Beata Fina di San Gimignano, Benozzo Gozzoli (1420-97)
Courtesy of Wikimedia
Courtesy of Wikimedia
Italy can boast a
wide number of saints, many of whom are local figures whose cults may
be restricted to a small geography, such as one particular commune,
most likely their native one, but nonetheless have resulted in a rich
cultural and devotional expression. The blessed Fina of San Gimignano
is one such saint whom I happened to come across during my wanderings
in the city of a hundred towers.
Casa di Fina, which sadly was closed by the time I got there
Fina was born in San
Gimignano in 1238 and died at the age of fifteen in 1253 on March 12.
March is the season of gillyflowers in San Gimignano, and hence these
became known as fiori di Santa Fina, the flowers of Santa
Fina. According to local legend, they blossomed all over the city
when she died. Her death had reputedly been foretold her three months
in advance by St. Gregory the Great, to whom she was particularly
devoted.
Gregory announcing the death of Fina, Scuola di Ghirlandaio, Capella di Fina
During her short
life, Fina excelled in the ascetic religiosity that had become so
extremely popular in the course of the 13th century. This was the age
of mendicant friars, of Francis of Assisi and Dominic of Caleruega,
and poverty and selfabnegation were keywords in the new paradigm of
sainthood. Fina was struck by illness at the age of ten and became
bedridden, and she was later orphaned. During her suffering she was
known to proclaim to her visitors the devotion she harboured to
Gregory, the Virgin and Christ until her death. This display of
unwavering, patient religiosity no doubt struck a chord in the
contemporary milieu, and would continue to attract attention as these
virtues remained popular well into the 14th century.
Capella di Fina, duomo di Maria Assunta, scuola di Ghirlandaio
Pictures from the chapel courtesy of this website
After her death, it
was reported that numerous miracles occurred at her tomb - or the
plank that had been her bed according to some - and she became the
centre of a local cult. In addition to the ascetic nature of her
devotion, the fourteenth-century devotees may also have been
attracted to her cult for her reclusion, an ideal of female sanctity
that grew popular in those times. The typology of the female recluse
also accorded well with the asceticism of the 13th century since the
typical recluse-saint performed her imitation of Christ, the imitatio
Christi, through poverty and self-mortification. This also became
the century of the flagellants, which took this ideal in a somewhat
different and more public direction.
It was a Dominican
friar who wrote the vita of Fina di San Gimignano, Giovanni
del Coppo who also was a native of that town, and it was typical for
the mendicant orders to produce hagiography for local saints in the
1300s. Andre Vauchez notes that mendicant friars showed considerable
interest in female lay sanctity in this period, regardless of whether
the saints in question had belonged to their orders (Vauchez 2005:
210).
Another current of
religiosity typical of the 14th century is also applicable to the
posthumous life of Fina di San Gimignano. This is the veneration of
saints who were not formally acknowledged by the Papacy, but who
nonetheless attracted tremendous local popularity and who even were
celebrated in the local liturgy. After the Papacy gained monopoly on
canonisations in 1234 under Pope Gregory IX, such practice had never
quite died out, but was very carefully executed. In the 14th century,
however, this became increasingly normal, and Vauchez suggests this
might have a connection to the schism and the crisis of authority
prevalent in that time. It is of course also important to note that
Italy, due to its fragmentary political map, had always and would
continue to act rather independently of external authorities.
The casket of Blessed Fina
Courtesy of this website
The cult of Fina set
its marks clearly on the city of San Gimignano. She was eventually
elected to be the patron saint of the city, and a hospital in her
honour was built only fifty years after her death. In 1457 the
Popular Council decided to furnish a beautiful chapel dedicated to
her in the collegiate church of Our Lady of the Assumption. The
chapel was built in the period 1468-72 by Giuliano da Maiano, and his
brother Benedetto made the altar in 1475. The walls of the chapel
were decorated by Domenico Ghirlandaio and his school, as seen above.
Perhaps the most
hauntingly beautiful artistic expression of Fina's cult is the
portrayal of her life by Florentine artist Lorenzo di Niccolò. Here,
Fina is shown here as the patron saint of the city, holding her
native town in her left arm and some gillyflowers in her right hand.
She is positioned next to St. Gregory, her particular saint.
Reliquary for Beata Fina by Lorenzo di Niccolò (1373-1412)
Courtesy of Wikimedia
Courtesy of Wikimedia
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