GIOVANNI da PENNA S. GIOVANNI, blessed. — One of the first disciples of St. Francesco d'Assisi, born at Penna S. Giovanni (Macerata) around 1193, died there in 1270 (or 1271).
Received into the Order in 1213, he met St. Francesco at the general chapter of Assisi in 1217, and was sent by him to Languedoc to found convents there together with about thirty friars. On returning to the March, he became superior in several convents; his work shone forth chiefly in his native city of Penna. Without bloodshed, he succeeded in settling the dispute between the counts Aldobrandini and their subjects, and in 1248 the city constituted itself as a Republic, as a free commune. The constitution is a monument of wisdom and justice.
The document, discovered in 1948 by R. Cecchetti in the Historical Archive of Penna S. Giovanni, represents a very rare example of a Charta libertatis, of which some examples are found in Tuscany and Lombardy. It has been studied by Prof. Pier Silverio Leicht of the University of Rome and is considered fundamental for a complete historical framework of Italian law. Through this Charta, Penna acquired, centuries ahead of the modern states, institutions for which peoples would later have to fight bloodily, such as, for example, the right of parliament; the granting of land to subjects according to a criterion of perfect equilibrium between capital and labour, that is, through the division of the produce «ad partibus» or «ad portionem», with the colonists’ right of redemption after several years.
GIOVANNI DA PENNA S. GIOVANNI - GIOVANNI PISANO
