FORLÌ, Diocese of. - City, diocese and province in Romagna; the diocese, a suffragan of Ravenna, extends over 320 sq km and has 80,350 inhabitants, of whom 80,115 are Catholics; it has 62 parishes served by 103 secular priests and 26 regulars, and a seminary (1948). The ancient Forum Livii had its first episcopal see around the 4th century, and its first bishop was St. Mercurialis. Before that date it is likely that a Christian community organized from Ravenna existed there; A. Harnack (Missione e propagazione del cristianesimo, Italian trans., 2nd ed., Turin 1945, p. 513) supposes that F. was among the Italian cities that had an episcopal see around 250.
The protobishop Mercurialis is commonly and more confidently assigned to the 4th century, but his history is uncertain and confused because of the numerous late legends that have altered his figure and even produced a duplication of his personality in some writers (P. Gams, Series episcoporum Eccl. cathol., Regensburg 1873, p. 697), who gave F. three bishops of this name in the early centuries. The records of the cult of St. Mercurialis in F. go back to the 9th century. A basilica dedicated to him, perhaps the primitive cathedral, near the via Aemilia, to the east of the ancient Forum Livii, existed at that time and preserved the body of the saint; but it was destroyed in a fire in the 12th century. A famous monastery, first of the Benedictines, then of the Vallombrosans, bore the name of the saint; through the donations of the bishops of F., of the counts of the Terra, and the privileges of the emperors, the monastery grew to great splendor, and its importance is attested by the rich archival patrimony, currently held by the State Historical Archive, at the municipal Library of F. In this period, the history of the bishops of F., which is intertwined with that of the illustrious monastery of S. Mercuriale, presents no notable events. Particular mention in the chronotaxis of the bishops of Forlì belongs to Giovanni Numai (1902-1911), commendatory abbot of S. Mercuriale, who annexed the historic abbey to the episcopal mensa; and to Pietro Grifi (1412-16), of Pisa, who carried out important legations and offices for the Holy See.
The history of the city and territory of F., belonging to the temporal domain of the Holy See, closely follows that of the exarchate of Ravenna; it fell under Lombard domination (L. Duchesne, I primi tempi dello Stato pontificio, Italian trans. A. M. Salvatorelli, p. 51) and from the 8th century formed part of the Papal State. After winning communal liberties in the 11th century (1058) and taking the Guelph side in the course of the struggles between Guelphs and Ghibellines in Italy, it fell under the dominion of the powerful Forlì families and then, definitively, of the powerful tyrant Francesco Ordelaffi, who was resubjected to the lordship of the Holy See through the work of E. Albornoz, papal legate (1357-58). The city was for some time the seat of the Presidency of Romagna and subject, even amid the agitated life of the lordships of the Ordelaffi and Riario, to the dominion of the popes, until the revolution. In the Restoration, Pope Pius VII (motu proprio 6 July 1816) chose it as the seat of a legation, and it remained so until its suppression (1859).
When the Nullius of Forlimpopoli was suppressed in 1848, F. received 11 new parishes (7 from the Nullius, 4 from Bertinoro), while in 1853, once the diocese of Modigliana was constituted, it had to cede as many (among them the towns of Terra del Sole, Castrocaro, Dovadola).
MONUMENTS
The present cathedral of S. Croce and S. Valeriano dates back to the 12th century; previously the church of the Most Holy Trinity, rebuilt in 1782, seems to have been the cathedral of F. S. Croce was restored in 1417 and visited by Pope Martin V (1418); the bishop of F., Alessandro Numai, having completed the works, consecrated it, dedicating it to S. Croce and to S. Valeriano. Its present form is a reconstruction of 1841 by the architect Giulio Zambianchi, in neoclassical style with a pronaos. Inside, some chapels are the destination of popular devotion: that of S. Valeriano, where the relics of the martyr are venerated; that of the Madonna della Ferita and the other of the Madonna del Fuoco, the most venerated in F. following the miraculous episode of 4 February 1428, in which the image remained unharmed in a fire.
The church of S. Mercuriale, a construction of the 12th century, has undergone many remodellings and restorations that have largely altered its lines; this is particularly true of the restoration of 1786. In the lunette above the portal, a valuable bas-relief of the 12th or 13th century, representing the Magi, is attributed to Fuccio Fiorentino. The slender Romanesque bell tower of 1180, by the Forlì artist Francesco di Deddo Aleotti, was built on the occasion of the translation of the body of S. Mercuriale, under Bishop Alessandro (1176).
S. Biagio in S. Gerolamo, of the 15th century, was restored in 1650. The monumental family temple of the Ordelaffi family preserved (before the destruction of 1944) distinguished works of art in its interior, among which: the Concezione by Reni and The Miracle of St. James the Greater by Melozzo. In the church of S. Pellegrino the body of Pellegrino Laziosi is venerated, a Servite, from 1942 co-patron of the city, one of the saints of which the diocese of F. boasts, together with the blessed Marcolino Amanni, a Dominican, and the blessed Giacomo Salomoni, also a Dominican.
The birthplace of Melozzo degli Ambrosi possesses a rich picture gallery, founded in 1858. Worthy of note are the archives: Archivio comunale (G. Mazzantini, Gli archivi della storia d'Italia, I [1899-1905], p. 41); Archivio capitolare, with a precious collection of parchments of the 11th-15th centuries (A. Pasini, L'Archivio capitolare di F., in La Romagna [1923], p. 547; 1924, p. 346).
Bibliography9 works
Serafino Prete