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ST. AGNES
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Amata, niece of Clara, Christina (10), Frances (3), Benvenuta, and Agnes Bernardi. In 1221 St. Francis appointed Agnes superior of the new community of Monticelli, at Florence. She returned to Assisi, was present at the death of St Clara in 1253, and died the same year at the ago of 55. Mrs. Oliphant, Francis of Assisi. Helyot, Ordres Monastiques, vii. 25. Cron. Serafica, ii, A.B.M. Mart, Seraph. Ord. and Ord. Capuccinorum. Her life will be given by the Bollandists when their calendar comes down to Nov. 16.

B. Agnes (18) Peranda, Sept. 17, Feb. 28. † 1281. Abbess of Barcelona. O.S.F. Niece of St. Clara, sent by her to establish a Franciscan convent at Barcelona. Agues was accompanied by her niece, B. Clara, who is commemorated with her. The convent was first inhabited about 1233; and Agnes presided over it for 48 years. Clara did not long survive her, and their bodies were solemnly translated by the bishop and six Benedictine abbots, Feb. 28. Monstier, Gynecæum, does not say how long after their deaths this ceremony took place, but mentions that Alfonso Colona was the name of the bishop. Her life is in the Cronica Seraphica, vol. ii. Boll., AA.SS. Præter., Sept. 17, Feb. 28.

B. Agnes (19) Beraardi, March 3. Daughter of Opportulus I^mardi. A nun who spent her life in the convent at Assisi, being placed there in her childhood, under St. Clara (2). Gynecæum.

B. Agnes (20) of Bohemia, June 7. Aunt of the more famous sainted princess of the same name. Daughter of Wenzel or Wladislaus II., duke of Bohemia. Sister of Premysl Ottokar I., first king of Bohemia (1198-1230). Sister of St. Angela. Abbess of St. George's at Pragne, which she restored. Procured from the king, her brother, some privileges for her monastery. Buried near B. Mlada, in the chapel of St. Anna, in the monastery of St George. She was a professed sister of the Premonstratensian Order, and is worshipped as a saint at Prague, but not throughout the Chnrch. Bucelinus, Epitome rerum Bohemicarum. Chanowski, Bohemia pia. Palacky, Geschicht von Bŏhmen. AA.SS. Boll. Præter, June 7. Wadding, in his Annales.

There seems to be an Agnes in every generation of the royal and ducal house of Bohemia. Many of them were holy nuns, and some are occasionally con- founded with the two above named, to the multiplication of saints and of miracles.

St. Agnes (21) of Bohemia, March 6. 1205-1282. Patron of Bohemia. Princess. Franciscan nun. Sometimes represented with a basket of bread beside her; sometimes with the Saviour taking a crown from her head and replacing it with a better one. Daughter of Premysl Ottokar I., first king of Bohemia (1198-1230), by his second wife Constance, sister of King Andrew of Hungary. Agnes was sister of B. Anna, duchess of Breslau and half-sister of St. Abdela. First cousin of St. Elizabeth of Hungary. Niece of the other holy Princess Agnes of Bohemia. She was born Jan. 20, 1205, in the Bysehrad or Wishegrad, at Prague. Before her birth her mother saw in a dream a coarse, ragged, grey gown under her gold-embroidered robes of state, and thought her dream meant that her child should one day wear such a garment. At three years old Agnes was betrothed to Henry Boleslaus, eldest son of the Duke of Silesia and the holy duchess St. Hedwig; she was sent to his country to be brought up in its language and manners. At the death of her fiancé, when she was only six, she was taken back to her parents, who entrusted her education to the nuns of the Premonstratensian cloister of Doxan. After the lapse of a few years she was betrothed to Henry, son of the Emperor Frederick II.; but, by some strange fatality, the name of the bride was omitted from the contract of betrothal, which seemed to some persons unlucky, to others a sign that a still higher alliance was the destiny of the young princess. She was now sent to Vienna to learn German and finish her education at the court of her future husband. Here she spent more time in works of piety and charity than in the pomps and gaieties of the court, fasting strictly on