FRANCIS MARIA OF LECCE. - A Franciscan from Apulia. From the province of St. Nicholas of Bari, he studied at the missionary College of St. Peter in Montorio in Rome. From 1688 to 1692 he was a missionary in the Lucerne Valleys, whence he was transferred to Albania, and in 1701 he was elected prefect of the missions of Macedonia, comprising the dioceses of Alessio and Durazzo. In 1705 he assisted in Rome at the printing of the Albanian Synod in Latin and Albanian; from 1705 to 1711 he taught the Albanian language at the Franciscan missionary College of St. Bartholomew on the Island. Having returned to his homeland, he died, it seems, in 1719.

He published the first Albanian grammar known to this day, under the title: Osservazioni grammaticali nella lingua albanese (Rome 1716); he also composed a dictionary of the same language, which he delivered to the prefect of the Archive of Propaganda, but it was not published. The grammar was later used by Fr. Francesco da Montalto for his Regole grammaticali della lingua albanese (Rome 1866).

Bibliography3 works

BIBL.: I. Rrota, Letratyre Shaype, Scutari 1925, p. 1313; P. Coco, I Francescani nel Salento, II, Taranto 1928, p. 366 ff.; A. Kleinhaus, Historia studii linguae Arabicae et Collegii Missionum Ordinis Fratrum Minorum in Convento ad S. Petrum in Monte Aureo Romne erecti, Quaracchi 1930, pp. 221-23.

Arduino Kleinhaus

@incollection{ec5_francesco_maria_da_lecce, author = {Kleinhans, Arduino}, title = {Francesco Maria da Lecce}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {V}, pages = {1614--1615}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1950}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/francesco-maria-da-lecce} }

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Francis Maria of Lecce

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