HolyPersons andHolyPlaces 201
pray for cures. The disgusted friars kicked the offerings over and threw the
devotees out, but the laity kept coming. Finally, in 1233 , Pope Gregory IX
himself ordered the friars to erect a suitable shrine for Dominic’s relics.^135
The commune of Gubbio constructed a worthy shrine for bishop Ubaldo
just in time for his funeral and appointed a notary to record the expected
miracles. At the bishop’s funeral, people from the countryside insisted on
singing Alleluias instead of the usual somber chants of the Requiem.^136 The
Dominicans of Siena did manage to chant a Requiem for Ambrogio
Sansedoni (d. 1286 ) inside their church, but his body had to lie in state
outside because of the crowds of people who already considered him an
intercessor in heaven. Donna Ghiluccia, wife of Masso of San Cristoforo,
was trampled while trying to kiss the dead friar’s hand. She lay on the pave-
ment spitting up blood. She was healed by invoking the holy Dominican,
after futile petitions to several other saints. God had directly validated Am-
brogio’s cult.^137 People said that when Alberto of Villa d’Ogna, known as
the Brentatore (‘‘wine porter’’), died at Cremona on 6 May 1279 , the ground
itself refused to receive his body; so dense were the roots and rocks that the
funeral party had to bury him in the choir of the church, where he was
accustomed to pray. It was a fine spot for a shrine. This was only the first of
the miracles that proved his holiness.^138
When the canonist pope Gregory IX opened an inquest for the canoniza-
tion of Ambrogio of Massa ( 1225 – 40 ), he recognized that the locals were
often the best judges of holiness. He began his investigation in the very year
of the holy man’s death, responding to the pleas of the ‘‘people and council’’
of Orvieto.^139 In the people’s mind, miracles, not papal commissions, made
saints. Miracles attracted the devotees.^140 Saint Omobono of Cremona’s bi-
ographer observed that miracles not only confirmed faith in God, they
proved the holiness of his servants, ‘‘for a good tree cannot bring forth bad
fruit.’’^141 The ‘‘fruit’’ did not need to be of cosmic dimensions. The miracle
that initiated the cult of Oringa Cristiana occurred a couple of days after her
death. A cleric named Don Tommaso was suffering from a bad headache
and offered a candle at her new tomb. The headache suddenly left him—and
135 .Processus Canonizationis S. Dominici,ed. M.-H. Laurent, Bologna Process 9 , MOPH 16 (Rome:
Institutum Historicum Fratrum Praedicatorum, 1935 ), 130 – 31.
136. Giordano of Citta`di Castello,Vita Beati Ubaldi Eugubini Episcopi, 21 – 29 , pp. 106 – 12 ; see esp.
23. 12 – 15 ,p. 108.
137. For her deposition notarized by Giacomo di fu Rustico, seeMiracula [B. Ambrosii Senensis],doc. 2
( 12 March 1287 ),AS 9 (Mar.iii), 201 ; recorded a second time ( 6 April 1287 ), in Recupero of Arezzo,
Summarium Virtutum et Miracula [B. Ambrosii Senensis], 10. 111 ,AS 9 (Mar.iii), 224.
138. Muzio of Modena,Annales( 1279 ), 571 – 72.
139 .Processus Canonizationis B. Ambrosii Massani, 2 ,p. 572 (letter of Gregory IX); note also the city
involvement in the ‘‘canonization’’ of Raimondo Palmerio: Canetti,Gloriosa, 215 – 16.
140. As noted inInquisitio de vita Joannis Cazefronte(shrine section), 254 – 55.
141 .Vita di s. Omobono, 166 : on saints miracles: ‘‘miraculi fortificha noy nella fede del nostro signiore.
... Non potest arbor bona fructus malos facere.’’