Daniele Farlati

Who was Daniele Farlati?

Daniele Farlati was an ecclesiastical historian.

Farlati was born in San Daniele del Friuli in the present Italian province of Udine. After having studied in Gorizia he entered, in 1707, the Society of Jesus in Bologna. He was for five years teacher of classics at the Jesuit college in Padua, and then went to Rome, where he completed his theological studies, was ordained priest, in 1722, and was again sent to Padua, to assist Father Filippo Riceputi in his historical labours.

Riceputi intended to write the ecclesiastical history of Illyricum, and in 1720 had issued, at Padua, a prospectus of this enterprise. For twenty years they both searched in all the libraries and archives of ancient Illyria for the material for their work; the matter they collected filled three hundred manuscript volumes. In 1712, just as two of the larger divisions, the martyrology of Illyria and the life of San Pietro Orseolo, were about completed, Riceputi died. Thus Farlati was left alone to work into presentable shape the prodigious amount of material collected. As co-labourer he chose Father Jacopo Coleti.