### TOLentino, Diocese of
In the province of Macerata, at 217 m above sea level, on the left bank of the Chienti River.
Over an area of more than 105 km², it has a population of 17,350 inhabitants, almost all Catholic, distributed across 15 parishes, served by 27 diocesan priests and 23 regular clergy; it has a seminary, 2 male religious communities and 7 female ones (Annuario Pontificio 1953, p. 277). The diocese is a suffragan of Fermo and has as its patron saint CATERVUS.
According to the humanist Filelfo, a native of Tolentino, the city would have been founded by Greek populations, deriving its name from *tolentinus* (?) which may mean "round," indicating the shape of the primitive city. The locality was inhabited since prehistory, but T. is most likely of small origin; it was a Roman colony and municipality; its importance was locally affirmed in the 11th–12th centuries, with the acquisition and subjugation of neighboring castles. Constituted as a commune, it adhered to the provisions of Cardinal Albornoz, who brought the lands of the Marches back into obedience to the Church; subsequently, after various events and lordships (the Varano, Francesco Sforza), it passed definitively to the Church, following its fortunes.
The first bishop of whom there is record is BASIL, who is found among the signatories of the Council at the time of Felix III (a. 487), then of the Council of Gelasius (a. 495), of Symmachus (a. 499 and 502). Some historians consider PROBIANUS, mentioned in one of the inscriptions on the sarcophagus of CATERVUS (late 4th century), as bishop of T. at the end of the 4th century, as the one who would have baptized CATERVUS, his wife SETTIMIA SEVERINA, and her brother BASSUS. After Basil, no other bishops of T. are known until it came under the jurisdiction of those of Camerino, until Sixtus V, who, with the bull *Super universas* of 10 December 1586, elevated “oppidum Tolentini in civitatem et collegiatam ecclesiam S. Mariae in cathedralem,” with the castrum Columnari and the villages of Paterno, S. Angelo, S. Andrea, uniting the Macerata (v.), stipulating “that the bishop pro tempore of Macerata be bishop of the two united churches, and although he is called bishop of Macerata, nevertheless in letters and in acts relating to the city and diocese of T. he should ordinarily subscribe himself bishop of Macerata and T.”
The present cathedral of T., dedicated to the Assumption and to St. CATERVUS, dates from the 8th century, rebuilt in the 13th (portal, bell tower), completely renovated in the 19th; it is joined to the oratory of St. CATERVUS (15th-century frescoes) in which is the famous sarcophagus with the bodies mentioned above, carved on all four sides, with the original lid, ordered by “Septimia Severina C. F. Mariot dulcissimo ac sibi Sarcofagum Et Panteum Cum Tricoro disposuit Et Perfecti.” The mausoleum with three apses and the sarcophagus were executed in forty-three days. On the front of the sarcophagus: the Good Shepherd and the Princes of the Apostles; on the antefixes of the lid, the busts of CATERVUS and SETTIMIA; on the right side, the Magi and Herod; on the left, the Epiphany; on the back side, the busts of the two spouses, with joined hands; monograms, doves, and other symbols adorn the sarcophagus, on which various inscriptions in prose and verse are engraved.
St. NICHOLAS (v.) is greatly venerated in T. The basilica of the Saint dates from the 13th century; renovated in the Baroque style, it presents on the exterior the characteristic portal by Nanni di Bartolo of Florence (15th century); inside, the “Cappellone,” in which is a cycle of frescoes with episodes from the life of Jesus Christ and of St. Nicholas, of the Giottesque-Rimini school, attributed to G. Barozio of Rimini (14th century) and his school. There is also a marble ark from 1474; below, a modern Gothic-style crypt, where the body of St. Nicholas is preserved. The adjacent cloister is notable for the variety of the arches of the columns and the supporting pillars (13th century).
To the history of T. are linked the Treaty concluded there on 19 February 1797 between Pope Pius VI and the Directory of the French Republic, with Napoleon; and the battle called della Rancia (from the name of the castle, 12th–14th centuries), of 1815 between the Austrians and Gioacchino Murat.
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Carlo Carletti
### THE TREATY OF TOLentino
Concluded between the Holy See and the French Republic on 19 February 1797. After the defeat of the Austro-Sardinians in the spring of 1796 and the siege of Mantua, Napoleon Bonaparte invaded the Papal Legations with his troops, forcing Pope Pius VI to the onerous armistice of Bologna on 23 June, by which the Pope—besides paying twenty million and delivering one hundred works of art—had to consent to the French occupation of Bologna, Ferrara, and the citadel of Ancona. During the summer Napoleon pressed for the stipulation of a regular peace treaty, sending to Rome the archbishop of Ferrara, Cardinal Alessandro Mattei, but the papal government was confident of an Austrian recovery through the announced descent of Marshal Würmser’s army. Both Würmser and later Alvini were defeated, and Mantua was forced to surrender on 2 February 1797: on the same date the French resumed hostilities against the Papal State, dispersing at Castel Bolognese, after honorable resistance on the Senio, the scant papal troops under General Colli-Marchini. Pius VI was then obliged to seek a new armistice and sent to Tolentino an embassy, of which Cardinal Mattei, Duke Braschi-Onesti, Marquis Camillo Massimo, and Monsignor Luigi Caleppi were part. The papal representatives were furnished with the prescribed powers for signing a treaty; not so the French representatives, who were Napoleon himself and Cacault. Against the advice of his collaborators, Mattei was induced to subscribe to the instrument of peace. By it, not only did the Apostolic See undertake to pay a further indemnity of thirty million and consent to the French occupation of Ancona, but it ceded to France the Legations of Bologna, Ferrara, and Romagna to be annexed to the Cisalpine Republic, as well as Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin, which became an integral part of the French Republic.
In the Venetian conclave of 1800, the Sacred College declared the Treaty of Tolentino null and void because extorted by violence. — See pl. XXIV.
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Renzo U. Montini