SOUTHWELL, NATHANAEL (BACON)

Jesuit bibliographer; b. Sculthorp, near Walsingham, Norfolk, England, 1598; d. at the Gesù, Rome, Dec. 2,1676. He studied the humanities at the College of English Jesuits, Saint–Omer, and entered the English College at Rome, October 1617, under the assumed name Southwell. He was ordained Dec. 21, 1622, and sent to England. Later he was recalled to Rome as minister and procurator of the college there. In 1637 he was appointed spiritual father and confessor of the college. Then he went to the Gesù where for more than 20 years he was secretary to five generals of his order: V. Caraffa (1646–49), F. Piccolomini (1649–51), A. Gottifredi (1652), G. Nickel (1652–64), and J. P. Oliva (1664–81). Even after his retirement in 1668 he remained admonitor to Oliva. He revised and continued the great work of Pedro de ribadeneyra, Bibliotheca Scriptorum Societatis Jesu (1676). He also compiled A Journal of Meditations for Every Day of the Year. Gathered out of Divers Authors, first published 1669, with a second edition, 1674, and a third edition, 1687. The work was translated from the original Latin by Edward Harvey, alias Mico, SJ, who died in prison in 1678.

Bibliography: t. cooper, The Dictionary of National Biography from the Earliest Times to 1900, 63 vol. (London 1885–1900) 18:700. j. gillow, A Literary and Biographical History or Bibliographical Dictionary of the English Catholics from 1534 to the Present Time, 5 vol. (London-New York 1885–1902) 1:95–96.

[h. s. reinmuth, jr.]