College of Saint Bonaventure

At Quaracchi, near Florence, Italy, famous as the centre of literary activity in the Order of Friars Minor , was founded 14 July, 1879, by Mgr. Bernardino del Vago, Archbishop of Sardis, then minister general of the order. The first director and superior of the college was Father Fidelis of Fauna, under whose scholarly and energetic management the new edition of the works of St. Bonaventure was inaugurated. Upon his death in 1881, Father Fidelis was succeeded by Ignatius Jeiler, of the province of Saxony. Besides being a man of profound piety, Father Jeiler possessed an intimate knowledge of scholastic philosophy and theology, especially that of St. Bonaventure, and was thus eminently fitted to take up the work of his predecessor. Two years before his death in 1904 Father Jeiler was succeeded by Leonard Lemmens, already well-known for his many contributions to Franciscan history. The series of works that have in recent years been published at Quaracchi, and edited by the "Patres editores", as they are usually called, have gained for them an enviable reputation for critical scholarship. Foremost among these, besides the "Opera Omnia" of St. Bonaventure, is the "Analecta Franciscana", edited in greatest part by Quinctianus Muller, O.F.M. (d. 1902), which contains a collection of chronicles relating to the early history of the order and of which four volumes have thus far (1885-1907) appeared. Besides these, the "Bibliotheca Franciscana scholastica medii aevi", of which three volumes have been published (1903-04), and the "Bibliotheca Franciscana ascetica medii aevi", inaugurated in 1904 with a critical edition of the writings of St. Francis, have placed the student of medieval literature under heavy obligations to the Quaracchi friars. As well as continuing the "Annales" of Wadding, the twenty-fifth volume of which appeared in 1899, the Fathers of the college have edited a number of other publications of a purely devotional and literary character. In 1903 a new critical edition of the work of Alexander of Hales was undertaken, which is to be followed by the other Franciscan scholastics. The "Acta Ordinis", a monthly in Latin, and the official organ of the order, and the new "Archivum Franciscano-Historicum", are published at Quaracchi.