medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (2. July) is the feast day of:
Lidanus of Sezze (d. 1118). Today's less well known saint from the Regno
is best known for activity outside the territory of the former
kingdom. But he was born in today's Civita d'Antino (AQ) in Abruzzo, where
he is honored today as a local boy who made good, and he is associated in
his tripartite Life and Miracles (BHL 4919-21) with the great Benedictine
abbey of Montcassino, now in Lazio but medievally in Regno territory.
The bearer of an unusual name (accented on the first syllable since at
least the sixteenth century and thought by some to be a version of
Lygdamus), he founded from Montecassino a monastery on land he had just
inherited near Sezze (ancient Setia) in southern Lazio. Sezze is
located in the Monti Lepini at the former eastern edge of the Pontine
Marshes; L.'s monastery, dedicated to St. Cecilia (said to have been his
mother's name), included marshy territory. Dionysius, the author of the
Life proper, tells us that L. was greatly annoyed by the constant
confused noise of the area's numerous little frogs and that, smiting the
marsh with his staff, he admonished them to be silent and to cease
disturbing a man of God. Which, not surprisingly, they did: the miracle
was that they stayed silent. According to D., not a peep has been heard
out of them since.
L. lived here for seventy-two years (if we assume that the young Lidanus of
the Life was eighteen when he founded the monastery, that gives him a life
span of four score years and ten) and was buried in the monastery
church. His remains were later translated to Sezze proper and interred in
its cathedral, where they remain today. L.'s cult was confirmed by Leo
X. One of Sezze's patron saints, he lives on in the names of many of his
present-day _concittadini_.
The ecclesiastical politics underlying the translation of L.'s remains and
the writing of his Life have been studied by Maria Teresa Caciorgna in two
articles: "Tra citta' e campagna: il culto di San Lidano a Sezze," in Sofia
Boesch Gajano and Lucia Sebastiani, eds., _Culto dei santi: istituzioni e
classi sociali in eta' preindustriale_ (L'Aquila: Japadre, 1984), pp.
200-26, and "San Lidano: da monaco a patrono" in her _Marittima
medievale: territori, societa', poteri_ (Roma: Il calamo, 1996), pp.
295-318. Vincenzo Venditti reproduces in black and white a
fourteenth-century portrait of L. in his entry "Lidano, abate, santo," in
the _Bibliotheca Sanctorum_, vol. 8 (1967), cols. 41-43.
Sezze's originally "romanesque" cathedral of Santa Maria was rebuilt in
1364 as a "Cistercian gothic" structure (the Cistercian houses of
Fossanova and Casamari are relatively nearby). It was rebuilt again in
1594, at which time it assumed its present peculiar appearance with the
main entrance located in what had been the apse and the main altar sited
where previously the main entrance had been. Some views are here:
http://www.sezzeweb.it/images/paese/davedere/santamaria02.jpg
http://www.romeartlover.it/Sezze4.jpg
http://www.sezzeweb.it/images/paese/davedere/santamaria01.jpg
L.'s relics are housed in the reliquary bust shown here during what is
thought to have been his first post-mortem visit to his native Civita
d'Antino (11. July 2004):
http://web.tiscali.it/sancarlodasezze/images/civita/DSCF1432.JPG
http://web.tiscali.it/sancarlodasezze/images/civita/DSCF1478.JPG
An illustrated, English-language page on Sezze (LT) and its environs:
http://www.romeartlover.it/Sezze.html
L.'s monastery was sited at a place called _Ad tres arcus_ ('At the
Three Arches'); just outside Sezze there is a row of Roman-period arches
named after him. One of these is shown here:
http://www.sezzeweb.it/images/dekstop/archi1024.jpg
A view of Civita d'Antino (giving a very inadequate impression of the
height of the surrounding mountains):
http://www.sezioneim.terremarsicane.it/ingr6/1_copia(18).htm
Best,
John Dillon
(last year's post, visuals revised)
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