biography
| name: |
Savonarola, Girolamo
|
pronunciation:
[savonarohla]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1452–98)
|
| biography:
| Religious and political reformer, born in Ferrara, NE Italy. He became a Dominican at Bologna in 1474, and after an initial failure, came to be recognized as an inspiring preacher. He was vicar-general of the Dominicans in Tuscany (1493), and his preaching began to point towards a political revolution as the means of restoring religion and morality. When a republic was established in Florence (1494), he was its guiding spirit, fostering a Christian commonwealth, with stringent laws governing the repression of vice and frivolity. His denunciations of the abuses of Church and government leaders made him many enemies, including Pope Alexander VI, who summoned him to Rome (1495) to answer a charge of heresy. He disregarded the order, was excommunicated in 1497, and burned in Florence. |
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