VERMIGLI, PIETRO MARTINE. — Canon regular, apostate. Born in Florence on 8 September 1500, died in Zurich on 12 November 1562.
He entered the congregation of the Canons Regular at Fiesole at the age of sixteen; at nineteen he was studying at Padua, and at twenty-six he was a preacher and teacher. For three years he was abbot at Spoleto, and in 1528 prior at S. Pietro ad Aram (Naples). There he came into contact with the circle that gathered around Juan Valdes and became acquainted with Fra Bernardino Ochino. Visitor of the Order in 1541, in June he was prior at S. Frediano in Lucca, where he proposed creating a centre of studies in harmony with the new doctrines that were by then spreading; he therefore invited Celso Martinengo da Brescia, Paolo Lazise da Verona, and Emanuele Tremello to teach Hebrew, as well as Celio Secondo Curione, who was already there, taking advantage of the compliance of the civic authorities, and he also published an anonymous pamphlet expressing heretical views. Summoned to Genoa by his superiors, he met Ochino in Florence and then went to Strasbourg, where he was welcomed by Butzer; he taught Hebrew and married (1546). Summoned to Oxford by Cranmer the following year, he collaborated in the reform of the English Church and ecclesiastical law. Forced to leave England upon the accession of Queen Mary, he resumed teaching at Strasbourg and then at Zurich, and took part in the Colloquy of Poissy (1561). “He was the most systematic and consistent theorist of Zwinglian-Calvinist doctrines,” which he pushed to their extreme, especially with regard to the Eucharist and predestination. He left biblical commentaries and other theological works, and was among the most resolute opponents of the Italian anti-Trinitarians who were attempting to win favour in Reformed circles.