Controversias religiosas y circulación de noticias impresas. Sobre las variantes editoriales de la “Relatione dello scisma anglicano” por Angelo Galioto

Abstract

In 1597, the Franciscan Observant friar Angelo Galioto, Master of Theology and Philosophy, published a pro-Catholic text entitled Relatione dello scisma anglicano, e del glorioso martirio del b.p.f. Giovanni Foresta francescano osservante: e di altri santi martiri d’Inghilterra nella persecutione d’Enrico Ottavo (Palermo, Giovanni Antonio De Franceschi). The work was dedicated to Ludovico Foresta, a relative of Blessed Giovanni, who had been the confessor of the Queen of England Catherine of Aragon and had suffered detention and martyrdom (1538) for having disapproved of the sovereign in his plan for divorce. The work had a clear apologetic purpose, as it was not limited to describing the different stages of the schism but clearly advocated the Catholic revenge of Princess Mary against Elizabeth of England. The author also took the opportunity to celebrate an illustrious victim of the persecuted Catholicism, thus spreading glory over the Franciscan Observant Order to which both he and the martyr belonged. Finally, it is very interesting to notice the existence of two different emissions for the same edition; in fact, the second version offers a more extensive and updated account of the Catholics’ persecutions in England during the last quarter of the 16th century.