Filippo Archinto

Titian, Portrait of Cardinal Filippo Archinto, 1558. John G. Johnson Collection, Philadelphia

Filipo Archinto (1500–1558), born in Milan, was an Italian theologian and diplomat. At the age of twenty he obtained a doctorate in law, at the University of Padua, and revealed such talents for diplomacy that Pope Paul III named him successively Governor of the city of Rome, Vice-Chamberlain Apostolic, Bishop of the Holy Sepulchre, and of Saluzzo. He also sent him to preside in his name at the Council of Trent, then transferred to Bologna.

St. Ignatius Loyola found in him a powerful protector, in the early years of the Society of Jesus, and only his death prevented his installation in the archiepiscopal chair of Milan to which Pope Paul IV had nominated him.

His theological works include De fide et sacramentis (Cracow, 1545; Ingolstadt 1546; Turin, 1549) and Oratio de nova christiani orbis pace habita (Rome, 1544).

Sources