Mass and choir, must be followed. The Order henceforth was canonically established.
Of the history of the Ambrosiani comparatively few details are known, and it is hardly necessary here to rehearse them at any length. It will suffice to say that various houses were founded, and that for more than half a century each monastery remained entirely independent, their only connexion being the fact that each adopted the same rule. In 1441 Eugenius IV united all the existing foundations in one Congregation under a Master-general who was to reside at the original convent where in future a full Chapter met every three years. It was found that the old discipline had become somewhat relaxed in the time of S. Carlo Borromeo, but at the request of the brethren this great Saint presided in person over their Chapter of 1579, and with his encouragement the earlier strictness was soon restored. Subjects, none the less, were few, and on 15 August 1589 Sixtus V issued a bull joining the Ambrosiani with the Apostolini or Barnabites,[1] who claimed the Apostle S. Barnabas as their founder, but whose constitution, as then followed at any rate, had been approved by Rome early in the fifteenth century. The Congregation thus formed was now generally known as the Brethren of S. Ambrose ad Nemus and S. Barnabas, and upon the engraved title-page of the second edition (1626) of Guazzo’s “Compendium Maleficarum,” the two Saints are duly depicted as patrons in full pontificalia.
Outside the archdiocese of Milan the Ambrosiani held for a while only two houses, both of which were at Rome: San Clemente,[2] and San Pancrazio. In Milan itself their most important monastery was that attached to the Church of San Primo, a parish which in more recent years was divided among three other churches, S. Bartolomeo, S. Babila, and San Andrea. The Church of San Primo and the adjoining cloister stood hard by the Porta Orientale where was the Collegia Elvetico at the opening of the Strada Marina. The religious also served the church of S. Ambrogio della Vittoria, which was built (1348) at Parabiago[3] in thanksgiving for the famous battle won there by the Milanese in 1339.
- ↑ The Brothers of S. Barnabas, not to be confused with the Barnabites, Clerks Regular, “Clerici Regulares Sancti Pauli,” founded by S. Antonio Maria Zaccaria in 1530.
- ↑ Now served by the Irish Dominicans. S. Pancrazio fuori le Mura was seriously damaged in 1849, but has been restored.
- ↑ For an account of the connexion of the Ambrosini with this church and the jealousy of the civic authorities who wished to appoint their own chaplains, see the article “Ambrosiani” by Monsignor Giovanni Galbiati in the “Grande Enciclopedia Italiana.”
