HICKEY, ANTONY

Irish Franciscan theologian and historian; b. County Clare, 1586; d. St. Isidore's College, Rome, June 26, 1641. Hickey received his early education in his native place. On Nov. 1, 1607, he entered the Franciscans at St. Anthony's College, Louvain, and studied there under Hugh ward and Hugh MacCaghwell. After ordination he was a professor of theology at Louvain and at St. Francis, Cologne. In 1619 he was called to Rome to collaborate with the historian Luke wadding. He resided at the Spanish friary of S. Pietro in Montorio on the Janiculum, but on the founding of St. Isidore's College he moved there on June 22, 1625, and became the college's first lector of theology. He was active on many Roman Congregations and on commissions set up for the revision of the Roman Breviary and of the Greek and Armenian liturgies. A stanch Scotist, he defended the Immaculate Conception with ardor. Wadding's edition of the works of Scotus includes three volumes of commentaries by Hickey on bk. 4 of the Sentences. In 1639 he was chosen definitor general of the Franciscan Order, and for a time he was titular provincial of Scotland. His Nitela Franciscanae Religionis (Lyons 1627) deals with aspects of the early history of the order.

Bibliography: g. cleary, Father Luke Wadding and St. Isidore's College, Rome (Rome 1925) 73–78. b. jennings, ed., Wadding Papers, 1614–1638 (Dublin 1953) 168, 219, 240–241, 269, 557, 558, 573, 606, 610, 614, 622. É. d'alenÇon, Dictionnaire de théologie catholique, ed. a. vacant et al. (Paris 1903—50) 6.2: 2358–59.

[c. giblin]