SERVI DI MARIA. — From the Marian movement that, from the beginning of the 13th century, was spreading almost everywhere, at times also under the name of S. di M., seven Florentine merchants withdrew in 1233 (v. SETTE SANTI FONDATORI) to embrace an eremitical and contemplative life near Florence and subsequently on Monte Senario, approximately 18 km from the city.
These seven principal devotees of Mary, as the contemporary author of the Legenda de origine Servorum Virginis Mariae calls them, did not believe that by this personal act, common in their time, they were initiating a new religious Order. Their example, however, had been greatly admired: the people immediately called them the S. di M. (a name that after 1245, first in Florence and then elsewhere, remained theirs par excellence), and there were consequently those who wished to join their association; this induced them to go to Florence to Bishop Ardingo, in order to lay the first organizational foundations of the nascent religious institution. In obedience to the Fourth Lateran Council, canon 13, they chose the Rule of s. Augustine and the corresponding Constitutions, which are the Premonstratensian ones, through the more recent Dominican redaction (1239–41), prefacing them with the reverences to be offered to the s. Virgin.
From 1250 onward the new religious organization gradually attenuated its eremitical character and accentuated its cenobitical and apostolic character; in this respect it obtained its first genuine papal recognition from Urban IV in 1263, renewed by Clement IV in 1265. Under Gregory X, at the Council of Lyons (1274), the decretal Religionum diversitatem was issued, limiting the number of the mendicant Orders; and it could be thought that the Order of the S. di M. was among those suppressed (cf. M.-H. Laurent, Le b. Innocent V, Città del Vaticano 1947, p. 349 ff.); but s. Filippo Benizi, then superior general of the Order, immediately began (February 1277) an effective defense of it which, through the Consilia Sapientum (opinions of the principal jurists of the time), concluded in 1290 with a new papal recognition. Final approval was given by Benedict XI in the bull Dum levamus of 11 February 1304. Over the centuries the Order of the S. di M. also had a congregation called the Observance (1411–1570) and the eremitical congregation of Montesenario (1592–1778); it spread to several nations outside Italy, was present at all the principal manifestations of the life of the Church, and took part in the struggle against Lutheran heresy.
It has 10 canonized saints: s. Filippo Benizi, s. Pellegrino Laziosi, s. Giuliana Falconieri, and the Sette Santi Fondatori; many blesseds and numerous servants of God in its three branches (the first, second, and third Orders), for whom the cause of beatification is in progress. In the Marian sphere it has frequently made an effective contribution, particularly to the development and spread of devotion to the Addolorata. Notable among its cardinals were: Laurerio (d. 1542), Stefano Borucci (d. 1589), Pieri (d. 1743), Caselli (d. 1828), and Lépicier (d. 1936). It had renowned theologians, especially in the fields of moral and ascetical theology, controversialists and widely known sacred orators, philosophers, men of letters, artists, musicians, and numerous professors at the principal universities, particularly Italian ones.
Today it has 12 major provinces, with a general rectorate, in Europe and North and South America; in addition, a provincial rectorate (Belgium) and five provincial commissariates (in Spain, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico); it has missions in South Africa, Brazil, and Chile.
Monasteries of cloistered Serve di M. (Mantellate) are found in Italy, Germany, Spain, and England; twenty-two Congregations of nuns of the regular Third Order are scattered throughout the world, in addition to various autonomous monasteries: all these nuns venerate s. Giuliana dei Falconieri as their principal foundress.
The secular Third Order, anciently called the Society of the Habit, also goes back, in various forms, to the earliest period of the Order; the rule of the Third Order in particular was approved by Martin IV in 1424 and modified by popes Leo XIII and Pius XI.