[BELLARMINE, Robert.]

Extremely rare edition in parallel Italian and Armenian translation of Robert Bellarmine's (1542-1621) influential catechism of Counter-Reformation theology, first published 1598 and translated into over fifty language, by an Armenian priest called Pietro Paolo. It was preceded by a Roman edition of 1623. This is the first work to be printed in Armenian by the press of the Sacra Congregation de Propaganda Fide, rather than just under their auspices. 

Cardinal Bellarmine was the most influential theologian of the Counter-Reformation. His Dichiarazione più copiosa is in the form of a dialogue in which a novice poses 273 questions about Catholic doctrine, which are answered by an instructor. It covers the Sign of the Cross, Creed, Lord's Prayer and Hail Mary, Ten Commandments, Sacraments, Beatitudes, Seven Deadly Sins, Four Last Things, etc. It was far more detailed than Bellarmine's earlier catechism of 1597, also sponsored by Pope Clement VIII and published in 1597, in which the teacher provided much briefer answers.

'The Roman Church ... saw the Eastern Christians as a fruitful field for proselytism ... In the C17th the Sacra Congregatio de Propaganda Fide, established ... in 1622 as part of the Counter-Reformation, undertook a printing programme in Armenian and other languages designed to provide missionaries and new converts alike with texts to support evangelisation and Catholic devotion' (Vrej Nerses Nersessian, The Parikian collection of Early Armenian Printing at Eton College Library (Eton: 2016), p. 7). Bellarmine's Dichiarazione had been translated into Arabic for the Sacra Congregatio in 1627. 

The operation of the Sacra Congregatio's press was slow: their next production in Armenian was the Missal of 1642; an Armenian alphabet was also issued in the 1630s under their auspices, but not from their press. Around 1623 a new phase began in the relations between the Armenian Church and the Roman Church, followed by a new expansion of Catholic publishing, due notably to the founding of the Sacra Congregatio de Propaganda Fide and its printing house. Also at this time, the Armenian religious authorities appealed to Rome for the creation of a printing house and school for the use of Armenians ... The work of the commission set up ... and charged with correcting the Armenian version was not crowned with success. It was necessary to wait until 1642 for a new ... Ordo divinae missae Armenorum to be printed' (Kévorkian, Catalogue des 'Incunables' Arméniens (Genève: 1986), p. 154). All the Armenian types used by the Sacra Congregatio were those cut by Robert Granjon in 1579 (ibid., p. 153).