PANEBIANCO, ANTONIO MARIA (in the world NICCOLÒ), cardinal. - B. at Terranova di Sicilia on 23 Aug. 1808, d. at Rome on 21 Nov. 1885.
Having entered the Order of Conventuals at barely fifteen years of age, he was professor of theology at the college of the Order and at the Seminary of Catania; in 1853, provincial of Sicily. Pius IX, having summoned him to Rome, sent him to Transylvania, together with the nuncio in Vienna, Mons. De Luca, to settle certain questions that had arisen with the Austrian government concerning mixed marriages in that remote province of the Habsburg Empire; P. brought the difficult mission to completion, to the full satisfaction of both parties.
Created cardinal priest of S. Girolamo degli Schiavoni on 27 Sept. 1861 (from which title he shortly thereafter passed to that of SS. XII Apostoli, a church served by the Fathers of his Order), he refused appointment as camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church, as he later refused to opt for a suburbicarian diocese: the Pontiff had to employ all his authority to induce him to accept the prefecture of the Congregation of Indulgences and Relics and, in 1876, the office of major penitentiary. He enthusiastically agreed, however, to be included in the commission entrusted with preparing the work of the Vatican Council, and in this field he carried out an action of truly great value.