Vita della Venerabile Madre Giovanna Francesca Fremiot di Chantal Fondatrice dell'Ordine della Visitazione di S. Maria, composta da Carlantonio Saccarelli de' Chierici Regolari Ministri degl'Infermi, e dal medesimo dedicata alla Reale Altezza di Eleonora Maria Teresa Madama di Savoja. Seconda edizione riveduta, e corretta dall'Autore

IN A BEAUTIFUL INLAID ROMAN BINDING - WITH AN ADDITIONAL FOLDING PLATE OF VINCENT DE PAUL
4to (239x170 mm) [28], 570, [18] pp. and 2 engraved plates. Woodcut ornament on the title page. Woodcut decorative initials and tailpieces. The first plate, engraved by C. Grandi after A.A. Orazi and dated 1734, shows Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal kneeling in front of Francis de Sales who is handing her down from the throne the book with the rules of her Order. The second larger folding plate (546x405 mm), not called for in the bibliographies and probably not pertinent to this edition, depicts Vincent de Paul praying for Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal and Francis de Sales who are ascending to heaven in the form of globes. Lavishly bound in a contemporary Roman inlaid binding of richly gilt red and black morocco, marbled endleaves, gilt marbled edges (very well preserved). On one of the front endleaves bookplate Arturo Dazza. Tear to l. V3 with no loss, small tear along a folding in the folding plate, some occasional staining, a very good copy.
Second edition (first Rome, Komarek, 1734). Jeanne-Françoise Frémyot de Chantal (1572-1641) was a French noblewoman, who after her husband death in 1601 decided to live a religious life, ultimately becoming a nun. In 1604 she met the bishop of Geneva Francis de Sales (1567-1622), who had a profound influence on her. In 1610 at Annecy she founded the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary. The order, which accepted women who were rejected by other orders because of poor health or age, had thirteen houses by the time de Sales died in 1622, and eighty-six before Chantal herself died in 1758 at the Visitation Convent in Moulins, aged 69. Vincent de Paul (1581-1660) served as her spiritual director after de Sales' death. She was beatified in 1751 and canonized in 1767.
Italian Union Catalogue, IT\ICCU\NAPE\010758.