The Ursulines, also known as the Order of Saint Ursula (post-nominals: OSU), is an enclosed religious order of women that branched off from the Angelines, also known as the Company of Saint Ursula, in 1572. The Ursulines trace their origins to the Angeline foundress Angela Merici and likewise place themselves under the patronage of Saint Ursula. While the Ursulines took up a monastic way of life under the Rule of Saint Augustine, the Angelines operate as a secular institute. The largest group within the Ursulines is the Ursulines of the Roman Union. History In 1572 in Milan, under Charles Borromeo, the Archbishop of Milan, members of the Company of Saint Ursula chose to become an enclosed religious order. Pope Gregory XIII placed them under the Rule of Saint Augustine. Especially in France, groups of the company began to re-shape themselves as cloistered nuns, under solemn vows, and dedicated to the education of girls within the walls of their monasteries. In the following century, the Ursuline nuns were strongly encouraged and supported by Francis de Sales. They were called the "Ursuline nuns" as distinct from the "federated Ursulines" of the company, who preferred to follow the original way of life. Both forms of life continued to spread throughout Europe and beyond. At the beginning of the 18th century, the period of its greatest growth, the order was represented by 20 congregations, 350 convents and from 15,000 to 20,000 nuns. Ursulines in North America Canada The Ursuline sisters were not the first Catholic nuns to land in the new world. They were preceded by the Hieronymites in 1585 in Mexico City, who established the convent of San Jerónimo y Santa Paula. In 1639, Mother Marie of the Incarnation, two other Ursuline nuns, three Augustinian sisters and a Jesuit priest left France for a mission in New France in what is now the Province of Quebec, Canada. When they arrived in the summer of 1639, they studied the languages of the native peoples and then began to educate the native children. They taught reading and writing as well as needlework, embroidery, drawing, and other domestic arts. The Ursuline convent in Quebec City is the oldest educational institution for women in North America. Their work helped to preserve a religious spirit among the French population and to evangelize native peoples of New France. United States The first Ursulines arrived at Mobile, Alabama, in 1719