Giuseppe Cottolengo

Italian priest (Bra, Cuneo, 1786 - Chieri 1842). Ordained a priest in 1811, he first carried out his ministry in Corneliano d'Alba; he then moved to Turin, where he resumed his studies and graduated in theology (1816), becoming canon of the church of Corpus Domini (1818).

Giuseppe Cottolengo, animated by a great spirit of charity towards his unhappy neighbor, in 1827 began his great mission of assistance to the derelict by opening a shelter to everyone: the house of the Red Vault in via Palazzo di Città in Turin. The "work", which soon became insufficient, was subsequently transferred to a farmhouse in the suburb of Valdocco.

Here Giuseppe Cottolengo founded, in 1832, the first real Little House of Divine Providence, under the protection of St. Vincent de 'Paoli, which also hosted those who, due to the particular gravity of physical deformations or their state mental, they found no refuge then elsewhere.

Parallel to and complementary to the Piccola Casa, with the collaboration of Marianna Nasi, the congregation of the Vincentian nuns (later known as the Cottolengo nuns) was born for the care of the sick. He also established the male communities of the brothers of San Vincenzo and the priests of the SS. Trinity and numerous other female communities.