STEFANESCHI, GIACOMO. - Cardinal, b. in Rome ca. 1270 to Pietro S. and Perna Orsini, d. June 23, 1343. Boniface VIII made him cardinal deacon of St. George in Velabro on Dec. 17, 1295. He was present at the attack of Anagni, committed against the Pope by William of Nogaret (Sept. 7, 1303), and defended his memory in the course of the trial held during the pontificate of Clement V, under pressure from Philip the Fair.
His clearly Ghibelline leanings deprived him of all political influence under Clement V, John XXII and Benedict XII. He left important works that provide valuable historical and liturgical information on contemporary events. The Opus metricum is a historical poem of very complex structure that he did not have time to revise. The only critical edition is that of Fr. X. Seppelt in the Monumenta Coelestiniana (Paderborn 1921; see the observations collected by R. Morghen, Il card. Jacopo Gaetano S. e l'edizione del suo Opus metricum, in Bull. Istit. stor. ital., 46 [1931], pp. 1-39). The Opus metricum comprises a life of St. Peter Celestine written before Dec. 17, 1295, a memoir on the election and coronation of Boniface VIII, finished after 1300, and another on the canonization of St. Peter Celestine. The work underwent revisions during the vacancy of the Holy See that followed the death of Celestine V. The author added to it a dedicatory letter, of Jan. 28, 1319, to the Celestines of Sulmona. The Jubilee of 1300 provided the cardinal with the occasion to set forth in a short work the origins and purposes of the Jubilee. His dissertation Liber de centesimo sive Iubileo anno was printed several times: in Bibliotheca maxima veterum Patrum (XXV, Lyon 1677), in Bessarione, 7 (1900), p. 299 ff.; Italian trans., Brescia 1950 (cf. also in Bull. Istit. stor. ital., 61 [1949], pp. 163-72).
His Roman ceremonial constitutes a mine of important information on the customs of the pontifical court in the 14th century and on the differences between these and those of earlier periods. It was published by Mabillon, Museum Italicum (II, Paris 1689, pp. 241-443). Its composition dates back to the years between 1304 and 1328. The original draft exists in manuscript 1706 of the Library of Avignon, of which some extracts have been published by Fr. Ehrle, Zur Geschichte des päpstlichen Hofceremoniales im XIV. Jahrhundert, in Archiv für Literaturund Kirchengeschichte, 5 (1889), pp. 565-87; L. H. Labande, Le cérémonial romain de Jacques Cajétan, in Bibliothèque de l'École des Chartes, 54 (1893), pp. 45-74; G. Mollat, Misc. Avenionensis, in Mél. d'archéol. et d'hist., 44 (1927), pp. 1-5 and by E. Müller, Das Konzil von Vienne, Münster 1934, pp. 671-78. M. Andrieu has victoriously contested the thesis maintained by Fr. C. Colomban Fisher against the authenticity of the Ordo XIV published by Mabillon (L'Ordinare de la chapelle papale et le card. Jacques Gaétani S., in Eph. lit., 39 [1925], pp. 230-260). A life of St. George martyr exists in cod. 129 C of the Capitular Archive of the basilica of St. Peter in Rome and according to Garampi (Illustrazione di un sigillo della Garfagnana, Rome 1759, p. 74), it would date back to 1316. Ms. lat. 5931, f. 95°-102° of the Bibl. nat. of Paris contains an account of a miracle that occurred at Avignon in 1320 thanks to the Blessed Virgin. - See plate XC.
Bibliography5 works
Guglielmo Mollat