Introduction

Biography

One of se­ven child­ren, Sa­von­a­ro­la showed pi­ety at a young age. Trou­bled by the sin and in­jus­tice he saw around him, he oft­en spent long hours in pray­er and con­tem­pl­ation.

After re­ceiv­ing a vi­sion of Hea­ven and the fu­ture ca­la­mi­ties of the church, he be­gan to preach re­pent­ance to the mul­ti­tudes. He con­tin­ued to a fer­vent pray­er life; his bi­o­gra­phies re­port that on Christ­mas Eve, 1486, he was in a trance­like state in the pul­pit for al­most five hours.

His de­nun­ci­a­tion of wide­spread cor­rupt­ion ev­ent­ual­ly drew the ire of the Church, and Pope Al­ex­an­der VI or­dered Sa­von­a­ro­la hanged and burned in the pub­lic square in Flor­ence, with two of his fel­low monks, Do­me­ni­co da Pes­cia and Si­lves­tro Ma­ruf­fi.