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(RELIGION.) BENAGASI Y LUXAN, JOSEPH JOAQUIN.
Vida del
Poderoso Negro San Benitio de Palermo, Descripta en Dies Cantos Joco-serios
del Reducissimo Metro de Seguidillas, con Argumentos en Octavas.
Full-page
engraved portrait of the black Saint, half-page woodcut head and tail-pieces; text within an
engraved border. [xx], 1-136 pages. 8vo, original full vellum, with “Obras de Benegas” in
ink on the spine; fore-edge of the front cover “nibbled” otherwise an exceptional copy.
[Place, date.]
[2,500/3,500]
FIRST EDITION
of this “serio-comic” life of San Benito of Palermo, sometimes called “Benedict
the Black,” or “Benedict the African.” Benito was born the son of African slaves in Sicily in
1526. The present volume is a highly unorthodox rendering of the saint’s hagiography, told in
verse, “in the style of seguidillas” a song-form of flamenco! Benito was freed by his master
when he was an adolescent and became a shepherd. At the age of twenty he met and fell in
with a group of Franciscan monks. When he was first admitted to the order, the Franciscans
made him their cook-how history repeats itself! And what a cook he must have been, because
early references to him state that he performed “great miracles” while cooking, which may well
have taken the form of herbal soups, teas etc. He was briefly made the head of novitiates, but
was quickly returned to the kitchen. Benito was held in such regard that people came from far
and wide; priests and theologians, and eventually the Viceroy of Sicily himself. Benito died in
1559 and was canonized by Pope Pius VII on May 24, 1807.
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