Between 1937 and 1955, Melchiorre da Pobladura (1904-1983) published for the first time, in the Monumenta Historica Ordinis Minorum Capuccinorum (MHOMC), the main sixteenth century Capuchin manuscript accounts of their Reform:
Mario da Mercato Saraceno (MHOMC I: Relationes de origine ordinis minorum capuccinorum, 1937; Bernardino da Colpetrazzo MHOMC II-IV Praecipui nascentis ordinis eventus (1939); Biographae selectae (1940); Ratio vivendi fratrum (1941); Mattia da Salò MHOMC V-VI Historia capuccina, 1946 and 1950; Paolo da Foligno MHOMC VII Origo et progressus ordinis fratrum minorum capuccinorum 1955. Although the above volume titles, introductions and notes are in Latin, the texts are in Italian from that time.
In 1943 he produced the first edition of La bella e santa riforma dei frati Cappuccini. In this xvii+319 pages, he presented texts taken from these documents and from the Capuchin Constitutions of 1536. The chapters in the book represent aspects of Capuchin life, and Melchiorre includes the texts that he deems representative of that life.
After he published MHOMC V-VII, he revised the book in a more ample, second edition of 1963 (xxiv+443 pages). "The Capuchin Reform-A Franciscan Renaissance" is an English translation of the second edition.
The MHOMC, as well as La bella e santa riforma, are available from
