Galileo’s daughter Livia took the convent name Sister Arcangela.
Livia Galilei was Galileo’s second daughter, born in 1601 to Galileo and Marina Gamba. Her older sister, Virginia, became Sister Maria Celeste, while Livia adopted the name Sister Arcangela. Both entered the convent of San Matteo in Arcetri, near Florence.
Galileo arranged for his daughters to enter religious life partly because, as children born outside marriage, they faced serious social and financial obstacles to making advantageous marriages. They entered the convent while young and later took their vows at about age sixteen. Livia became Sister Arcangela in 1617.
Virginia, or Sister Maria Celeste, is much more famous because of the surviving letters she sent to Galileo between 1623 and 1633. That prominence can cause a common mix-up: Maria Celeste was Virginia, not Livia. Livia’s convent name was Sister Arcangela, and historical accounts describe her as having struggled more with convent life than her sister.