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the name of two orders of nuns.
1. That founded at Bourges in 1500, by Jeanne, queen of France, after her divorce from Louis XII. These nuns also call themselves the nuns of the ten virtues, viz., the virtues exhibited, as they say, in the mysteries which the Roman Church commemorates in the ten festivals of the Virgin Mary. Their rule is formed upon the idea of an initiation of these virtues. They wear a gray habit, a red scapulary, a cross of gold or silver, suspended from the neck, and a ring of one of those metals on the finger. At the Revolution they had 45 nunneries in France and Holland, all of which were suppressed. — Helyot, Ordres Relig. 1, 227.
2. Another order of nuns, otherwise called CELESTINES SEE CELESTINES (Colestes or Colestinoe), from the girdle and mantle of sky- blue which they wear over their white habit. A Genoese widow, named Maria Victoria Fornari, instituted this order in 1602 or 1604. The constitution of the order, approved by Clement VII, enjoins poverty and separation from the world. They are allowed to speak to persons out of their house only six times a year, and then only to their nearest relatives. In 1860 they had three nunneries in Italy, six in Belgium, and five in France. In Rome they are called Turchine (i.e. the “violet-blue” ones). — Helyot, Ordres Religieux, 1, 236; P. Carl vom heil. Aloys, Statistisches Jahrbuch der Kirche (Regensbg. 1860).