PORTIUNCULA

A rural chapel on the plain below Assisi, Italy, called also St. Mary of the Angels, favorite church and headquarters of St. Francis of Assisi. E. d'Alençon (1904) and L. Canonici (1963) have demonstrated that an alleged foundation of the chapel by Syrian monks in the 4th century and restoration by St. Benedict in the 6th were invented by S. Vitale in 1645. It was probably built in the 10th or 11th century; its site is first mentioned in a document of 1045, and the chapel itself about 1150. The chapel was originally known as St. Mary of the Angels because of local reports of angelic visitations, but it was called St. Mary of the Portiuncula in the mid-13th century; later both names were used. Its proper ecclesiastical title is uncertain: it may be the Assumption, or it may be the Annunciation (as is suggested by the polyptych behind the altar painted in 1393). The church belonged to the Abbey of San Benedetto on Mount Subasio, but it was abandoned late in the 12th century, until the young Francis repaired it in 1207. There he received his vocation and founded his first order (1208), acquiring the Portiuncula from the Benedictines (1210) and having it consecrated (1215?). There he vested St. Clare (1212), held general chapters, and died in an adjacent cell (1226). The church and friary, at first subject to the basilica of San Francesco, passed to the Observant Franciscans in 1415. A triplenaved basilica (papal since 1909) of St. Mary of the Angels was erected over the chapel and death cell (1569–78), and was later rebuilt after an earthquake (1836–40); a marble façade and portico were added in the 20th century (1926–30). Since about 1270 the Portiuncula has been one of the major Marian shrines of Europe, owing to the fame of the "Pardon of Assisi" or the Portiuncula Indulgence, a plenary indulgence, without offerings, gainable by pilgrims yearly on August 2, which Honorius III is reported to have spontaneously granted to Francis in 1216 at Perugia, upon hearing of a private revelation received by the saint. The prolonged controversies regarding its historicity and subsequent extensions have been documented by R. Huber. Its validity has not been questioned since the first extant papal briefs affirming it under Boniface VIII (1294–1303). In 1622 it was extended to all visitors to Franciscan churches; Benedict XV on April 16, 1921, made it a daily toties quoties indulgence, under the usual conditions [see Enchiridion Indulgentiarum (Rome 1952) n.698].

Modern scholars have questioned the granting of the indulgence in 1216 because: (1) it is not mentioned in early Franciscan biographies, chronicles, or official acts, or in a sermon by an archbishop of Pisa in Assisi in 1261 listing indulgences gainable at the basilica of San Francesco; (2) in 1215 the Fourth Lateran Council ordered that indulgences granted for consecrations of churches be restricted to 40 days; (3) Honorius III in 1222 conceded to the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome only a partial one of one year and 40 days; (4) plenary indulgences could then be gained only by participants in or material supporters of the various Crusades; (5) documents attesting the Portiuncula Indulgence date only from 1277 and are contradictory in details; and (6) two basic compilations by the Catalan Andrea Batlle (or Bajuli; c. 1315), edited by A. Fierens (1910) and J. Cambell (1963), and by Fra Francesco di Bartolo della Rossa of Assisi (c. 1334), edited by P. Sabatier (1900), include improbable visions, miracles, and legendary materials. (New biographical data on Francesco di Bartolo were published by A. Fortini in 1959.)

Historians who accept the granting of the indulgence in 1216 reply that the first compilation of evidence made by Bp. Theobald of Assisi about 1310 contained critically acceptable attestations by Friar Benedict of Arezzo (d.1282) and Giacomo Coppoli (fl. 1276), a prominent Perugian friend of Bl. Giles of Assisi. They stated that they had heard it narrated by Brother Leo of Assisi (d. 1278), St. Francis's confessor, or by Brother Masseo, who accompanied the saint to Perugia in 1216. Benedict of Arezzo and a companion testified in 1277 that they frequently heard Masseo describe the granting; their testimony, incidentally, implies that Masseo was then dead and so did not die in 1280 as traditionally reported. In 1311 Bl. John of La Verna testified that numerous friars had informed him they had also received the account from the eyewitness Masseo. Fra Francesco Venimbeni of Fabriano (d. 1322) wrote in his minor Chronica [cf. partial ed. by G. Pagnani in Archivum Franciscanum historicum 52 (1959) 153–177] that he went to Assisi in 1268 to gain the indulgence and heard Leo tell about it. A treatise defending it by Peter John Olivi (d. 1291) indicates that it was accepted and disputed c. 1279. The spiritual writer Ubertino da Casale declared that he gained the indulgence in 1284. The testimony of such witnesses establishes the fact of the granting in 1216, in the judgment of P. Sabatier, M. Faloci Pulignani, L. Oliger, M. Bihl, G. Abate, and R. Huber. However, they question or reject a number of additional incidents narrated in the two late compilations.

One of several points still requiring clarification is whether St. Francis in 1216 publicly announced the indulgence at the Portiuncula in the presence of seven bishops; for, once proclaimed, how could it have been, in effect, ignored for 50 years? The late accounts stress that the Curia urged Honorius to retract it and induced him to restrict it to one day a year. That, owing to this potent official opposition, the saint voluntarily allowed it to lapse soon after receiving it is suggested by his reported advice to Leo to keep it a secret until near the end of Leo's life. A few writers have seen a discreetly cryptic allusion to the indulgence in a friar's vision, recorded by both Thomas of Celano in 1245 and St. Bonaventure in 1261, of a countless throng of men kneeling before the Portiuncula, imploring and obtaining God's mercy.

Bibliography: p. sabatier, ed., Fratris Francisci Bartholi de Assisio Tractatus de Indulgentia S. Mariae de Portiuncula (Paris 1900). r. m. huber, The Portiuncula Indulgence from Honorius III to Pius XI (New York 1938). m. bihl, "Bibliographia," Archivum Franciscanum historicum 33 (1940) 199–210. g. fussenegger, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner, 10v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65) 8:625–626. r. brown, comp. and tr., Our Lady and St. Francis (Chicago 1954). a. fortini, Nova vita di San Francesco, 4 v. in 5 (Assisi 1959). l. canonici, La Porziuncola e gli inizi dell'Ordine Francescano (Assisi 1963). j. cambell, "Glanes Franciscaines: La Première compilation de Barcelone," Archivo Ibero Americano 23 (1963) 77–78, 86–88, 439–448. o. englebert, St. Francis of Assisi: A Biography, tr. e.m. cooper, 2d augm. ed. by i. brady and r. brown (Chicago 1966).

[r. brown]