1604 SERMONES by DIDACUS antique BLIND TOOLED PIGSKIN BINDING w/ CLASPS

Didacus Conciones Quadragesimales Vespertinae Super Septem Poenitentiales Psalmos. Venice, Societates Veneta; 1604 24 leaves, 682 pages. With woodcut title vignette. Original blind-tooled pigskin over wooden boards with intact brass clasps. Spine with raised bands and manuscript title labels with beautiful title vignette with a view of Venice Front endpaper with period manuscript ownership entry With damage to the upper right corner of the front cover. Good condition otherwise Size: 4 3/4 by 6 3/4 inches Text in Latin Didacus of Alcalá (Spanish: Diego de Alcalá), also known as Diego de San Nicolás, was a Spanish Franciscan lay brother who served among the first group of missionaries to the newly conquered Canary Islands. He died at Alcalá de Henares on 12 November 1463 and is honored by the Catholic Church as a saint. Didacus was born c.? 1400 into a poor but pious family in the small village of San Nicolás del Puerto in the Kingdom of Seville. As a child, he embraced the hermit life and, later, placed himself under the direction of a hermit priest living not far from his native town. He then led the life of a wandering hermit. Feeling called to the religious life, he applied for admission to the Observant (or Reformed) branch of the Order of Friars Minor at the friary in Albaida and was sent to the friary in Arruzafa, near Córdoba, where he was received as a lay brother. As a friar he worked at various manual trades to support the brotherhood. During his years living in that location, he journeyed to the villages in the regions surrounding Córdoba, Cádiz, and Seville, where he would preach to the people. A strong devotion to him still exists in those towns