Il culto di San Napoleone. Ricerche erudite nella Milano napoleonica

The introduction of Saint Napoleon’s cult, saint unknown to martyrologies, for the first time certified in the Almanach National of the XIth year (1802-1803) and to which, under the Empire, was associated with the national feast of the 15th of August, maybe testifies to the most audacious of Bonaparte’s attempt to feed his self-worship appealing to the forms of catholic liturgical tradition. Question up to now not much investigated of Napoleonic religious politics, but fundamental to comprehend the dynamics finalized to sacralise the monarch’s power, the new cult became under the Empire the object of many erudite studies, aimed at find references about Saint Napoleon in martyrologies and hagiographical sources. This article intends to present, describing the different phases and showing the dissimilar finalities, three researches managed in Napoleonic Regno d’Italia on the saint patron of the Empire, in which was involved the Collegio dei Dottori of Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana. The study wants to illustrate the role played by the scholars of the Federician institution - in particular from the Custode del Catalogo Pietro Mazzucchelli - in the process from which would have been originated the subsequent elaboration of the hagiographical leganda of Saint Napoleon. Besides this, the work aims also to underline the contribution given by the Ambrosiana’s Doctors to some researches concerning Bonaparte’s patron, led by the famous intellectual and erudite from Cremona Isidoro Bianchi and from the parish priest of Milan Alessandro Astesani.