Vir sane eruditissimus. Tommaso Verani, un agostiniano del Settecento

he paper intends to offer a biographical and intellectual profile of the Augustinian Tommaso Verani (Turin 1729-Chieri 1803). Leading exponent of the Observant Congregation of Lombardy, Verani rearranged and described important Augustinian archives and libraries in central and northern Italy; moreover, thanks to his historical-erudite and bibliographic studies, he was in contact with well-known intellectuals of the second half of the Eighteenth Century, including the Jesuit Girolamo Tiraboschi and the Dominican Giovanni Battista Audiffredi. The paper is followed by the complete transcription of Verani’s autobiography, preserved in the ms. Bosio 132 of the Central Civic Library of Turin. In fact, this text constitutes an important source not only for reconstructing the life and interests of Tommaso Verani, but also provides numerous information about the history of the Observant Congregation of Lombardy and the Italian socio-cultural panorama of the Eighteenth Century.