NARDI, FRANCESCO. - Prelate, canonist, and publicist, b. at Vazzola (Veneto) on 18 June 1808, d. at Rome on 22 March 1877. Having embraced an ecclesiastical career, he taught biblical exegesis at the diocesan Seminary of Ceneda. He then taught at the I. D. Ginnasio of Venice, and subsequently became professor of ecclesiastical law and philosophy at the University of Padua, of which he was also rector magnificus.
He published in three volumes Elementi di diritto ecclesiastico (2nd ed., enlarged and corrected, Padua 1854) and a work on Diritto matrimoniale cattolico (ibid. 1857). Owing to his competence in canon law, he became auditor of the S. R. Rota for the Austrian Empire and in 1859 settled in Rome, where he later became secretary of the Congregation of Bishops and Regulars. He also carried on a very extensive activity as a publicist, begun in 1848 with the Lettera a Giuseppe Mazzini in risposta alla sua lettera a Pio IX (Venice 1848), and continued during the decade 1860-70 in defence of the temporal power of the popes (Osservazioni sul dispocio del 27 ott. 1860 di Lord Giovanni Russell ministro degli Esteri di Gran Bretagna, Rome 1860; Roma e i suoi nemici. Al signor De la Guerannière, ibid. 1862; S. Bernardo, s. Caterina da Siena e Carlo Magno sul potere temporale del papa: Al signor Bojean senatore, Turin 1862, etc.). He also devoted himself to geographical studies and was an ordinary member of the Pontifical Academy of the Nuovi Lincei.