VERNAZZA (VERNACIA), BATTISTA, Venerable. - Mystic, born in early April 1497 in Genoa, died there on 9 May 1587, daughter of Ettore (c. 1470–1524), notary and humanist, indefatigable promoter, both in Genoa and beyond, of charitable works and apostolic endeavors, founder of the Hospital for the Incurables (1512), of the companies of the Mandiletto (1497) and of Jesus and Mary, of the brotherhood of Divine Love, and of the monastery of St. Joseph.
At thirteen she entered the Canoniche Segreti of Terano, in the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie. She
VERNIZIA, BATTISTA — VEROLI
was threatened with excommunication by Bishop P. Barozzi and a more thorough reading of Aristotelian texts in the translations by Ermolao Barbaro led her to abandon it, in order to adhere to the traditional doctrine of the immortality of the soul.