Lucia Broccadelli da Narni in Ferrara: The Short Season of a Living Saint, the Changing Memories of the Biographers

Lucia Broccadelli was born in Narni in 1476, and become a Domenican tertiary in 1494. During her stay in a convent in Viterbo, the rumor spread that she received the stigmata and, as for other ‘alive saints’ of the period, her spiritual power was highly considered among the local government. Duke Ercole I of Este asked for many times in vain to obtain the moving in Ferrara of Lucia, so that he decided to kidnap her, with the help of a huge sum of money given to the Podestà of the city. The paper deals with three levels in order to describe the holiness of Lucia: The Church’s attitude about the figure of Lucia, the framework offered by contemporary sources and the changing focus of historiography in regard to her.