**SULPRIZIO, Nunzio, Venerable.** – Born at Pesco Sannita (diocese of Sulmona) on 13 April 1817, died at Naples on 5 March 1836.
Left an orphan at an early age, he was taken in by a rough and unyielding uncle who was a blacksmith (1826). This uncle overburdened him with work and ill-treatment to the point of reducing him to a pitiable state. When this came to light, another uncle, a military man, brought him down to Naples and entrusted him to his colonel, Felice Wochinger. Moved by the sight of the poor boy’s skeletal frame, who could barely stand even with crutches, Wochinger had him admitted to the Hospital of the Incurables of St Mary of the People (1832); later he took him into his own home, where he soon died of gangrene.
Despite such harsh treatment, he maintained an unalterable piety and peace; both in the hospital and in Wochinger’s home he exercised a remarkable apostolate through his example and above all through his advice and exhortations to serve and love the Lord. His cause for beatification was introduced on 9 July 1859.