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 VERCELLONE

349

VERCELLONE

'ella Torre of Milan (1263), of the Marquesses of [onferrato (1277), who appointed Matteo Visconfi ijilain (1290-9). The Ghibellines (Tizzoni) and uclphs (Avogadri) disputed the city from 1301 till (34, the latter party being expelled several times, lus enabling the Marquess of Monferrato to take ercelh (132S), which voluntarily placed itself under le Viscount of Milan in 1334. In 1373 Bishop Gio- inni Fieschi expelled the Visconti, but Matteo ro- mquered the city. Facino Cane (1402), profiting i' the strife between Giovanni Maria and Fihppo iaria Visconti, took Vercelli, but was driven out by eodoro di Monferrato (1404), from whom the city issed to the dukes of Savoy (1427). In 1499 and )53 it was captured by the French, and in 1616 and )78 by the Spaniards. In 1704 it sustained an ener- 'tic siege by the French, who failed to destroy the rtress; after this it lared the fortunes Savoy. In 1821 ercelli rose in fa- )ur of theConstitu- Dn.

According to an a c lent lectionary le Gospel was first cached here in the cond half of the ird century by Sts. ibinianus and Mar- ilis, bishops from aul, when they w-ere turning to their oceses. The epis- ipal see was not es- blished till after le peace of Con- ant inc. The first shop was St. Euse- us, a Sardinian, a ctor of the Roman hurch and a stren- )us opponent of Arianism. From Vercelh the Gospel iread through the valley of the Po and its environs; wards the end of the fourth century, perhaps even iring the episcopate of St. Eu.sebius, new dioceses ere erected. From Eusebius to Nottingo (830) lere were forty bishops, whose images were pre- rved in the Eusebian basilica, so called because St. ii.sebius dedicated it to St. Theonestus, martyr, and IS interred in it. He introduced the common and onastic life among his clergy, from whom bishops r the surrounding territory were often selected, niong his successors were: St. Simenus (370), who iptized and consecrated St. Ambrose; St. Honoratus 9li), who administered the Viaticum to St. Ambrose; . Justinianus (living in 451); St. ^milianus (about 10) built an aqueduct for the city at his own expen.se; . Flavianus (541); St. Celsus (6t)5); Norgaudus 44) restored common life among the canons; Liu- ardus (880), who had been archchancellor of Charles e Fat (deposed later); and who was slain during the vasion of the Huns (899), Uke Regenbertus (904- ■trus (978), imprisoned in the Holy Land by the lyptian Mu.ssulmans; Leo (999), chancellor of to III and Henry II; Gisulfus (11.33) re-established mmon life among the canons in 1144; St. Albertus 18.5-1204), founder of the chair of theology, later itriarch of Jerusalem; Renerio Avogadro (1296) op- i.sed the partisans of the heretic Fra Dolcino; Gu- ielmo Didier (1437), an elector of Felix V, antipope; iuliano della Rovere (1.502), later Pope Julius II 503) ; Cardinal Guido Ferrerio (1562), founder of the minary, embellished the cathedral and introduced e Triclentine reform; Gianfrancesro Honomo (1572) ntinued the reform and replaced (1573) the Euse-
 * ) ; Atto (d. 960), reformer of ecclesiastical discipline;

bian Rite by the Roman. In 1817 the Diocese of Vercelli, then suffragan of Turin (but previously of Milan\ was made an archdiocese, the first archbishop being Giuseppe di Grimaldi. The dioceses .suffragan to Vercelli are: Alessandria, Biella, Casale, Novara, Vigevano. The archdiocese contains 136 parishes; 250,000 inhabitants; 447 secular and 33 regular priests; 7 houses of religious (men), and 4 of nuns; 4 educational institutes for boys, and 8 for girls. The religious periodicals are "L'unione" (weekly) and "La santa infanzia" (monthly).

Cappelletti, Le chie^e d' Italia, XII: Savio, GH antichi vescovi del Piemonle (Turin, 1899), 403; Pasti, VerceUi sacra (Como, 1909).

U. Benigni.

Vercellone, Carlo (Charles), Biblical scholar, b. at Biella, Milan; d. at Rome, 19 Jan., 1869. He entered the Order of the Barnabites, at Genoa, in 1829; studied philosophy at Turin and theol- ogy at Rome, under Aloj'sius Ungarelli ; taught the sacred sciences at Alessan- dria, Turin, Perugia, and Parma; and, in 1847, was made presi- dent of the college of the Barnabites at Rome, a position which he held to- gether with the charge, first, of proc- urator, and then general, of his order, and with various offices in several Roman Con grega- ,. tions, until hisdeath.

■•• ^^'"^^'•^ His first publication

was (1857) the edition (5 quarto volumes) of the Vati- can MS. (B) of the Scriptures prepared by Cardinal Mai under the auspices of Leo XII and printed from 1828 to 1838, to which he added by way of preface a letter to the reader. That this edition was far from perfect, Mai himself had well reaUzed, and Vercellone pubhcly acknowledged in the above-mentioned letter; he at once set out to have it corrected mainly from Mai's notes, the outcome of his labours being a new octavo edition of the New Testament (Rome, 1859), prefaced by an excellent epistle. A few months before, a poor reprint of the New Testament edition of 1857 had been struck off at Leipzig for a London firm. Yet critics persisted in thinking a new and accurate edition of the "Vaticanus" was imper- atively needed, and Pius IX manifested his inten- tion to carry out the design and entrust it to Wrcellone. The latter helped Tischendorf in the preoaration of his "Nov. Test. Vat." (Leipzig, 1867).

In 1868, appeared the first volume of the "Bibliorum sacrorum gra'cus codex vaticanus, auspice Pio IX . . . editus",theworkof Vercellone and the Basilian monk Cozza; the second volume (Cienesis-Josue) followed in 1869, shortly before Vercellone's death, and the others in 1870, 1871, 1872, and 1881, Cajetan Sergio and Canon Henry Fabiani having replaced Vercellone. Vercellone's critical studies on the text of the Latin Vulgate, although he brought the work only as far as IV Kings, contributed more to his fame than the editing of the Vatican MS. These studies, with im- portant and valuable prolegomena, appeared (2 vols., l.S0-64) under the title, "Varia> lectiones Vulgatx latins' editionis Bibliorum", and may be said to have paved the way to the revision of the Vulgate now in progress. As i)reparatory to his edition of the