Cardona, John Baptist

, bishop of Tortosa, in Catalonia, was a native of Valencia, in Spain, of which cathedral he was made a canon. He went to Rome, with great fame for learning, during the pontificate of Gregory XIII. and was promoted to the bishopric of Elne, a town of Roussillon, the seat of which see was afterwards removed to Perpignan. He was then translated to the bishopric of Vich; and lastly to that of Tortosa where he died, in 1590. In 1587 he published at Tarracona a quarto volume, containing, 1. “De regia Sancti Laurentii Bibliotheca.” 2. “De Bibliothecis (ex Fulvio Ursino) et De Bibliotheca Vaticana (ex Onuphrii Scedis.”) 3. “De expurgandis haereticorum propriis nominibus.” 4. “De Dyptichis.” Of these, the first, in which he treats of collecting all manner of useful books, and having able librarians, and in which he strongly exhorts Philip II. to put the Escurial library into good order, is of considerable value to bibliographers. His treatise “De Dyptichis,” those ancient public registers, is also very curious. Copies, if we may so speak, of these registers, are still -to be seen in France, at Sens, Dijon, and Besangon, the latter of which has been well described by M. Coste, the librarian of that city. ²

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