Acta Sanctorum

The monumental collection of biographies and legends of the saints, organized according to the ecclesiastical calendar of saints' days, published by the Bollandists,* a group of Belgian Jesuit scholars named for John Bolland, under whom the first volume appeared in 1643. Work continued until interrupted in 1773 by the dissolution of the Society of Jesus and halted in 1796 by the French Revolution, not to be renewed until 1837. The critical attitudes of the Bollandists brought them under the censures of the Spanish Inquisition* in 1695 and caused some of their publications to be placed on the Index. The project is now complete through 10 November. Earlier sections have been supplemented in Analecta Bollandiana, a review devoted to hagiography published since 1882.