SBARAGLIA (SBARALEA), GIOVANNI GIACINTO. - Historian and bibliographer of the Conventual Franciscans, born in S. Niccolò della Rotta (Forlì) on March 13, 1687, died in Rome, at the SS. Apostoli, on June 2, 1764.
A religious from August 4, 1703, he was ordained a priest on April 5, 1710. In 1715 he was sent to Rome where in 1718 he obtained the doctorate and mastership in theology. Having returned to Ferrara, he devoted himself to historical and bibliographical studies. He then moved to Florence, Assisi, and Rome (Nov. 1751), where he remained until his death. His scientific ideal: « Non nova cudere, sed aliena cribrare... meliora facere », is evident throughout his published and unpublished scholarly production.
Among his unpublished works, it is sufficient to mention: the Chronotaxia Romanorum Pontificum; the Opus miscellaneum reviewing Labbe's Collectio Conciliorum; the Critica Pagii in Annales Baroni; the Supplementum ad Italiam Sacram Uphelli (preserved in the General Archives of the Conventuals at SS. Apostoli in Rome). Among his published works, the following should also be noted: Disputatio de sacris praxorum Ordinationibus... (Florence 1750) with various appendices; the monumental edition of the Bullarium Franciscanum from 1218 to 1303 (4 vols., Rome 1759-68) and the Supplementum et castigatio ad scriptores Trium Ordinum S. Francisci a Waddingo alisque descriptos, which, in addition to correcting, doubles the collection, bringing the names from 2249 to 5267 (1st posth. ed., Rome 1806; 2nd ed., 3 vols., ibid. 1908-36). These last two works, indispensable for Franciscan history, establish him as the principal representative of critical Franciscan historiography.