Girolamo Savonarola

I

Introduction

Girolamo Savonarola (1452-98), Italian preacher and reformer, whose zealous attempt to uproot corruption ended in martyrdom.

Savonarola was born on September 21, 1452, of a noble family in Ferrara. In 1474 he joined the Dominicans in Bologna. He made his first appearance as a preacher in 1482 in the priory of San Marco, the Dominican house in Florence. His preaching centered increasingly on the sinfulness of the time, and he openly attacked the corrupt and aristocratic adherents of the Medici family.

II

A Political Preacher

In 1493 his proposed reform of the Dominican order in Tuscany (Toscana) was approved by the pope, who named Savonarola its first vicar-general. His preaching was now political. In one of his discourses he pointed plainly to the coming ascendancy of the French led by King Charles VIII. When this prediction was fulfilled by the appearance of the French invasion forces in 1494, Savonarola helped to welcome Charles to the city. When the French left Florence, a republic was established from which the Medici were excluded, and Savonarola became, although without political functions, its guiding and animating spirit.

During his brief tenure of influence Savonarola displayed both his extraordinary genius and the extravagance of his ascetic theories. The republic of Florence was to be the model of a Christian commonwealth, and stringent enactments were made for the repression of vice.

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III

Growing Unpopularity

His denunciations did not spare even the pope, Alexander VI. Together with the attribution to Savonarola of a supernatural gift of prophecy and his extravagant interpretation of the Scriptures, these denunciations incurred the displeasure of Rome; in 1495 he was called to answer a charge of heresy. On his failure to appear in Rome, he was forbidden to preach, and the brief by which the Florentine branch of his order had been made independent was revoked. He indignantly refused the pope's attempts at conciliation and was again forbidden to preach, an order he disregarded.

Meanwhile, his difficulties at home began to deepen. The measures of the new republic proved impracticable. The party of the Medici, called Arrabbiati (Italian, “enraged”), began to recover ground, and a conspiracy was formed to support them. Five of the conspirators were executed, which only served to hasten the reaction against Savonarola. The execution of these conspirators was afterward charged to Savonarola.

At the critical point of the struggle, in 1497, came a sentence of excommunication from Rome. Savonarola openly declared the censure invalid and refused to hold himself bound by it. During an outbreak of the plague Savonarola, prevented by the excommunication from administering the sacred offices, devoted himself zealously to ministering to the sick monks.

In 1498 he was declared guilty of heresy and seditious teaching and sentenced to death. The trial record was sent to Rome, where the sentence was confirmed. Savonarola, with two members of his order, was given up to the secular power. On May 23, 1498, after he had administered the last communion to his two companions and himself, the three were hanged and their bodies burned.

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