ON BL. ALBERT BESUTIUS, HERMIT, BY LAKE MAGGIORE IN THE DUCHY OF MILAN,
In the year MCCCLIX.
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
The place, the public veneration, the body, the Life, the chronology.
Albertus Besutius, hermit, by Lake Maggiore in the duchy of Milan (Bl.)
BY J. P.
Lake Verbanus is one among the other lakes of great name and vast size in Lombardy beyond the Po, The situation of the place: namely the Larian, the Benacus, and the Sebine, commonly called Lago Maggiore. These things and many others the reader will find in Orlendius in part 2 of the Sacred and Profane World, volume 1, book 1, chap. 3. According to Baudrand's measurement, it is XIV thousand paces distant from Novara to the north, and XXXVI from Milan to the summer sunset. Upon this lake, in the geographical map of the Milanese state exhibiting the Alpine or Northern part, in Blaeu, there is set the place of S. Catharine, of which it will be helpful to make mention below, and not far thence Besozzo among the mountains, which is the very Italian name of our Besutius. That this place was the birthplace of the Blessed one Franciscus Maria Guazzo records in the Italian Life chap. 3, p. 23, and he affirms that he departed thence toward Lake Maggiore, that he might explore mount Ballazzo [*], and might find a place suitable to his purpose. The foregoing serves the reader for forming an idea of the place in which our Hermit washed away the sins committed in the world, and lived and died piously.
[2] Galesinius thus announces him on this day: In the diocese likewise of Milan, his cult; the finding and translation of saint Albert the confessor, calling him indeed a Saint, as also Auxanus, of whom we treated above, from a very ancient codex of the church of Milan: in which, he says, we have seen written out the Lives of the Saints who have churches or altars in that diocese. Ferrarius in his General Catalogue records him under the title of Blessed: In the territory of Milan, of Bl. Albert the hermit. But in his notes he observes these things: His body is laid up in the church of saint Catharine de Saxo by Lake Verbanus. With the same title also he is marked by the same Ferrarius in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy; and in the alphabetical index which is prefixed to it, of the names of the Saints who are venerated in Italy, he is entered Albertus conf. in terr. Mediol. III Septemb. Corp. in eccl. S. Catharinæ de Saxo. But in the same Catalogue, in his Life, it is narrated that his body, when it had lain hidden for some time, was found by Domnina, a noble woman of Besozzo, … with a marvelous and sweet odor breathing forth from it: which was afterward translated into the chapel of S. Catharine: and to many who flee to his help divine benefits are granted; as will be said below.
[3] But the things which pertain to the finding and translation of the body of the body: are narrated in another manner and a little more fully in Guazzo chap. 7, p. 91, which from the Italian I render to this sense: In the year, he says, of restored salvation MDXXXV, on the XIII day of July, while certain foundations were being built about the chapel of S. Catharine, on the side which looks toward the mountain, his sepulcher was found with the body wholly entire, as if he had died but a few months before. It was found by master Zacharias and master Peter Maria, brothers, masons of Bersago. When that holy tomb was being opened, there came forth from it so sweet an odor that it surpassed the fragrance of balsams and of the other Sabæan perfumes; whence those who were present remained stupefied and motionless like statues from wonder, since they could not learn what kind of fragrance this was, which lasted many days.
[4] are reported: There were present there also Master Priest John Peter Sabbadinus of Caravate, and Master Gaspar of Leggiuno, besides many others whom I pass over for brevity's sake: who all, filled with a mind most well disposed, poured out a great abundance of tears for the inward consolation which they had, because of the treasure found. Today it lies deposited in the chapel of S. Catharine together with other holy relics. It was found seventy-nine years ago now. Thus Guazzo: to which he had premised that the revelation of his relics happened eighty-five years after his death.
[5] the chronological reckoning: But neither of these chronological notes holds. Not the first: for from the year 1535, in which the body was said to have been found, to the year 1625, in which that biographer published and dedicated his book, are ninety years. Nor the second either: for indeed the death of the Blessed one happened, as I shall presently say, in the year 1359, from which, if you reckon to the year 1535, in which the revelation or finding of the said body took place, you must needs find a hundred and seventy-six years, as will be plain to one who counts the reckoning. And these things indeed follow the chronological note of Ferrarius and Castellanus, who fix the Blessed one's death at the year 1359, whom I too have followed above; but by no means Guazzo, because he does not combine the times rightly enough. For in chap. 6, p. 77, he attaches the Blessed one's death to the year 1450, under the Pontificate of Nicholas V, after forty years spent in the desert; and yet in chap. 1 he refers his conversion to a better life to the year 1316, under the Pontificate of John XXI, called XXII.
[6] The Life is given from Ferrarius His Life was published in Ferrarius in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy on this day, from the monuments, as is added at the foot of that same Life, of the church of S. Catharine, which the Brethren called of S. Ambrose ad Nemus at Milan possess, frequented by the peoples dwelling by Lake Verbanus: out of which the history of Bl. Albert was extracted and printed at Pavia in the year of the Lord MDCI. This copy I have not yet seen. A Life of the Blessed one in Italian also Brother Franciscus Maria Guazzo, of the Order of S. Ambrose ad Nemus of Milan, published in the year 1625 from the Milanese press, but interpolated with so many digressions that it is rather a panegyrical oration, nay indeed a forest of various matters, than a historical narrative. This reason moved me to cast my eyes upon the account of Ferrarius, which I subjoin.
Annotata* otherwise.
LIFE
From Ferrarius's Catalogue of the Saints of Italy.
Albertus Besutius, hermit, by Lake Maggiore in the duchy of Milan (Bl.)
The Blessed one's conversion to a better life: Albert a of the family of Besozzo b, under John XXII, Supreme Pontiff c, was giving his labor to increasing his wealth by right and wrong. He, being once caught within Lake Verbanus d in the utmost peril of his life because of a sudden and most savage storm that had arisen, vowed that he would change his life for the better if he escaped alive. The storm therefore being calmed after the vow, Albert, having returned home, restored his usuries, distributed his goods to the poor, and obtained leave to lead a solitary life from his wife, who herself also, vowing continence, shut herself up in a monastery, and he climbed a lofty mountain overhanging the aforesaid Lake, not without labor, crawling on hands and feet, carrying nothing with him but a basket, a flask, and a rope: where he found a cave in which he long practiced the eremitic life, receiving bread from those who sailed past by lowering the basket, and water by the flask, on the rope. There he overcame most grievous snares of the demons and temptations, being strengthened by an angelic vision.
[2] But when, being fed by angels, he had for a long time ceased to let down the basket and the flask, and was believed by the sailors and the neighboring inhabitants to be dead, by his counsel a church was built to S. Catharine, Virgin and Martyr a certain unwonted brightness appearing about his hut, at the time when a huge pestilence was raging, induced a certain priest to persuade the neighboring peoples that Albert was still alive, and to hasten to him, that he might bring them help in so great a scourge. Without delay, many devices being employed and the mountain at last climbed, they find Albert having gone forth not far from his cave, and beg him to succour the people by his prayers before God. He, using stricter fastings, when with assiduous prayers he had entreated God and the Lady Catharine, virgin and martyr, an angel appearing to him, heard that the plague would cease if he should raise a church to the aforesaid virgin and martyr in that place; and he saw, after the angel's departure, a stone of square form sprinkled with blood, bearing before it the form of the church that was to be built.
[3] After VIII days, when the peoples returned according to the agreement, Albert sets forth the angelic answer. They, the sacred building being presently begun, which in a short time was completed, are freed from the pestilence: but Albert, already worn out with age and vigils, [the pestilence ceases. The Blessed one's death: the finding and translation of the body.] being seized by a brief fever, rendered his soul to God on the III of the Nones of September in the year of restored salvation MCCCLIX e. Whose body, when it had lain hidden for some time, was found by Domnina, a noble woman of Besozzo, in a marble sarcophagus, the earth being dug up, with a marvelous and sweet odor breathing forth from it: which was afterward translated into the chapel of S. Catharine; and to many who flee to his help divine benefits are granted f.