BLANDRATA, or BIANDRATA, GIORGIO (c. 1515-1588)

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BLANDRATA, or BIANDRATA, GIORGIO (c. 1515-1588) , Italian physician and polemic, who came of the De Blandrate family, powerful from the early part of the 13th century, was born at Saluzzo, the youngest son of Bernardino

Blandrata

BLANDRATA, or BIANDRATA, GIORGIO (c. 1515-1588)

. He graduated in arts and

medicine

MEDICINE

at Montpellier in 1533, and specialized in the functional and nervous disorders of women. In 1544 he made his first acquaintance with Transylvania; in 1553 he was with Alciati in the Grisons; in 1557 he spent a year at Geneva, in constant intercourse with Calvin, who distrusted him. He attended the English wife (Jane Stafford) of Count Celso Massimiliano Martinengo, preacher of the Italian church at Geneva, and fostered

anti

ANTI, or CAMPA

-trinitarian opinions in that church. In 1558 he found it expedient to remove to Poland, where he became a leader of the heretical party at the synods of Pinczow (1558) and Ksionzh (156o and 1562). His point was the suppression of extremes of

opinion

OPINION (Lat. opinio, from opinari, to think)

, on the basis of a

confession

CONFESSION (Lat. confessio, from confiteor, acknowledge, confess)

literally

drawn

DRAWN

from Scripture. He obtained the position of court physician to the queen dowager, the Milanese Bona Sforza. She had been instrumental in the burning (1539) of Catharine Weygel, at the age of eighty, for

anti

ANTI, or CAMPA

-trinitarian opinions; but the writings of Ochino had altered her views, which were now anti-Catholic. In 1563

Blandrata

BLANDRATA, or BIANDRATA, GIORGIO (c. 1515-1588)

transferred his services to the Transylvanian court, where the daughters of his patroness were married to ruling princes. He revisited Poland (1576) in the

train

TRAIN (M. Eng. trayn or trayne, derived through Fr. from Late Lat. trahinare, to drag, draw, Lat. trahere, cf. trail, trace, ultimately from the same source)

of Stephen Bathory, whose tolerance permitted the propagation of heresies; and when (1579) Christopher Bathory introduced the

Jesuits

JESUITS

into Transylvania, Blandrata found means of conciliating them. Throughout his career he was accompanied by his two brothers, Ludovico and Alphonso, the former being canon of Saluzzo. In Transylvania, Blandrata co-operated with Francis

David

(d. 1579), the antitrinitarian bishop, but in 1578 two circumstances broke the
connexion. Blandrata was charged with "Italian vice ";

David

renounced the

worship

WORSHIP (i.e. " worth-ship," O. Eng. weor8scipe)

of Christ. To influence David, Blandrata sent for Faustus Socinus from Basel. Socinus was David's guest, but the discussion between them led to no result. At the instance of Blandrata, David was tried and condemned to prison at Deva (in which he died) on the charge of innovation. Having amassed a fortune, Blandrata returned to the communion of Rome. His end is obscure. According to the Jesuit, Jacob Wujek, he was strangled by a nephew (Giorgio, son of Alphonso) in May 1588. He published a few polemical writings, some in conjunction with David.
See Malacarne, Commentario delle Opere e delle Vicende di G. Biandrata (Padova, 1814) ; Wallace, Anti-trinitarian Biography, vol. ii. (185o). (A. Go. *)

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