TORINO, ARCIDIOCESI DI

TORINO, ARCHDIOCESE OF. - At the time of its foundation, the Turin diocese encompassed all the territory between the dioceses of Ivrea, Asti, Acqui, Alba, Albenga, and Embrun, from the Dora Riparia to the Po, as far as the Stura di Cuneo and the Tanaro valley.

Towards the end of the 6th century, the Franks detached part of the Susa Valley and the Maurienne and founded the new diocese of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne. Subsequently, the following were detached from Turin: Saluzzo (1511), Fossano (1592), Pinerolo (1749), Susa (1772), Cuneo (1817), and Asti (1817). Elevated to a metropolitan see on 17 May 1515 with Ivrea and Mondovì as suffragans, today it has Acqui, Asti, Alba, Mondovì, Cuneo, Saluzzo, Fossano, Pinerolo, Ivrea, and Aosta as suffragans.

It comprises 34 deaneries, 332 parishes, and 1,200 non-parochial churches, 150 municipalities of which 14 are in the province of Cuneo, 5 in Asti, and 130 in the province of Turin. Population: 1,100,000; diocesan priests: 1,085; priests from outside the diocese: 50; male religious orders and congregations: 26; female: 61. Major seminary of philosophy and theology at Rivoli, near Turin; gymnasial seminary at Giaveno; archiepiscopal boarding school at Bra. High schools, vocational, and agricultural schools are run by the Jesuits, Brothers of the Christian Schools, Salesians, Rosminians, and Giuseppini del Muraldo; for girls by the Dominican Sisters, Religious of the Sacred Heart, Salesians, Pious Mothers, Faithful Companions, Sisters of Saint Anne, of Saint Joseph, etc.

I. HISTORY

"Augusta Taurinorum," perhaps founded on the same site as the pre-Roman Taurasia, capital of the Taurini, was during the Roman age the most important western subalpine city. In 69 A.D. it was partly burned during the civil war between Otho and Vitellius. Near Turin in 12 A.D., Constantine had a victorious encounter with Maxentius.

Christianity entered relatively late. Systematic evangelization began only after the middle of the 3rd century. Modern criticism considers the martyrs Solutor, Adventor, and Octavius as genuine Turin martyrs, and the later attribution—once prevalent—of these saints to the Theban Legion (v. THEBAN SAINTS, MARTYRS) is unfounded. By the end of the 4th century, Saint Maximus (v.) must be considered the first bishop. His great figure reveals the existence of a flourishing Christian community in Turin, even amidst numerous pagans. In those terrible years, when the barbarian invasions of Italy began, Saint Maximus governed amidst the painful situation. Under Saint Maximus, between 397 and 401, a Council was held in Turin, convened at the request of the bishops of the Roman province of Gaul, who were divided over the rights of their metropolitan see.

The list of bishops for the 5th and 6th centuries is incomplete. Victor in 494 traveled to Gaul with Saint Epiphanius of Pavia to free prisoners taken by King Gundobad of Burgundy during a raid into Upper Italy. Ursicinus (562–609) suffered imprisonment at the hands of the Lombards and saw the Maurienne and part of the Susa Valley detached by the Franks, who made them autonomous dioceses despite his protests and those of Gregory the Great. Under the Lombards, Turin formed a vast duchy largely corresponding to the ecclesiastical diocese and gained importance as a bulwark of the kingdom against the Franks. The Carolingian government that followed was composed of Frankish counts. Louis the Pious in 817–18 CLAUDIUS, MATTHIAS (v.), a man of broad, if not profound, learning and of iconoclastic tendencies. With the dissolution of Carolingian imperial unity and the reformation of the Kingdom of Italy, the struggle between Guy of Spoleto and Berengar of Friuli gave rise to the Arduinici dynasty, which dominated the March of Turin for a century and a half.

The marchional period, particularly under Olderic Manfredi and his daughter Adelaide, was a time of recovery after the devastation of the 10th century. In this great work, alongside Olderic and Adelaide, Bishops Gezone and Landulf, and to some extent Cunibert, are held in high honor. In the 11th century, through the efforts of the marquises and the aforementioned bishops, the abbeys of Caramagna, Saint-Just of Susa, Saint Peter of Savigliano, Pinerolo, Saint Solutor, Cavour, the provostship of Oulx, the cathedral of Chieri, and the collegiate church of Testona were founded. At the end of the marchional period, the power of the bishop grew, alongside the autonomy of the city. In 1159, a diploma of Frederick Barbarossa granted Bishop Carlo full comital rights over the city and its countryside. This did not prevent the strengthening of communal autonomy. At the beginning of the 13th century, the Commune and the bishop were still allied against the Counts of Savoy. Later, the bishop’s power declined, and the Commune and the Savoys contended with varying fortunes until, after the brief lordship over Turin of the Angevins and William VII of Montferrat, the Savoys prevailed.

The economic situation of the diocese also worsened by the end of the 13th century. Nevertheless, the pastoral activity of Bishop Goffredo di Montanaro (1254–1300) is noteworthy, despite long disputes with the Savoys and the abbots of Saint-Michel-de-la-Cluse and his legation to Constantinople. Similarly notable is the work of Bishop Guido II (1319–48) and his successors Giovanni di Rivalta (1364–1411), Aimone (1411–38), and Ludovico di Romagnano (1438–68). Pastoral visit reports and synodal acts reveal excellent prelates. Giovanni di Rivalta and Ludovico di Romagnano in particular worked, with some success, for the conversion of the Waldensians (v.), a task already undertaken as early as 1209 by Bishop Giacomo I. Under Ludovico di Romagnano, on 6 June 1453, the famous Eucharistic miracle of Turin occurred. Two soldiers from the garrison of Exilles, part of the forces of Duke Ludovico of Savoy, while their comrades were looting the town, entered the church, opened the tabernacle, and stole the silver ciborium containing the consecrated Host. They descended to Susa and sold the loot to some merchants, who loaded it into a sack and carried it on a mule to Turin. There, in front of the church of Saint Sylvester, the mule refused to move. No amount of beating could make it advance; instead, the sack fell to the ground and burst open, scattering its contents. The ciborium, however, rose into the air, opened by itself, and suspended the Host above it, which radiated light in all directions. Bishop Ludovico di Romagnano, informed of the event, arrived in procession and raised a chalice toward the Host, praying Jesus to descend and remain with His people. The Host indeed descended and was triumphantly carried to the cathedral. A small shrine was first erected on the site of the miracle, and in 1598 the splendid Basilica of Corpus Domini was built there (cf. G.M. Sanna Solaro, *Il miracolo di T.* Torino 1894). Ludovico, the last of the Savoy-Acaja line, founded the University of Turin in 1405 (with a bull of the antipope Benedict XIII dated 24 October), later confirmed by imperial privilege in 1412 and by Pope Eugene IV in 1448. In 1505, Erasmus of Rotterdam received his doctorate in theology there. Among the preachers in the region in the 15th century, Saint Vincent Ferrer (1402) and Saint Bernardino of Siena (1436) are to be remembered.

At the end of the century (1498), Cardinal Domenico Della Rovere, bishop of Turin, built the current cathedral (v. MEO DI FRANCESCO DEL CAPRINO). On 17 May 1515, Leo X elevated the church of Turin to a metropolitan see, separating it from Milan. Meanwhile, the situation in Turin and Piedmont had become dire, battered by the war between Francis I and Charles V. In 1536, the French entered Turin, sacking it and destroying four boroughs and twelve churches. Duke Charles III of Savoy died in exile in 1553.

Protestant infiltration was particularly notable in the valleys from Pinerolo to the Po Valley, the Varaita Valley, Maira Valley, and Stura Valley. In Turin, the city councillors, even under French rule, intervened with strong determination to oppose heresy; as early as 1522 the city assigned a stipend to a teacher who would read St Paul, and in 1542 this instruction was extended to four parishes and the Cathedral, and in 1563 the Company of St Paul was formed, with members from all classes, for the defence of the faith and charity.

The pastoral situation of the diocese was difficult. This is attested by Msgr. Filippo De Mari, vicar of Cardinal Cibo, archbishop, in the report of his visitation (1545–46). He found parish priests ignorant and incapable of preaching, negligent, idle, and lacking books. He considered it unnecessary to draw up new synodal constitutions, but rather to make known the old ones, which had fallen into total oblivion «also through the carelessness of some of our predecessors».

With Cardinal Archbishop Gerolamo Della Rovere (1564–92) and Emmanuel Philibert, the Church and State in Turin and Piedmont experienced a rebirth. Famous was the cardinal’s disputation with heretics at Caraglio, in the presence of Emmanuel Philibert. Of immense importance was his visitation of the valleys and the fruits it yielded. Fundamental were the Constitutions of his Synod (19 April 1575), in which he reminded priests that he had founded the Seminary (1567) in accordance with the prescriptions of the Council of Trent (introduced into the State in 1562). With Emmanuel Philibert, Turin definitively became the capital of the Savoyard State. The duke transferred the relic of the Holy Shroud to Turin (1578). Charles Emmanuel I and Archbishop Carlo Broglia (1592–1617) continued worthily the work of reconstruction. Pastoral visitations, six diocesan synods, and the regular sending of Jesuit and Capuchin missionaries to the valleys by this great archbishop, together with the assistance and energy of Charles Emmanuel, restored to the diocese and Piedmont the unity of faith and zeal for the care of souls among the clergy. On such examples the pastoral action of the archbishops of Turin continued throughout the 17th century, which saw the establishment in the city of the Oratory of St Philip (1649) and the Missionaries of St Vincent (1654). From the Oratory of St Philip came Bl. Sebastian Valfré, counsellor to the dukes and comfort to the people during the terrible siege of Turin in 1706.

The victory of 1706 opened the way to a new great development in Turin and Piedmont. The city, which in the communal-seignorial period had barely 6,000 inhabitants and 30,000 in 1570, rose to 90,000 by the end of the 18th century. Outside the old circle of ramparts the city expanded, following the regular, orthogonal layout of the old Roman colony. With the French Revolution, the State and Church of Turin entered a new phase of life and difficulty. The archbishop and cardinal Gaetano Costa and King Victor Amadeus III died in 1796. They were succeeded by Archbishop Carlo Buronzo del Signore and King Charles Emmanuel IV, both of great piety but lacking in courage. The events, moreover, were greater than they. The royal government sought to cope with the extremely difficult economic and military situation through taxes, loans, and suppressions of ecclesiastical property agreed with Rome. Meanwhile, France outright annexed Piedmont (1798) and introduced the methods and legislation of the French Republic. There was a brief change of scene with the arrival of the Austro-Russian forces under Suvorov (1799), and then, after the victory at Marengo (1800), a new provisional French government.

The metropolitan seminary was suppressed, and through a long series of acts against ecclesiastical bodies, a general suppression was reached (17 July 1802) of monastic orders and religious congregations. Piedmont became a French province (11 September 1802); the Piedmontese dioceses were reduced to Turin, Saluzzo, Acqui, Asti, Alessandria, Vercelli, Ivrea, and Mondovì. Ecclesiastical life, however, experienced a temporary improvement after Napoleon’s imperial coronation and with the arrival in Turin of the new archbishop Giacinto Della Torre (1804–14). Although his expressions were at times excessively laudatory of Napoleon, it is certain that in the ten years of his episcopate he was able, with dignity, to obtain in every circumstance the maximum possible for his clergy and his people. He reopened and restored, even spiritually, the Seminary of Turin, opened the Gymnasium Seminary of Giaveno, reestablished the monthly moral conferences, fostered spiritual exercises among the clergy, and obtained exemption from military service for clerics. He died on 8 April 1814, and on 25 April the annexation to France came to an end. Victor Emmanuel I was in Turin on 20 May. Legislation reverted to what it had been in 1770, with the modifications introduced by the royal government up to 23 June 1800. Despite the goodwill of the Holy See and the King, not all religious orders could be restored.

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**Turin, archdiocese of - Madonna and Child. Painting by G. M. Spanzotti (15th century) - Turin, Pinacoteca.**

Meanwhile, on 17 July 1817 Pius VII reorganised the situation of the dioceses of Piedmont, with the two metropolitan sees of Turin and Vercelli. With Turin remained Acqui, Asti, Ivrea, Mondovì, Saluzzo, Alba, Cuneo, Fossano, Pinerolo, and Susa. The episcopal jurisdiction of the ancient abbeys was suppressed, although the abbeys themselves were reconstituted. The disturbances of 1821 marked the times, even though the ten years of Charles Felix seemed years of definitive consolidation in the ecclesiastical and civil spheres. Charitable institutions were restored and religious bodies largely reestablished. St Joseph Benedict Cottolengo (v.) began his marvellous work. Approval was given to the establishment of the Ecclesiastical College (v.) of St Francis of Assisi for practical morality, CAFFARO (v.) Bosco (v.) would be found as master and pupil. In 1831 Archbishop Chiaretti and Charles Felix died. With Msgr. Franzoni and Charles Albert, the epoch of the Risorgimento proper opened for Turin and its diocese, which would lead both to die in exile. The events of this period are better known, as they are now of national interest. Msgr. Franzoni did not have the mentality or temperament suited to winning strong sympathies; nonetheless, the trial and his deportation to Fenestrelle constitute shameful pages in the history of the Piedmontese government (1850). The Apostolic Nuncio left Piedmont after the abolition of the ecclesiastical forum was approved (April 1850). Relations with the Holy See were severed only in 1855, after the law for the suppression of religious orders was approved with amendments (22 May 1855). Msgr. Franzoni died in exile in 1852.

This period of strained relations between State and Church, far from marking a standstill, represents one of the most dynamic ages in the life of the diocese of Turin. The names of Cottolengo (d. 1842), Joseph Cafasso (d. 1860), Fr Bosco—then fully active in his oratories and founder in 1869 of the Salesian Congregation—Murialdo, and the Artigianelli College begun in 1850, Margotti, director first of L’Armonia and then founder (1863) of L’Unità Cattolica; and among the laity, Solaro della Margarita, Cesare Balbo, Federico Sclopis, Silvio Pellico, Giuseppe Manno, Pier Alessandro Paravia, Tommaso Vallauri, Carlo Promis, and Marchesa Giulia di Barolo,

Charles Albert

A. Spada d. 1813

Data by Olderico Manfredi and his wife Berta in 1028. They endowed it with many possessions, yet the religious life was always in difficulty, at least from the end of the 12th century. With the 13th century there was also economic decline. The other female Benedictine abbey at Rifreddo was founded by the marquises of Saluzzo in 1220. It soon adopted the Cistercian Rule. For Rifreddo, too, the end of the 13th century marks the end of expansion and the beginning of efforts to preserve a large part of its assets, which it managed to do for centuries.

The Cistercian abbeys of Staffarda and Casanova, founded in 1131 and 1142 respectively, represent two model abbeys, dynamic elements in the religious and agricultural life of Piedmont in the 12th–13th centuries. In the 15th century both passed into commendatory rule (Staffarda, where the magnificent abbatial church, now parochial, still stands, is now subject to the diocese of Saluzzo; Casanova is in the diocese of T.).

III. MONUMENTS

T. is at the forefront of Italian cities in urban planning and construction, but is less rich artistically. Of the Roman age only the Porta Palatina remains, an imposing brick structure from the Augustan age, and traces of the Roman theatre. From the marquessal period come the magnificent Romanesque bell tower of the Consolata (11th–12th century) and the east side of Palazzo Madama. Gothic art is represented by the church of S. Domenico; the Renaissance by the fine cathedral of S. Giovanni, built by Cardinal Domenico Della Rovere of the noble Vinoppo family near T., from which came some of the city’s greatest bishops. The contractor was Meo del Caprino (Amedeo De Francisco da Settignano); the architect Baccio de’ Pintelli. Begun in 1491, completed in 1498. Among the painters who worked in T. were Gian Martino Spanzotti (frescoes in S. Domenico) and Defendente Ferrari (altarpiece of SS. Crispino and Crispiniano in the Duomo).

The Orvietan architect Ascanio Vitozzi, under Charles Emmanuel I, began the systematic expansion of the city to the south, designing Piazza Castello and Via Nuova (now Via Roma). The architects Carlo and Amedeo di Castellamonte continued the work (Amedeo designed the Royal Palace). Guarino Guarini exercised his virtuosity in S. Lorenzo, in the overly fanciful Chapel of the Holy Shroud, and in the Carignano and Accademia delle Scienze Palaces. Juvarra, under Victor Amadeus II, combined architectural with urbanistic activity. His works include the military quarters (1728), the splendid church of the Carmine, the Seminary, the west façades of Palazzo Madama, the great church of S. Filippo, the basilica of Superga, etc. Juvarra’s art had a wide following, especially through the work of Vittone and Benedetto Alfieri (Teatro Regio and Teatro Carignano). With the French Revolution the finest architectural period may be considered closed.

In the diocese: outstanding examples of the Romanesque period are the Sacra di S. AMARI, MICHELE (v.) and the church of S. Pietro in Avigliana. A few kilometres from Avigliana is the Gothic church of S. Antonio di Ranverso (1188), one of the principal medieval monuments of Piedmont, notable also for the frescoes by Giacomo Jaquerio (15th century), while in Avigliana itself (S. Giovanni) are works by Defendente Ferrari (polyptych of 1511). At Pecetto in the church of S. Sebastiano are 15th-century frescoes by the Piedmontese Jacobino Longo, an example of 15th-century art in the countryside of Piedmont. At Chieri are important the church of S. Domenico of the 14th century, the grand Gothic cathedral of 1405 with its 13th-century baptistery.

Important for art in Piedmont (v.): the Accademia di Belle Arti with its attached art collection; the Pinacoteca of T., especially notable for its rich collection of paintings of the Flemish school; the Museo d’Antichità, which, alongside works documenting the spread of Roman art in the Piedmontese valleys, contains one of the richest collections in the world of Egyptian antiquities; the Museo Civico, fundamental for the study of Piedmontese art in its various historical periods, contains extensive collections of carved woodwork of the 14th–15th centuries, glass, ceramics, fabrics of the 17th–18th centuries, and some important works of Piedmontese painting of the 15th–16th centuries; the Royal Armoury, founded by Charles Albert, is one of the most important in Europe.

IV. ARCHIVES AND LIBRARIES

A precious repository is the State Archive, formerly the Savoy archive, then a state archive since 1850, with an attached library notable for manuscripts and incunabula. Also very rich is the Archiepiscopal Archive, reorganized and better arranged in 1934. Among the libraries: the Biblioteca Nazionale Universitaria (560,000 volumes, 2,500 manuscripts, 1,600 incunabula; 10,000 prints, 500 Italian, 250 foreign journals). The Biblioteca Civica: with 180,000 volumes, temporarily housed in Palazzo Carignano. The Biblioteca Reale: 150,000 volumes, 4,000 manuscripts including precious illuminated codices, rare incunabula, drawings and manuscripts by Leonardo da Vinci including his famous self-portrait. The Seminary Library, founded in 1752, is valuable for theological-legal subjects and works of Piedmontese interest.

Francesco Grosso

V. PONTIFICIO ATENEO SALESIANO

Established in T. through the efforts of the fourth successor of St John Bosco, Fr Pietro Ricaldone, the Ateneo Salesiano was approved by the Holy See on 3 May 1940. Alongside the three traditional ecclesiastical faculties of philosophy, theology and canon law, it possesses a Higher Institute of Pedagogy devoted to the study of educational problems in the light of Christian doctrine and the specific educational tradition of the Salesians.

Attached to the Faculty of Philosophy are Institutes of Social Sciences, Physics and Mathematics, Biology, Anthropology and Ethnology, and Experimental Psychology. These, while complementing the study of philosophy, also serve the Institute of Pedagogy, which, alongside theoretical studies, pursues experimental research, especially in the field of vocational guidance. To this end a large laboratory of psychology has been developed.

Among the publications of the Ateneo, in addition to those by individual professors, the Collana pedagogica d. Bosco should be noted; it is issued in three series: theoretical works, historical works, and specialized treatises.

The Ateneo’s journal is the Salesianum (since 1939), to which a Library is attached, which reached its 20th volume in 1952. The journal also serves as the organ of the International Center for Sindonological Studies.

Between 1940 and 1952, degrees were conferred upon one hundred students of the Ateneo, hailing from more than thirty nations where the Salesian mission operates, along with five hundred licentiates in the various faculties, in addition to specialization diplomas from the various institutes. — Vedi tavv. XXXI–XXXII.