Caterina Vigri (Vegri) of Bologna

Caterina Vigri (1413–1463), Poor Sister of the Order of Saint Clare, is one of the most important figures of Italian religious women of the fifteenth century. Born in Bologna in 1413 to Giovanni Vigri of Ferrara and Benvenuta Mamellini of Bologna, Caterina was sent to Ferrara at a young age to be educated together with the daughters of the Marquis Niccolò III d’Este. Here Caterina acquired good knowledge of Latin, learning to write, paint, illuminate, and play an instrument. In 1426 Caterina left the court to join a community of pious women of Augustinian inspiration, founded in Ferrara a few years earlier by Bernardina Sedazzari, under the title of Corpus Domini. Between 1429 and 1435–1436, the pious women of Corpus Domini entered in the sphere of influence of the observant Franciscans, with the definitive acceptance of the rule of Saint Clare, including the obligation of enclosure. Caterina was always one of the main supporters of this choice, which was not without problems for the community. She also acted, for some time, as novice mistress. The community of Ferrara in those years was in contact with the main representatives of the Franciscan Observant movement, in particular Alberto da Sarteano and Giovanni da Capestrano. In Ferrara Caterina developed, discreetly, an intense literary activity: while she personally copied her breviary (which she also later illuminated), she wrote the treatise I dodici giardini and also Le sette armi spirituali. Her autograph of this latter text is extant. In 1454 the civic authorities, with friars of Bologna, asked the Corpus Domini monastery of Ferrara to send a group of nuns to found a new monastery in Bologna, with the same title. Caterina, although ill, was chosen as abbess and, together with a group of sisters, she returned to her hometown. Here the female community immediately took on a leading role. Numerous young women from the most important Bolognese families (starting with the Bentivoglio family) asked to enter the convent. Caterina encouraged the creation of an extraordinary female community of literary and artistic production. Caterina herself continued her literary activity in Bologna, transcribing a breviary in her own hand, which she illuminated herself, and writing numerous laudi (at least thirteen attributed to her with certainty have been preserved).