The Transmission of Birgittine and Catherinian Works within the Mystical Tradition: Exchanges, Cross-Readings, Connections

This chapter aims to trace the role of Catherine of Siena and Birgitta of Sweden within the Observant reform. After having described the particular modes of the transmission of their mystical works, i.e. respectively the Dialogo and the Revelations, the author focuses on some significant manuscripts from the Italian peninsula and on a few key-figures, both men and women—Alfonso Pecha of Jaén, Cristoforo di Gano Guidini, Tommaso da Siena, Chiara Gambacorta, the Birgittine nuns of Paradiso in Florence and Syon in England and others— in order to demonstrate that there were a fluid context of exchanges between Birgittine and Catherinian circles.