Peraga, Bonaventura De

Peraga, Bonaventura De an Italian cardinal, was born June 12, 1332, in Padua. He entered the Order of St. Augustine while very young, went to study in Paris, and there taught theology. He was a friend of Petrarch, and it was he who pronounced his funeral oration (1374). Three years later he was elected general of his order (1377), When schism entered the Church, Bonaventura declared himself for Urban VI, who rewarded him by giving him a cardinal's hat (1378). His zeal for the court of Rome proved fatal to him: he was killed while passing over the bridge St. Angelo to go to the Vatican, and Francois de Carrara, tyrant, of Padua, is suspected of ordering the deed. But no historian has yet given a proof of this crime, and we are ignorant of the precise date of the year in which it was committed, though it was supposed to be about 1390. The cardinal is none the less made a martyr to the faith, and the continuators of the Actes des Saints have admitted him into their vast collection (vol. 11, June 10). He had composed commentaries on the epistles of St. John and St. James, lives of saints, sermons, etc. See Petrarque, Rerum senilium, lib. xi, ep. 25; Scardeoni, Antiq. Patav. lib. ii; J. Pamphile, Bibl. Augustiniana; Tommasini, Fibl. Patavina, p. 75; Tiraboschi, Storiln della letter. Ital. v. 139-141.