Biography

He was born at Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

.

He entered the Jesuit novitiate

Novitiate

Novitiate, alt. noviciate, is the period of training and preparation that a novice monastic or member of a religious order undergoes prior to taking vows in order to discern whether they are called to the religious life....

 in 1572, became rector

Rector

The word rector has a number of different meanings; it is widely used to refer to an academic, religious or political administrator...

 of the Jesuit college at Nola

Nola

Nola is a city and comune of Campania, southern Italy, in the province of Naples, situated in the plain between Mount Vesuvius and the Apennines...

 and was master of novices

Master of novices

The master of novices or novice master is a term used in the Roman Catholic Church to refer those religious to whom is committed the training of the novices and the government of the novitiate of a religious order or congregation...

 at Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

 for five years.

He was finally appointed secretary of the Jesuit general Claudio Acquaviva

Claudio Acquaviva

Claudio Acquaviva was an Italian Jesuit priest elected in 1581 the 5th Superior General of the Society of Jesus...

, who in 1558 detailed him to write the history of the Jesuit Order, his master piece.

He died in Rome in 1606.

Works

His history of the Jesuit Order comprises only the generalate of St. Ignatius. It was edited by Sacchini, and appeared under the title "Historiæ Societatis Jesu prima pars" (Rome, 1614, 1615, 1621; Antwerp, 1620; Cologne, 1620). It is written in the form of annals and based chiefly on a life written by the saint's secretary, de Polanco.

It was continued by Sacchini, Petrus Possinus, Joseph de Jouvancy

Joseph de Jouvancy

Joseph de Jouvancy was a French poet, pedagogue, philologist, and historian.-Life:...

 and Guilo Cesare Cordara. The sixth and last part, reaching to 1633, was published at Rome in 1758.

Other works are:

• Annuæ litteræ Societatis Jesu, anni 1583-85 (1585–1588)
• Vita Petri Fabri (1617); the same also appeared under the title Forma sacerdotis Apostolici, expressa in exemplo Petri Fabri (1647)
• Tractatus seu Commentarii in Summarium Constitutionum et in regulas communes (1876).