medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (19. January) is also the feast day of:
Bassian of Lodi (d. 409, perhaps). The existence of a late fourth-
century bishop of Lodi named Bassianus is clear from the correspondence
of Ambrose of Milan, from stray records of contemporary northern
Italian church councils, and from Paulinus of Milan's Life of Ambrose.
What is not so clear are the details of this person's life. Apart from
what one learns from the aforementioned sources we have only a later
twelfth-century Life of B. (BHL 1040) from Lodi plus an early modern
derivative thereof that differs in some particulars. This brief
document, which aims at elegance and often achieves it, is thought to
be a revision of a tenth-century (ca.) original. Whether that in turn
drew upon reliable earlier information now lost (the Life as we have it
does draw on Ambrose and on Paulinus of Milan) is really anyone's
guess, as is therefore the accuracy of the Life's dating of B.'s death
(at fourscore years and ten) to the eighth year of Honorius and
Theodosius.
According to the Life, B. was a Sicilian from a wealthy family who was
sent to Rome for literary (i.e., higher) education and who by divine
grace obtained a Christian teacher. B. converted to Christianity, was
active in the Roman church, and while still a young man fled from Rome
to Ravenna in order to escape agents sent by his father, who wished him
to renounce his faith and return to to Sicily. Having arrived at
Ravenna he performed a public miracle that led to the conversion of the
local prefect and hence to that of many others as well. Here B. was
ordained a priest and spent many years before the church of Lodi
through divine intervention chose him to replace its recently deceased
bishop. B.'s exemplary performance in this office saw his performance
of several miracles; he also obtained the grace of predicting both
Ambrose's death and his own.
Lodi's cathedral has been dedicated to B. since at least the tenth
century. When the Milanese destroyed Lodi in 1158 they spared the then
cathedral church, located in what came to be known, once the city was
refounded in a new location, as "Lodi Vecchio" ("Old Lodi"). This
essentially "romanesque" structure, which in the thirteenth century
received a "gothic" facade and other modifications, is shown here:
http://www.lodi.lombardiainrete.it/lodivecchio.asp
http://www.viboldone.it/borgo/bassiano.asp
The new cathedral in the new city was already under construction in
1159. B.'s relics were translated here in 1163. A few views follow:
http://www.italiamedievale.org/sito_acim/concorso_2004/concorso_2004_lod
i.html
TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/4gglx
http://www.sbarrax.it/img/2004/20040800_buffer/tn/Lodi_CsoVittorio_023.j
pg.html
TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/45zzc
http://www.sbarrax.it/img/2004/20040800_buffer/tn/Lodi_Duomo-
retro_029.jpg.html
TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/4yx3h
http://www.sbarrax.it/img/2004/20040800_buffer/tn/Lodi_Duomo-
retro_030.jpg.html
TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/5ux7f
Prior to this, however, refugees from Lodi had erected at Pizzighettone
in today's Cremona province a church dedicated to B. Said to date to
1158, that too is still in existence.
Though it's been rebuilt as a "gothic" church
http://www.pizzighettone.com/pizzighettone/11876.htm
http://www.pizzighettone.com/pizzighettone/11877.htm
"romanesque" portions remain:
http://www.pizzighettone.com/pizzighettone/13741.jpg
The interior contains an interesting fourteenth-century relief of the
Adoration of the Magi (third illustration from the bottom;
expandable .jpg):
http://www.rbscom.it/Piceleonese/pizzighettone/arte.html
The blow-up is here (but its URL may not be stable):
http://www.rbscom.it/Piceleonese/pizzighettone/pizzighettone4g.jpg
Another dedication to B. in the same province is the church of San
Bassiano at San Bassano (shown here in an old photograph taken before
the belltower's removal):
http://www.comune.sanbassano.cr.it/storia/cenni/foto.asp?i=5&m=5
San Bassano, by the way, was the birthplace of the sixteenth-century
humanist poet Marco Gerolamo Vida.
Bassano del Grappa (VI) in the Veneto is thought to derive its name
from that of a late antique estate called _fundus Bassianus_ (from
Bassus, a common Roman name). But its patron saint since at least the
early sixteenth century has been our B.; perhaps the association of the
two Bassiani dates to Bassano del Grappa's period of Milanese control
in the late fourteenth and very early fifteenth centuries.
Bassano del Grappa, by the way, was the birthplace of the late
fourteenth-century humanist Castellano da Bassano.
Another "Bassian" toponym is San Bassiano (LT) in southern Lazio. Here
the traditional patron is St. Erasmus, whose cult has been widespread
locally since the eleventh century. But, in another instance of cultic
diffusion by paronomasia, B. is now a copatron and even appears on the
town arms:
http://digilander.libero.it/tdsotm1/Lazio/Comuni%20lt/bassiano.htm
Bassiano, by the way, was the birthplace of the late fifteenth- and
early sixteenth-century humanist printer Aldo Manuzio.
Had there not been so many humanists who were born in places never
associated with B., one might be tempted to make something of this.
Best,
John Dillon
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