FRATELLI AMBROSIANI

Fratelli Ambrosiani. – A monastic congregation which, by a bull of Gregory XI (1375), gathered into a canonical community under the Rule of St Augustine, but with the Ambrosian rite, a group of “cromiti” who had long lived in the hermitage of S. Ambrogio ad Nemus on the outskirts of Milan. The foundation of this hermitage is traditionally traced back to St Ambrose himself, though in reality the “cromiti” were gathered there by three Milanese nobles, Alessandro Crivelli, Antonio Petrasancta and Alberto Besuzzi (12th or 13th century). The various monasteries that later arose were placed under the jurisdiction of the monastery of S. Ambrogio ad Nemus by a bull of Eugenius IV in 1441. To this congregation Sixtus IV united the Congregation of the Brothers of St Barbara. They ceased to exist in the 17th century.