St. Maurus: Against all the snares of the Devil. Unrecorded.
Saint Maurus / [Amulet]. Breve Sancti Mauri Abbatis Contra omnes insidias Diaboli, & Inimicorum omnesq; morbos depellendos, Mane, & Vespere dicendum... Bologna: “Bononiae ex Typographia Longhi,” s.a. [c. 1740-97]. [20.5 x 18.0 cm], [1] f. Folds, staining and edge wear.
Unrecorded 18th-century broadside ‘brief’ attributed to Saint Maurus (512-84). It consists of prayers and a call-and-response to be chanted as a protection “against all the snares of the Devil, and of the Enemies, and for driving away all diseases.” One who recited the prayer the morning and evening could hope to be “powerfully delivered from every evil of mind and body, and every plot of our Enemies, and from the power of the Devil.”
Abbot Maurus, the first disciple of Saint Benedict, developed a reputation as a healer, and even today a (rather simple) ‘Blessing of Saint Maur’ may be recited in treating the infirm. In 17th- and 18th-century Italy, he was often referred to as a “taumaturgo” (“miracle working”), and this broadside printed in Bologna by Longhi points to the extended powers of Maurus (see, e.g., Puccinelli, Crescimanni, and Capocasale).
The Longhi family of printers worked in Bologna for generations, but the formula of the imprint found here (“Bononiae ex Typographia Longhi”), based on dated comparisons, would seem to date this sheet to between 1740 and 1797, with the earlier part of that range being most likely.
The presswork here is rather indifferent. One letter is printed upside down (“nostrornm” for nostrorum”) and the general appearance is unlovely. The Latin language, however, points to a more learned audience. I am not certain how the sheet would have been used (as an aide-memoire or an amulet?). Nor have I found the wording or formulation of these prayers elsewhere (it borrows from various conventions, e.g., the ‘agios o theos’ invocation).
OCLC, KVK and ICCU/OPAC do not locate this item.
*Placido Puccinelli, Vita di S. Mauro abate, il taumaturgo della Francia, e l’Esculapio de gli oppressi da sciatiche, catarri, ed altri malori (Florence: per Francesco Onofri, 1670); Pompeo Crescimanni, Esercizio di devozione verso il glorioso taumaturgo S. Mauro abbate da pratticarsi ogni giorno da’ suoi divoti a fine d’essere preservati, e liberati da ogni male, e specialmente dalle infermità corporali. Coll’aggiunta dell’uso de’ prodigiosi segni del medesimo Santo (Palermo: per Felicella, 1740); Giuseppe Capocasale, Divota novena del gloriosiss. taumaturgo S.Mauro Abbate (Rome: s.n., 1781).