to F.; when Catiline's conspiracy broke out, the colonists rose up against the Senate and welcomed Catiline as a fugitive, who became their leader. But meanwhile, as Florence arose on the plain, the fortunes of F. turned fatally toward decline. Nevertheless the name of F. returns when Radagaisus with his Goths attempts the enterprise of Florence
(405 A.D.). Subsequently, subjected to the Ostrogoths, it is closely besieged by the Greek troops of Belisarius (530 A.D.) to whom F. submits; this facilitates the exodus of many of its citizens to nearby Florence. The defeat marks the beginning of its decline: the only institution that preserves its ancient prestige is the bishopric. In the 12th century a feud carried out by the Florentines to the detriment of the Fiesolans is recalled, from whom they took the carroccio and other insignia, as well as their liberty. Then silence falls over F. The Florentines of Cacciaguida's time fabulated "of the Trojans, of F. and of Rome" (Paradiso, XV, 126). It is certain that many illustrious families of medieval Florence descended from F.: thus the Adimari, the Caponsacchi, the Importuni, the Pazzi. For centuries the fortune of F. showed no sign of reviving and its history was merged with that of Florence. So it was also during the grand duchy; only in times very close to our own, in the national rebirth, did F. begin to flourish again, transforming itself into the smiling little town that it is, sought out as a destination by tourists for its art and its memories, and as a pleasing residence by compatriots and foreigners.
2. Religious history
The accounts concerning the spread of Christianity in F. are scanty and uncertain, like those of the other Tuscan dioceses. F. soon had a bishop of its own, notwithstanding the proximity of Florence; this was perhaps due to the autonomy of its civil institutions and to the vastness of the territory over which it extended its jurisdiction. Hence also the extent of the diocesan circumscription, which still distinguishes it, notwithstanding the eccentricity of its episcopal see. A Fiesolan bishop is alluded to in a letter of Pope Gelasius. At the Council of Constantinople, under Justinian, one of its bishops was present, by name Rusticus. In the 6th century the poverty of the Fiesolan church was notable, whose goods were subjected to spoliation and plunder during the Lombard supremacy: so much so that the bishop Alexander, returning from the court of Authari, where he had championed the rights of his Church, was drowned in the Reno by the usurpers. It was then that the basilica of S. Pietro in Gerusalemme, already risen on the ruins of a pagan temple, received his remains and took the title of S. Alessandro. But that this poverty persisted even afterward is witnessed by a petition of the priest Agrippinus and the deacon Servandus in favor of their Church, which Pope Gregory the Great recommends to Venantius bishop of Luni. Another bishop, Gesulfus, subscribes to a Roman Council under Eugenius II (824-27). A learned and famous bishop was then the Irishman Donatus, venerated as a saint; not only because he obtained, even before Florence, the recognition of ecclesiastical immunities, assisted in Rome at the coronation of Lothair II and at the Roman Councils, under Leo IV, and the Lateran, under Nicholas V, but also because, in the rebirth of studies after the capitulary of Olona, he taught his disciples grammata et schemata metrorum. Later Teuzo primicerius became celebrated as a teacher of grammar. There is record that in the 10th century the bishop Zanobi made a donation of certain goods to the clergy of the cathedral and of S. Alessandro, on condition that they reduce themselves to the common life, and provided with numerous priests for the vacant ministries in his diocese; while a predecessor of his and namesake had obtained in his favor goods situated between Florence and F. But, without doubt, a bishop who marks an important moment in Fiesolan history is Jacopo Bavaro, because he transferred the relics of the patron St. Romulus from the ancient cathedral situated where the Fiesolan badia stands today to the new cathedral (11th century), which he himself caused to rise in the upper part of the hill, the ancient one now finding itself on the periphery of the city and almost at the foot of the hill. And the new Cathedral, thus arisen, was and remained always the center and heart of civic life. Meanwhile the wooded slopes of the diocese were being populated by illustrious cenobies, in which the monastic life was beginning and flourishing; the abbeys arose of Vallombrosa, of Passignano, which even today receives the body of St. John Gualbert, of Coltibono, Montescalari, S. Godenzo in Alpe, Badia fiesolana. The blessed Carlo of Montegranello withdrew to a penitential life near the summit of the Fiesolan hill, giving origin to the religious Order which was called that of St. Jerome.
In the Middle Ages the Fiesolan clergy exercised notable influence in municipal life. The podestà swore fidelity to the statutes in the church of S. Maria Primerana; the clergy, in turn, on Easter Monday proceeded to the drawing of lots for the gonfaloniere among the prominent families of the city. The bishop exercised feudal jurisdiction over many lands, among which the county of Turicchi, which Paschal II confirmed to him by bull, and in confirmation of which Honorius III intervened another time; not without frequent jurisdictional conflicts first with the Florentine Republic and then with the Grand Duchy, until the feudal jurisdiction of the bishop came to be extinguished with the incorporation of Tuscany into the French Empire. In the 14th century the diocese was notable for the episcopal ministry of St. Andrew Corsini, under whose episcopate the cathedral was enlarged. But already the Fiesolan bishops had abandoned the city of their cathedra. As early as 1228 the Florentine Republic had ceded to them with full jurisdiction the church of S. Maria in Campo, situated in the center of Florence, so that they might reside there. And from that date this church constitutes even today an oasis of Fiesolan ecclesiastical jurisdiction within Florentine diocesan territory. Hence also the many names of Florentine patricians in the roll of Fiesolan bishops. In 1420 the bishop of F. was declared a suffragan of the Florentine see. The Florentine residence did not prevent the bishops of Fiesole from effectively promoting the religious growth of the diocese. Francesco Cattani da Diacceto, recently returned from Trent, celebrated the diocesan Synod in S. Maria in Campo in 1585; another synod was convened there in 1618 by Bartolomeo Lanfredini. Then came other synods, such as those of Tommaso Ximenes in 1622, of Lorenzo Della Robbia in 1636, of Roberto Strozzi in 1648 and 1664, of Filippo Soldani in 1674. The most recent synods are those celebrated by Msgr. D. Cammilli in 1902 and 1907 and by Msgr. G. Fossà in 1936; synods celebrated at F. because already since 1874, as the dignity of the reflourishing city and the new times now demanded, Bishop L. Corsani had restored the episcopal residence to F. Shortly afterwards the episcopal curia was also restored to F., while still retaining at S. Maria in Campo, for easier access by the clergy, some offices of the curia itself.
3. Illustrious figures
Besides the saints already mentioned, mention is made of the bishops: Braccio Martelli, who took part in the Council of Trent, and Francesco Cattani da Diacceto, formerly consul of the Florentine Academy, author of hagiographic and theological works and translator of the De officiis of St. Ambrose. Bishop Francesco M. Ginori too was known for his culture and was a member of the Accademia della Crusca. But even better known was the canon Angelo M. Bandini, born and deceased in the diocese of Fiesole. He was librarian of the Marucelliana and of the Laurenziana in Florence; besides most erudite studies on the Greek classics, among them Callimachus and Nicander, he composed the famous catalogue of the Greek and Latin manuscripts of the Laurenziana, highly esteemed even today. On his death he bequeathed to the Seminary of F. his rich library. - See pl. LXXXIII.
Bibliography15 works
Emilio Sanesi