Giovanni Antonio Baranzano
Giovanni Antonio Baranzano, who later became Padre Redento Baranzano (4 February 1590 – 23 December 1622), was an Italian Barnabite priest, astronomer and writer. He wrote Uranoscopia (1617), a pamphlet that supported the sun-centered solar system, but the church forced him to retract his ideas.
Baranzano was born in Serravalle Sesia to Pietro and Clara. He studied in Crevalcuore, Vercelli, Novara and Milan, and at Monza he learned religion, philosophy, Latin, Greek, Hebrew and Chaldaic. He became a Barnabite on 11 March 1609, taking the name Redento.
In 1615 he was sent by Ambrogio Mazenta to teach at Collège Chappuisien in Annecy. He spent much of his time preaching against the Calvinists, but he also began exploring scientific ideas. He corresponded with Francis Bacon, who told him about his Novum Organum, and he was known to Galileo Galilei.
Baranzano published a note on physics, Novae opiniones physicae (1619). He is best known for his astronomy work started in 1617, which accepted the Copernican heliocentric view and challenged Aristotle’s ideas. Uranoscopia seu De coelo was published in 1619 by Jean Pillehotte in Lyon.
The Archbishop of Milan summoned him to correct his writings, and Baranzano wrote a tract retracting his ideas, Nova de motu terrae Copernican iuxta Summi Pontificis mentem disputatio (1618). He remained critical of simply repeating Aristotle’s ideas.
After 1620 he taught at Montargis with Father Tobia Corona, where he died in 1622.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 17:29 (CET).