BARBAZIANO. — A Milanese monk of the time of St. Ambrose. He left the monastery founded by the Saint in Milan to take refuge in Vercelli, from where he spread the heterodox doctrines of Jovinian against virginity and fasting. St. Ambrose, rightly fearing that such propaganda might dissuade the Vercelli virgins from their vows and the ascetics from their penances, hastened to write to the faithful of that church a letter (LXIII, 20-21) in which he inveighs vehemently against B. He repeatedly calls him a disciple of Epicurus, the apologist of voluptuousness, whom philosophers have rightly expelled from their society. It is not known what became of him.
