STEFANESCHI, GIACOMO. — Cardinal, born in Rome around 1270 to Pietro S. and Perna Orsini, died on 23 June 1343. Boniface VIII made him cardinal deacon of S. Giorgio al Velabro on 17 December 1295. He was present at the attack on Anagni, perpetrated against the Pope by Guglielmo di Nogaret (7 September 1303), and defended his memory during the trial held under the pontificate of Clement V, under pressure from Filippo il Bello.
His distinctly Ghibelline tendencies deprived him of all political influence under Clement V, Giovanni XXII, and Benedetto XII. He left important works that provide valuable historical and liturgical information about contemporary events. The Opus metricum is a historical poem of highly complex structure, which he did not have time to revise. The only critical edition is that of Fr. X. Seppelt in the Monumenta Coelestiniana (Paderborn 1921; V. 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 s. Pietro Celestino written before 17 December 1295, an account of the election and coronation of Boniface VIII, completed after 1300, and another concerning the canonization of s. Pietro Celestino. The work underwent revisions during the vacancy of the Holy See following the death of Celestine V. The author added to it a dedicatory letter, dated 28 January 1319, to the Celestines of Sulmona. The Jubilee of 1300 gave the cardinal the opportunity 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 translation, 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 usages of the papal court in the fourteenth 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 from the years between 1304 and 1328. The original version is preserved in manuscript 1706 of the Avignon Library, from which several extracts were published by Fr. Ehrle, Zur Geschichte des päpstlichen Hofceremoniales im XIV. Jahrhundert, in Archiv für Literatur- und 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 successfully refuted the thesis advanced 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 s. Giorgio martire is preserved in cod. 129 C of the Capitular Archive of the basilica of S. Pietro in Rome and, according to Garampi (Illustrazione di un sigillo della Garfagnana, Rome 1759, p. 74), dates from 1316. Ms. lat. 5931, fols. 95°–102° of the National Library of Paris contains an account of a miracle that occurred at Avignon in 1320 through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin. — Vedi tav. XC.