RANDI, LORENZO ILARIONE - Enciclopedia Cattolica, Vol. X, p. 312

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

RANDI, LORENZO ILARIONE. - Cardinal, born at Bagnacavallo (Faenza) on 18 July 1818, died in Rome on 20 December 1887. Having entered the prelature to pursue a career in state administration, he distinguished himself brilliantly, also thanks to the protection of Cardinal Antonelli, and earned the merit of initiating the rapid solution to the difficult problem of establishing a good railway network in the Papal States.

Extraordinary commissioner and apostolic delegate in the Marches and in the provinces of Pesaro and Urbino (1856), he was able with skill and cunning to thwart, especially in Ancona, every revolutionary attempt during the turbulent year of 1859.

The work carried out in such difficult circumstances facilitated his rise to the positions of vice-camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church, governor of Rome, and director general of police (June 1866); it was thanks to him that public order was safeguarded during the crisis of autumn 1867, with the complete failure of the extensive pseudo-insurrectional plots then hatched, while during the extreme events of 1870 he remained faithful and vigilant at his post until the final hours of the morning of 20 September, transferring the most confidential documents of the department he oversaw.

Pius IX, in the Consistory of 15 March 1875, created him cardinal in pectore and published him on the following 17 September with the deaconry title of Santa Maria in Cosmedin.

A skilled and profound connoisseur of numismatics, he spent his final years at Palazzo Taverna completing that

(from Encyclopédie photographique de l'art, Le Nuitè du Caire. Ed. Tels. Bib. tav. 127, Ramses II - Bust of R. II. 16 years of wars against the rebels, until he made (1290) a peace and friendship treaty with the new Hittite king Hattušil, a treaty of which the hieroglyphic text remains in an inscription

precious collection of papal coins and medals, which was acquired by Leo XIII in 1901 and revitalized the Numismatic Cabinet of the Vatican Library, whose collections had largely been dispersed during the Jacobin and Napoleonic occupations.

BIBL.: L. Teste, Preface au Conclave, Paris 1877; L. Balduzzi, Degli studi e degli offici dell’en. sig. card. L. I. R., Luogo 1890; Moroni, LXXXVIII, p. 78. On his figure and work cf. G. G. Franco, I Crociati di S. Pietro. Storia e scene storiche della guerra di Roma l’anno 1867, 3 vols., Rome 1869-70, see indices; R. De Cesare, Il Conclave di Leone XIII e il futuro Conclave, Città di Castello 1888, pp. 160, 165, 180; R. De Cesare, Roma e lo Stato del papa dal ritorno di Pio IX al 20 sett., II, Rome 1907, p. 265; A. Vigevano, La fine dell’esercito pontif., ibid. 1920; K. von Schlozer, Rom. Briefe (1864-69), Stuttgart-Berlin 1920, see index; P. Dalla Torre, L’anno di Mentana, Turin 1938, pp. 18, 173-224 and passim; S. Negro, Seconda Roma (1850-1870), Milan 1943, see index.