Blessed Vivaldo Stricchi

Blessed Vivaldo Stricchi (c. 1260–1320) was a Franciscan tertiary and hermit whose twenty years of solitary prayer in a hollow chestnut tree made him one of Tuscany's most remarkable ascetics. His death site in the forests of Montaione became the Sacro Monte di San Vivaldo, known as the "Jerusalem of Tuscany." ## Life Vivaldo was born around 1260 in San Gimignano, the famous Tuscan hill town of towers. He became a Franciscan tertiary—a layperson living according to a simplified form of the Franciscan Rule—and devoted himself to caring for the sick. For twenty years, Vivaldo served as companion and caregiver to Blessed Bartolo da San Gimignano, a priest afflicted with leprosy who had founded a hospital outside the town walls. Vivaldo nursed Bartolo through the long deterioration of his disease, washing his wounds and attending to his needs until Bartolo's death in 1300. ## Hermit Years After Bartolo died, Vivaldo withdrew into the dense forests between Montaione and Castelfiorentino, seeking complete solitude with God. In the woods called Boscotondo, he found a massive hollow chestnut tree—barely large enough for a man to kneel—and made it his hermitage. For the next twenty years, Vivaldo lived in this tree trunk, practicing extreme austerity. The local peasants occasionally glimpsed him at prayer or brought him scraps of food, but he remained largely hidden from the world. ## Death and Discovery On May 1, 1320, a hunter pursuing game through the forest noticed his hounds circling a great chestnut tree and refusing to move on. Approaching, he found Vivaldo kneeling inside the hollow trunk, his hands joined in prayer, his eyes fixed upward—dead, yet still in the posture of contemplation. The hunter raised the alarm. Villagers from Montaione came to carry Vivaldo's body to the parish church, where he was buried beneath the high altar. Miracles soon occurred at his tomb, and devotion spread throughout the region. ## Veneration In 1325, a chapel was built at the site of the chestnut tree. The following decades saw construction of a church, and in 1500, Franciscan friars began transforming the forest around Vivaldo's hermitage into a remarkable complex of chapels reproducing the holy sites of Jerusalem—the Sacro Monte di San Vivaldo. In 1516, Pope Leo X granted plenary indulgences to pilgrims visiting the San Vivaldo chapels, giving them the same spiritual benefits as pilgrims to the Holy Land itself. Vivaldo's cult was officially confirmed by Pope Pius X in 1908. His feast is celebrated on May 1, the anniversary of his death. **Feast Day:** May 1 **Patronage:** Montaione; hermits