Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 10.djvu/595

 MONTEVIDEO

539

MONTFAUCON

lonRinp; "ad Dominum Papam specialiter". It re- ceived throughout the Middle Ages many marks of consideration from the kings of the Two Sicilies, within whose domains there were at one time no less than one hundred monasteries of this branch of the Benedictine order. After many vicissitudes, laxity of rule tlireatened ruin to the abbey, and in the six- teenth century Clement VIII charged Blessed John Leonard founder oi the Clerks Regular of the Mother of God, to restore the monastic spirit. The new constitutions were approved by Paul V in 1611, and included among other things a regulation that the monks of Monte Vergine should use the Camaldo- lese Breviary. The habit of the monks was to be white, and they were to wear a white scapular.

From the beginning the abbey seems to have been freed from diocesan control, and its abbots had the faculty of conferring the four minor orders and confir- mation. Between 1440 and 1.51.5 it was held in com- mendnin by five cardinals, and in that year was united with the Hospital of the Nunziata at Naples. The governors of the hospital sent as their representative to Monte Vergine a sacristan who interfered with the discipline of the place, and from this indignity the monks were freed by St. Pius V in 1557. In 1579 Gregory XIII gave them charge of St. Agatha's in Subura, Rome; Paul V made it a privileged abbey, and it remained in their care until Gregory XVII gave it to the Irish students (see Irish College, Rome).

The monastery chapel contains an ancient Byzan- tine picture of the Blessed Virgin Mary, said to have come originally from Antioch. The dark features of the Bles.scd Virgin standing out from a background of bright gold have won for it from peasants and pil- grims the name of "Schiavona". The story runs, that the head of the picture was cut from its frame by Baldwin, the Latin Emperor of Jerusalem, to save it from desecration, that it was found among his posses- sions by his grand-niece Catherine of Valois (who lies buried in the chapel), and that she gave it to Monte Vergine. The lower portion of the picture as it ex- ists in the shrine was added at a later date by the brush of Montana di Arezzo. The church is also said to contain relics of the bodies of the young men, Si- drach, Misach, Abdenago, who were saved from the fiery furnace. These relics were brought from Jeru- salem by Frederick II. Pentecost and the eighth of September are the two great days of pilgrimage and rejoicing at Monte Vergine. The nearest town is Mercogliano and on these days its population is more than doubled. The present abbot is Mgr. Victor Cor- vaia,O.S.B., born at Palermo, 19 June, 1834, succeeded IS January, 1884. The chapter consists of 15 canons. The abbot's jurisdiction extendsover 7 parishes form- ing part of four communes in the border provinces of Avellino and Benevento. There are 27 chapels within the prelacy, and the population of 8070 souls is ministered to by 31 secular priests and 18 regulars.

Vita S. Gulidmi Abhntis in Acta SS., June, V; Giordano, Craniche di Monte Vergine (Naples, 164S) : Mabillon, Ann. Bened., VI: de Cesare, Memoria per Monte Vergine (Rome. 1840); Crawford, Southern Italy and Sicily (London, 190.5); Ecclesiastico (1908); Gerarckia (1910); Ann. Pont.

(1910).

J. C. Grey

Montevideo, Archdiocese of (Montisvidei), in Uruguay, comprises the whole of the republic. This territory was under the jurisdiction of the Paraguayan Church till 1620, when it became subject to Buenos Aires. In 1828 the Holy See erected it into a vicariate Apostolic. On 15 July, 1878, it was raised to episcopal rank, Mgr. Hyacinth Vera being finst bishop; on 19 April, 1897, it was made an archdiocese. It was de- cided at that time to erect two suffragan sees, Melo and Salt6, but no appointments have yet been made (1910). Since colonial days ended, the Church has been perse- cuted at times, esjiecially between 1S80 and 1890 under Santos, who forbade religious under forty to make

vows, instituted civil marriage, and made it a crime to baptize a child before its birth was registered civilly. To-day, however, the Church is flourishing, and the archdiocese contains many congregations of men (Jesuits, Capuchins, Redemptorists, Salesians, etc.), and over 300 nuns engaged in teaching and chari- table work. The diocese contains 72,210 square miles, and about 1,103,000 inhabitants (in 1906), almost all Catholics, of whom 308,000 were in the Depart- ment of Montevideo. There are 46 parishes, 7 filial cures, 122 priests, and about 100 chapels and churches. The present occupant of the see is Mgr. Mariano Soler, b. at San Carlo, Uruguay, 25 March, 1846; elected bishop, 29 June, 1891; consecrated archbishop, 19 April, 1897; he has two auxiliary bishops : Mgr. Ricardo Isasa (titular Bishop of Anemurium), b. at Montevideo, 7 February, 1847; elected, 15 February, 1891; and Mgr. Pio Gaetano Secondo Stella (titular Bishop of Amizona), b. at Paso del Molino, Uruguay, 7 August, 1857; elected, 22 December, 1893. Almost all the inhabitants are Catholics, there is, however, a small Piedmontese Waldensian agricultural colony in the East of Colonia.

Among the noteworthy buildings of the City of Montevideo may be mentioned the cathedral, begun in 1803, completed and restored in 1905; and the Jesuit, Redemptorist, and Franciscan churches. Within recent years conferences of St. Vincent de Paul have been established in all the city parishes; likewise an excellent Catholic club; and an institute for Cath- olic working-men. The city dates back to early in the seventeenth century; a small fort, San Jose, was built there in 1724; in January, 1728, the town was founded by Bruno de Zabala with the name San Felipe y Santiago; in 1807 it was captured by the British; in 1828 it became the capital of the republic; from 1S42 to 1851 it withstood the nine years' siege by Oribe and his Argentine allies. Montevideo has within recent years grown to be one of the seven greatest seaports in the world (see Uruguay). San Jose de Mayo (9000) con- tains &. magnificent church, more massive than the cathedral; and also the college of the Sisters of Nues- tra Senora del Huerto, which has a very pretty chapel attached. (For the early Uruguayan missions among the Indians see Reductions of Paraguay.)

Araujo, Geogra/ia rmcional (Montevideo, 1892); Mulhale, Handbook of the River Plate Repnilics (Buenos Aires, 1892); Keane, Central and South America, I (London, 1809).

A. A. MacErlean.

Montfaucon, Bernard de, French scholar, b. in 1655, at the chateau de Soulatge, Department of Aude, arrondissement of Carcassone; d. in Paris, at the Abbey of St-Germain-des-Prcs, in 1741. He was the son of Timoleon de Montfaucon and of Flore de Maignan. His family, originally of Gas- cony, had settled in Languedoo after the Albigensian Crusade of the thirteenth century; its principal .seat was the ch&teau of Roquetaillade (arrondissement of Limoux), where Bernard was reared. He wa.s in- stnic'led by Pavilion, Bi-shop of Aleth, his father's friend, and in 1672, at the age of thirteen, he entered the Acad<'niie des Cadets at Perpignan, (o prepare for a military career. After his father's death, he left home with his relative, the Marquis d'llautpol, a captain of grenadiers in the Regimeiil of Laiiguedoc, and served as a volunteer imdor Turenne (1673). He went through the campaign of Alsace-, was at the battle of Marienthal, and fell dangerously ill at Saveme. In jnirsuance of a vow made to the Blessed Virgin, he then returned to his own cmmtry, resolved upon entering religion. On 13 May, 1676, he made his profession in the Beiieilictiiie moiiiistery of Durade, at Toulouse. Being sent to the Abb(^y of Soreze, he there learned Greek, nicking rapid Jirog- ress. He next spent eight years at the priory of la Grasse (Aude). Claude Martin, assistant superior of the Congregation of St-Maur, noted his zeal and