POSSEVINO, ANTONIO. - Jesuit, diplomat, b. at Mantua on 10 July 1533, d. at Ferrara on 26 Feb. 1611.
Having gone to Rome in 1550, he was chosen as tutor to the nephews of Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga and in 1559 received from this a commendam of the military Order of St. Anthony at Fossano (Cuneo). In the same year he entered, in Rome, the Society of Jesus; but already the following year, 1560, he was sent to Piedmont to Duke Emmanuel Philibert to check the Waldensianheresy in the Valleys and to promote the founding of colleges for the young. Ordained priest in 1561, he continued his apostolate in the valleys of Luserna and Angrogna, then at Chambéry and at Lyon. Rector of Avignon (1565-1570) and of Lyon (1571-73), from 1573 he was on his first diplomatic mission, as secretary of the superior generalEverard Mercurian.
In 1577 Gregory XIII sent him as his legate to Sweden, where he succeeded in converting King John III, but not in reuniting Sweden with Rome. In 1581 he went as legate to Russia and Poland, to make peace between Stephen Báthory, king of Poland and voivode of Transylvania, and Ivan IV the Terrible, tsar of Russia, and at the same time to promote the union of the Russian Church with that of Rome. But he obtained only the conclusion of the peace of Jam Zapolski (1582); as for the union with Rome, he gained only certain favors for Catholics. More fortunate was his work directed toward the union of the Ruthenians, urging the propagation of Catholic writings, the founding of a Russo-Ruthenian Seminary and freedom of schooling for the Catholic Ruthenians. Deprived of the office of legate because of jurisdictional questions with the nuncio of Poland, A. Bolognetti, the Father devoted himself to missionary activity throughout Poland, Bohemia and Upper Hungary, founding papal seminaries at Erlam, Mähren and Siebenburg. A further mission to King Báthory, entrusted to him by Sixtus V, failed because of the King's death. The Father then turned to teaching theology at Padua (1587-91), where he had as a pupil St. Francis de Sales. He also concerned himself with the reconciliation of Henry IV of France with the Church.
Also worthy of note is his editorial activity: Trattato del sacrificio dell'altore (Lyon 1563); Il soldato cristiano (Rome 1569), written by order of Pius V for the troops sent to France and for the fleet dispatched to Lepanto; Transsilvania (Vilnius 1584; republished by J. Veresz in Pontes rerum Transsilvanicarum, III. Budapest 1913); Moscovia (ibid. 1586), which earned him the title of "discoverer of Russia"; Bibliotheca selecta, qua agitur de ratione studiorum (Rome 1593; ed. in Biblioth. der Kathol. Pädagogie, XI, Freiburg im Br. 1901); Apparatus ad omnium gentium historiam (Venice 1602) and the more renowned: Apparatus sacer ad scriptores V. ac N. Testamenti (3 vols., Venice 1603-1606).
Bibliography17 worksthe principal source for his life is the unpublished autobiography, written by the Father when already old, in the third person, at the requ
BIBL.: the principal source for his life is the unpublished autobiography, written by the Father when already old, in the third person, at the request of Cardinal C. Baronio and on the commission of Paul V: Annalium quinquaginta annorum (3 vols., Arch. rom. S. J., Opp. NN., 336). Biographies: J. Dorigny, La vie du p. A. P., Paris 1712; N. Chezzi, Vita del p. A. P., translation of Dorigny's work with notes, many unpublished letters and several additions at the end, Venice 1759; L. Karttunen, A. P., un diplomate pontifical au XVIe siècle, Lausanne 1908. - Studies: P. Pierling, Possevini missio moscovitica, Paris 1882; id., Un nonce du Pape en Moscovie, ibid. 1884; id., Bathory et P., ibid. 1887; id., La Russie et le St Siège, II, ibid. 1897; H. Biaudet, Le St Siège et la Suède durant la seconde moitié du XVIe siècle, 2 vols., Paris-Geneva 1907-13; Monumenta Poloniae Vaticana, V. Alberti Bolognetti nuntii apost. in Polonia Epist. et acta, 1581-82, part 1, Kraków 1933 (with more than 70 letters and memorials of P.), see index; I. Poplatek, Geneza Seminarium papieskiego w Wilnie, in Ateneum Wileńskie, 1 (1933), pp. 47-50; K. Derks, P. A. P., I. De contra-reformist, II. In Zweden, III. De vredesbemiddelaar, in Studien, 119 (1933), pp. 314-32, 405-31, 419-27; G. Soranzo, Il p. A. P. e l'ambasciatore inglese a Venezia (1604-1605), in Aevum, 7 (1933), pp. 385-422; C. Crivelli, La disputa di A. P. con i Valdesi (16 luglio 1566), in Arch. Hist. S. J., 7 (1938), pp. 79-91; G. Castellani, La creazione della C. d. G. del p. A. P. da una relaz. ined. del medesimo, ibid., 14 (1945), pp. 102-24; H. Fouqueray, Hist. de la Comp. de J. en France, I, Paris 1910, pp. 335-41, 441-51, 542-50; II, ibid. 1913, pp. 251-55; Sommervogel, VI, 1061-93; IX, 781; Pastor, IX-XII, see index.
Testore, Celestino. “Possevino, antonio.” In Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. IX, coll. 1836–1837. Città del Vaticano: Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1952. https://azioneromana.com/article/possevino-antonio.
MLA
Testore, Celestino. “Possevino, antonio.” Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. IX, Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1952, coll. 1836–1837. Azione Romana, https://azioneromana.com/article/possevino-antonio.
BibTeX
@incollection{ec9_possevino_antonio,
author = {Testore, Celestino},
title = {Possevino, antonio},
booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica},
volume = {IX},
pages = {1836--1837},
note = {Cited by column},
publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico},
address = {Città del Vaticano},
year = {1952},
url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/possevino-antonio}
}
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