BARBARIGO, Gregorio, Blessed. - Born in Venice to Gian Francesco and Lucrezia Leoni on Sept. 16, 1625, died in Padua on June 18, 1697. Having completed his studies in Padua, he accompanied the Venetian ambassador Alvise Contarini to Münster on the occasion of the celebrated negotiations for the peace of Germany. Returned to Venice, he was elected Savio agli Ordini, but Fabio Chigi, who had come to know him at Münster, urged him to enter the clergy; in Dec. 1655 he was ordained a priest in Venice. Chigi, having become Alexander VII, wanted him near himself in Rome in 1656 and created him his domestic prelate, entrusting him with important assignments. Appointed bishop of Bergamo on July 10, 1657, and created cardinal on Apr. 5, 1660, he was recalled to Rome in 1663 and then, in Apr. 1664, transferred to the diocese of Padua. The pastoral activity begun at Bergamo found scope to unfold with great fruit at Padua through enlightened beneficence, through the pastoral visits. He took particular care for the reorganization of the Tridentine seminaries, which were then passing through a period of decline. He began with that of Bergamo, but at Padua he gave ample manifestation of his ingenious activity, spurred on by his many-sided culture and by the decline into which ecclesiastical studies had fallen in the University of Padua itself. Having transferred the seminary to the suppressed monastery of the Vanzo and reduced it to better form, he set about promoting the study of Latin and Greek, for which that seminary preserved an excellent reputation throughout the whole 18th century, and reorganizing ecclesiastical studies according to the new needs, proposing new Regulae studiorum dictated by himself (cf. S. Serena, L'Opera del card. b. G. B. nel Seminario di Padova, Padua 1938, p. 33 ff.). In 1684 he founded next to the seminary a new, very well equipped printing press for the printing of school texts, of the classics, of the Fathers; and he wanted it furnished not only with Greek type, but also with Arabic, Syriac, Armenian and Persian type, because the B. also kept his eyes open on the East, in the hope of contributing to the religious rapprochement of those peoples (cf. S. Serena, Il card. G.B. e l'Oriente, Rome 1938). In this the B. served as a model to other prelates for the development of their seminaries. The B. took part in the Conclaves of 1667 and 1669, from which Clement IX and Clement X emerged. In that of July 1676 some cardinals proposed his candidacy, but he caused the votes to converge on the one who became Innocent XI. In the Conclave of 1689, when his election seemed well under way, he promoted the election of Alexander VIII. After the latter's death, in the new Conclave (1691) he gathered as many as 35 votes; but this candidacy too failed, because the B.'s uprightness was too much feared (cf. S. Serena, Il card. G.B. ed il Conclave del 1691, Padua 1933).
He was beatified by Clement XIII on Sept. 20, 1761. WORKS: Scritti inediti del b. G. B., published by P. A. Uccelli, Parma 1877; G. B., Lettere pastorali, editti e decreti, pubblicati in diversi tempi, Padua 1920; Quarantadue lettere del b. G. B. a Gio. Pastrizio, with preface and notes by S. Serena, Padua 1938; Clarorum Venetorum ad Antonium Magliabechium epistolae, II, Florence 1746, p. 28 ff.; Lettere del b. G. B. a M. A. Ferrazzi, Padua 1934.
Bibliography2 works
1761: J. Stievano, Sulla vita del b. G. card. B. vescovo di Padova. Padua 1897 (cf. Anal. Bolland, 18 [1899], pp. 303-304); G. Alessi, Vita del b. G. B., Padua 1897 (cf. review in Anal. Bolland, 17 [1898], p. 264); id., Il seminario di Padova, Padua 1911, pp. 49-180; G. Bellini, La tipografia del seminario di Padova, ibid. 1927.
Pio Paschini