Ferruccio Lamborghini - car maker

Tractor manufacturer inspired by Enzo Ferrari's 'insult'

Ferruccio Lamborghini was dismissed
by Enzo Ferrari as a mere tractor maker

Fans on one side of a great rivalry in Italy's performance car market were in mourning on this day in 1993 following the death at the age of 76 of Ferruccio Lamborghini.

Lamborghini, who made his fortune from building tractors to service Italy's post-war agricultural recovery, set up as a car maker in 1963 in direct competition with Enzo Ferrari, who had been selling sports cars with increasing success since 1947.

It is said there was no love lost between the two, not least because they first met when Lamborghini turned up at Ferrari's factory in Maranello, a few kilometres from Modena, to complain to Enzo in person that Ferrari were using inferior parts.

Lamborghini had become a collector of fast cars and owned a Mercedes-Benz 300SL, a Jaguar E-Type and two Maserati 3500 GTs among others.  He acquired his first Ferrari, a two-seater 250GT with bodywork designed by Pinin Farina, in 1958, and went on to own several more.

He was generally unimpressed, complaining that they were noisy and rough and essentially re-purposed track cars, with too little luxury refinement.  After encountering a series of mechanical problems, notably with the clutches, all of which required the cars to be returned to the factory, he accused Ferrari of fitting poor quality parts.

Lamborghini's raging bull logo

Yet Enzo is alleged to have dismissed his complaints, telling Ferruccio that he was not prepared to be lectured about high performance cars by a tractor manufacturer.  Insulted, Lamborghini decided he would hit back.

His first step was to prove his point about inferior parts by fitting one of his troublesome 250GTs with a clutch used in his tractors, delightedly making it known that the problem was solved and never returned.

Then, happy in the knowledge that the tractor business, as well as the heating and air conditioning business he had set up as a second income stream, would continue to make profits without requiring too much attention from him, he devoted himself to producing cars of his own.

Working on the basis that a car in the grand tourer category should have attributes that were lacking in Ferrari's offerings, namely high performance without compromising ride quality, and luxury interior appointments, he took only four months to produce his first car, unveiling the Lamborghini 350 GTV at the Turin Motor Show in October 1963.

Ferruccio sold the 350 GTV at a loss at first to remain competitive on price with the Ferraris but soon his factory at Sant'Agata Bolognese - just 40km (25 miles) from Maranello - was increasing production and expanding its workforce.

The Lamborghini Miura was hailed for its aerodynamic
and beautiful design features

Over the next few years, models such as the 400 GT, the Miura - the first to use the mid-engined, rear-wheel drive design that is now standard - the Urraco and the Espada established Lamborghini as Ferrari's main rival in what became known as the supercar market.

In opposition to Ferrari's famous prancing horse on the company badge, Lamborghini's symbol was a raging bull, inspired by his interest in bullfighting.  The Miura, in fact, was named after Don Eduardo Miura, a breeder of bulls from Seville, the Urraco after a bull breed, and the Espada after the Spanish word for sword.

Ferruccio's involvement with making cars ended in 1974 after a series of events beyond his control plunged all of his companies one by one into financial difficulties.  He retired to a 740-acre estate on the shores of Lake Trasimeno, near the town of Castiglione del Lago in Umbria, and began to produce wine.

It represented a return to his roots in farming, having been born into a family of grape producers in 1916 in Cento, a town in the province of Ferrara in Emilia-Romagna, only a few kilometres from Sant'Agata Bolognese.

His interest in his youth had been in agricultural vehicles.  He acquired skills as a mechanic while serving in the Italian Royal Air Force in the Second World War, opened a garage after the war and competed in the 1948 Mille Miglia motor race in a modified Fiat, which he crashed into the side of a restaurant in Fiano, near Turin, ending his participation after 700 miles (1,100km).

The Lamborghini Museum in Sant'Agata Bolognese

The accident put him off racing and encouraged him to devote his energy to using spare parts from military vehicles to turn into tractors before eventually building new tractors from components made for the purpose.

Lamborghini died in hospital in Perugia on February 20, 1993, after suffering a heart attack. He is buried at the Monumental Cemetery of the Certosa di Bologna monastery.

His cars live on, now produced under the ownership of Volkswagen.  In fact, recent years have seen the marque achieve record sales.

The Lamborghini name is also preserved in Ferruccio's son Tonino's range of clothing and accessories, while his daughter, Patrizia, runs the Lamborghini winery on the Umbrian estate.

In 1995, Tonino opened a museum in honour of his father's legacy, the Centro Studi e Ricerche Ferruccio Lamborghini in Dosso (Ferrara), which was moved to Sant'Agata Bolognese in 2014 with the new name Ferruccio Lamborghini Museum.

Travel tip:

Cento is an agricultural town in Emilia-Romagna that was once part of the dowry of Lucrezia Borgia, daughter of Pope Alexander VI, who seized it from the Bishop of Bologna.  Things to see include the Rocca (castle), built by the Bishop in 1378, and the 18th century Palazzo del Monte di Pietà, in which is housed a civic gallery exhibiting paintings by the famed local artist, Giovan Francesco Barbieri, better known as Il Guercino, whose works can also be found in the Basilica Collegiata San Biagio. Apart from Lamborghini and Il Guercino, other notable people born in Cento include the grandfather of former British prime minister Benjamin D'Israeli and Jessica Rossi, who won a gold medal for shooting at the London 2012 Olympics.

Book your stay in Cento with Booking.com

Lamborghini's estate offers beautiful views of the lake

Travel tip:

Castiglione del Lago is a charming small town sitting on a promontory in the south-west corner of Lake Trasimeno. The old centre, which is ringed with medieval walls, is not only full of character but has an outstanding view of the lake and some fine buildings, including the Renaissance style Palazzo della Corgna, which has a museum and gallery and serves as the town hall, which is connected by a covered corridor with the Rocca del Leone, a pentagonal castle completed in 1247.  The lake shore nearby has some pleasant beaches and reputedly very good restaurants.

Hotels in Castiglione del Lago by Booking.com

More reading:

Flaminio Bertoni - a sculptor who designed works of art on four wheels

Why Battista 'Pinin' Farina was so important to Ferrari

How a motor scooter changed the life of helicopter designer Corradino D'Ascanio

Also on this day:

1339: Visconti v Visconti in the Battle of Parabiago

1549: The birth of  Francesco Maria II della Rovere, the last Duke of Urbino

1778: The death of ground-breaking academic Laura Bassi

1816: Rossini's opera The Barber of Seville premieres in Rome

(Picture credits: Ferrucio Lamborghni by kys96811; logo by vllmtt; Miura by Andrew Bossi; museum by Leonard J DeFrancisci; Lake Trasimeno by Schwarzer Kater; all via Wikimedia Commons)

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Vittorio Grigolo - opera singer

Tenor courted public popularity as way to land 'serious' roles

Vittorio Grigolo in a picture for
his album The Italian Tenor

The operatic tenor Vittorio Grigolo was born on this day in 1977 in Arezzo in Tuscany.

Grigolo has performed at many of the world's leading opera houses and is currently starring in Werther by Jules Massenet at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

Yet he has achieved fame as a serious performer after first releasing an album of popular songs and using reality TV shows to put himself in the public eye.

Brought up in Rome, Grigolo was a child prodigy who began to sing at the age of four, his love for music inspired by his father, who liked the family house to be filled with the sound of opera arias.

He won a place at the prestigious Sistine Chapel Choir School by the time he was nine and at 13 appeared on the same stage as the opera legend Luciano Pavarotti as the shepherd boy in Giacomo Puccini's Tosca at the Rome Opera House.  It earned him the nickname Il Pavarottino - the little Pavarotti.

Grigolo's progress continued to be rapid.  At 18 he joined the Vienna Opera Company and became the youngest tenor to perform at Teatro alla Scala in Milan at the age of 23.

Grigolo performs in the role of Nemorino in
Gaetano Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore

But in the years that followed, he felt his career reached a plateau. It was this lull that persuaded him to switch his attention to the pop world, cashing in on the vogue for classically trained voices singing contemporary songs by releasing in 2006 the album, In the Hands of Love, a collection of pop ballads and songs from the musicals.

As part of his promotion campaign, he appeared with Pavarotti and Dame Kiri Te Kanawa at the Classical Brit Awards at the Royal Albert Hall in London, sang numbers from the album at a Miss Universe 2006 evening gown competition in Los Angeles, performed alongside Lionel Richie at the 'Proms in the Park' in Hyde Park, London and sang at a charity event sponsored by Macy's department store in New York.

While in America, he appeared in the third series of the hit show Dancing with the Stars - based on the British show Strictly Come Dancing and mimicked in Italy with Ballando con le Stelle - although not as a competitor but a guest artist.  He also accepted an invitation to appear on the dating game show The Bachelor.

Watch Grigolo perform E lucevan le stelle from Tosca in Verona in 2012

The effect was as he had hoped.  His profile raised, as well as his talent he now had box-office appeal. Better roles at more prestigious venues began to come his way. By 2010 Grigolo had made his debut at both the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden (as Le Chevalier des Grieux in Massenet's Manon) and at the Met (as Rodolfo in Puccini's La bohème).

Grigolo cashed in on the popularity of pop
songs performed by operatic voices

Known for his exuberant, impassioned performances, it was feared that he would burn out quickly but critics agree that he has managed his voice well despite a hectic schedule.  Not a fan of the faddy diets some opera performers follow, he allows himself a glass of wine with his lunch even when he is singing in the evening, keeping his vocal chords supple by sucking peppermint bonbons.

He has recorded five more albums since In the Hands of Love.  Most consist of opera arias, although one of them, entitled Ave Maria, is of songs he remembers from his time with the Sistine Chapel Choir.

A music lover with eclectic tastes, he has not ruled out future dalliances in the pop world but for the moment his focus is on serious opera.  Not one to bother with false modesty, in one recent interview he claimed he had succeeded Pavarotti as "the Italian tenor, the voice of Italy" and was "proud to carry the flag for Italy" - even though he actually lives in Lugano, across the border from Italy in tax-friendly Switzerland.

Although it may seem Grigolo's destiny was to sing, the world of opera almost lost him to his other great passion, cars.

At the same time as supporting him in his development as a singer, Grigolo's father, a successful designer, also agreed to sponsor his ambitions as a racing driver, helping him progress through karting right up to Formula 3000, a now defunct feeder class for Formula One.

He even tested for Benetton in Formula One after signing up with F1 driver Giancarlo Fisichella's manager, but after an accident left him with two broken ribs and a cancelled concert appearance he had to make a choice.  He plumped for singing.

The distinctive, sloping Piazza Grande is a feature of Arezzo

Travel tip:

Grigolo's home city of Arezzo in Tuscany, situated about 80km (50 miles) south-west of Florence, is a medieval city that has grown into a modern conurbation of around 100,000 people, although the historic centre remains an attractive spot on the Tuscan tourist trail.  The main sights include the sloping Piazza Grande, which sits just behind the 13th century Romanesque apse of Santa Maria della Pieve and was once the main marketplace of the city.  A few streets away, the city's Duomo - the Cathedral of Santi Pietro e Donati - contains among other artistic treasures a wooden choir designed by Giorgio Vasari and a painting of Mary Magdalene attributed to Piero della Francesca.


Travel tip:

The Sistine Chapel is a chapel in the Apostolic Palace, the official residence of the Pope, in Vatican City. Originally known as the Cappella Magna, the chapel was renamed after Pope Sixtus IV, who restored it between 1477 and 1480.  As well as being a place of religious activity, the chapel is the meeting place for the Papal conclave, the process by which a new pope is selected. The Sistine Chapel is notable too for the frescos that decorate the interior, most particularly the ceiling and The Last Judgment, painted by Michelangelo.



More reading:

Why Luciano Pavarotti is among Italy's greatest opera stars

Andrea Bocelli - the perfect voice for pop and opera

The musical genius of Giacomo Puccini

Also on this day:

1743: The birth of cellist Luigi Boccherini

1953: The birth of comic actor and director Massimo Troisi

(Picture credit: Arezzo piazza by Enlightenmentreloaded via Wikimedia Commons)


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Roberto Baggio - football icon

Azzurri star regarded as Italy's greatest player

Roberto Baggio pictured after his world
record transfer to Juventus

The footballer Roberto Baggio, regarded by fans in Italy and around the world as one of the game's greatest players, was born on this day in 1967 in Caldogno, a small town situated about 10km (6 miles) north of Vicenza in the Veneto.

Baggio's career spanned 22 years, most of them spent at the highest level, with Fiorentina, Juventus, Bologna, both Milan clubs and, finally, Brescia, winning the Serie A title twice, the Coppa Italia and the UEFA Cup.  He played in three World Cups - in 1990, 1994 and 1998 - and achieved the unique distinction among Italian players of scoring at all three.

He scored 318 goals all told, the first Italian for 50 years to top 300 in his career.  Yet he spent almost the whole of his active playing days battling against injury.  Over the course of his career, he had six knee operations, four on his right knee and two on the left, and often could play only with the help of painkillers.

His fans believe that without his injuries, Baggio would have been placed in the same bracket as Pele, Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi as the best players in history.  Italy's most famous football journalist, the late Gianni Brera, said Baggio was the greatest Italian player he ever saw, better than both Giuseppe Meazza and Gianni Rivera.

Baggio prepares to take his fateful
penalty at the 1994 World Cup

Those supporters held him in such reverence they gave him the nickname il Divin' Codino - the Divine Ponytail - on account of the hairstyle he wore for most of his career, of his conversion to Buddhism, and because to them he was a football god.

Baggio's career was almost finished before it had really begun when he suffered his first serious knee injury at the age of 18, playing for his first club, Lanerossi Vicenza, in Serie B.

He barely played for the next two years and required extensive surgery.  The injury came two days before he was due to finalise his transfer to Serie A club Fiorentina and several doctors predicted he would not play again, thanks to the damage done to the anterior cruciate ligaments and the meniscus of his right knee.

Yet Fiorentina stuck by him, funded the cost of two operations and were ultimately rewarded with performances of the exquisite brilliance that defined his career and identified him as the complete player, a creative midfielder who could set up a goal for a teammate with the perfect pass, but also a dribbler with the guile and trickery of the greatest wingers and a finisher as deadly as the finest strikers.

In Italy he was categorised as a fantasista, the kind of player every coach dreams of if he has any romance in his veins, the kind of player capable, to use a description Italians would understand, of "inventing the game" with a moment of sublime and unpredictable skill.

When he moved to Juventus in 1990, the £8 million fee made him at the time the most expensive footballer in the world.

Baggio at the 1990 World Cup finals in Italy,
where he announced himself as a star

It is hardly any wonder that his supporters despair of the fact that he is remembered all too often for the moment in his career when it all went wrong, when he missed his penalty in the shoot-out at the end of the 1994 World Cup final in the United States, handing the trophy to Brazil.  It was one of only eight penalties Baggio failed to convert from a total of 79 in his career.

Yet the picture of Baggio, head bowed, suddenly lost and alone among the 95,000 people present at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, became the image of the tournament, symbolic of an heroic failure.  Baggio had dragged his nation to the final almost singlehandedly by scoring five of their six goals in the knock-out stages. He was, as usual, defying injury - playing in the final with painkilling injections and a heavily strapped thigh after suffering a hamstring tear - yet at the critical moment fate turned against him and his kick went over the bar.

For all the strength of his faith - and he credits Buddhism with helping him through his darkest moments - Baggio confessed that the penalty miss haunted him for many years afterwards, because he had not been able to deliver the dream for his teammates but also because it felt wrong that he would be remembered for something negative.  In fact, by its very longevity, his career had been a triumph against the odds, given the bleak prognosis he was given at only 18 years old.

His fans prefer to remember a seemingly endless list of brilliant goals and spend many hours debating which might be called the best, given that he scored so many of all types, from superbly placed free kicks and perfectly executed volleys to delicate lobs and wonderful mazy dribbles.

Robert Baggio during a recent television
documentary reflecting on his career

The most famous goals, inevitably, are those he scored for Italy, such as the one with which he announced himself on the world stage against Czechoslovakia in Rome in the 1990 World Cup finals in his home country, a run from the half-way line full of feints, dips and swerves, capped with a clinical finish.

Others prefer the two he scored against Bulgaria in a one-man show in the semi-final in 1994 at the Giants Stadium in New York.

His own favourites include a perfect lob from the edge of the penalty area towards the end of his career, playing for Brescia against Atalanta in Serie A.

Although born into a large Catholic family, Baggio became a Buddhist on New Year's Day 1988, his conversion a response to the despair and pain he endured during his long period of injury while with Fiorentina.  He prays and meditates daily and claims the religion, to which he was introduced by a friend, made him see life as a challenge to his inner strength.

In 1989, he married Andreina, the daughter of a neighbour in Caldogno he had known since he was 15. They have three children, a daughter, Valentina, and two sons, Mattia and Leonardo, the latter named after one of his heroes, Leonardo da Vinci.

He has a home in Argentina, where he is a supporter of the Boca Juniors club from the Italian neighbourhood of La Boca in Buenos Aires, and often visits Japan through his Buddhist links.

Since finishing his playing career he has spent some time coaching with the Italian Federation and a lot of time involved with charity work, raising money for research into motor neurone disease (also known as ALS) and on behalf of the United Nations, for whom he was active in raising money to fund hospitals, generate help for the victims of the Haiti earthquake, and to tackle bird flu.  His support for the Burmese pro-democracy movement and its imprisoned leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, contributed to Baggio being named 2010 Man of Peace by the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates.

The Basilica Palladiana in the centre of Vicenza

Travel tip:

Vicenza is always associated with Andrea Palladio, the city's most famous resident, and no visit should miss out the Teatro Olimpico, which he wanted to create as a Roman theatre inside a medieval building and which was completed, after his death, by Vincenzo Scamozzi, the designer responsible for stage sets giving the illusion of three dimensions.  The city is notable too, of course, for its rich collection of Palladian villas, as well as churches containing paintings by Giovanni Bellini and Paolo Veronese among others.  Away from art and architecture, Vicenza is a city with a wealth of fine restaurants and chic bars and comes to life from about 6pm, with bars serving the traditional aperitivi - vast, free buffets from which customers buying a drink can help themselves at the start of an evening on the town, or simply on the way home from work.

Hotels in Vicenza from Expedia

Travel tip:

Although Brescia, where Roberto Baggio ended his career, is a wealthy city thanks in the most part to its industrial past, there are sights worth seeing for travellers not put off by the somewhat scruffy streets and downmarket shops around the railway station.  The ruins of a Roman forum can be found at Tempio Capitolino, there are two cathedrals, one 150 years old, the other dating back to pre-Renaissance times, and the castle, which holds a museum of the Risorgimento, has its origins in pre-Roman times and has been fortified a number of times, most notably by the Venetians in the 16th century.

Hotels in Brescia from Hotels.com

More reading:

Arrigo Sacchi - coach who steered Italy to the 1994 World Cup final

How Azeglio Vicini's bid to win the World Cup for Italy on home soil ended in heartbreak

When Marco Tardelli's scream became the symbol of Italy's 1982 World Cup triumph

Also on this day:

1455: The death of early Renaissance painter Fra Angelico

1564: The genius Michelangelo dies in Rome

1983: The birth of tennis star Roberta Vinci


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Giordano Bruno - 'martyr of science'

Dominican friar condemned as a heretic

Giordano Bruno's beliefs brought him into conflict
with the church from an early age

Giordano Bruno, a Dominican friar, philosopher and cosmological theorist who challenged orthodox Christian beliefs in the 16th century, died on this day in 1600 when he was burned at the stake after being found guilty of heresy.

The principal crimes for which he was tried by the Roman Inquisition were the denial of several core Catholic doctrines.

Bruno challenged the divinity of Christ, the virginity of Mary, and the transubstantiation - the idea that Eucharistic offering of bread and wine in Mass becomes the body and blood of Christ.

He also questioned the idea of God as a holy trinity of divine persons - the Father, the Son (Jesus) and the Holy Spirit.  His own belief was closer to pantheism, which contends that a God is an all-encompassing divine presence rather than existing in some personal form with human traits.

This idea formed part of his cosmological theory, in which he supported the idea that everything in the universe is made of tiny particles (atoms) and that God exists in all of these particles.

Yet this was in contradiction of the established Catholic wisdom, as was his support for the idea advanced by the Renaissance astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus that Earth revolved around the sun, rather than the other way round.

The 17th century perception of the universe, with the
Earth at its centre, that Bruno challenged

Bruno took this one step further by suggesting that the sun, which Copernicus placed at the centre of the universe, was in fact merely one of an infinite number of suns in an endless universe, each of these suns being surrounded by planets, and that Earth was likely to be only one of many planets inhabited by living beings.

After many years essentially on the run, Bruno was imprisoned in Rome in 1592, subjected to periodic torture and finally condemned to die by immolation, the sentence carried out in Campo de' Fiori, where he was stripped naked, with his tongue tied down to prevent any heretical outbursts, and suspended upside down before a fire was lit beneath him.

Bruno had been born Filippo Bruno in the town of Nola in what his now Campania, on the north-eastern slope of Vesuvius. He moved to Naples to study at the age of 14 and entered the monastery of San Domenico Maggiore at the age of 17, taking the name of Giordano.

He remained there for 11 years but in that time became known for questioning accepted beliefs.  He removed images of the saints from the walls of his room, keeping only a crucifix, took an interest in Arab astrology and obtained copies of banned texts, which he encouraged others to read.  He consistently expressed doubts about areas of the Catholic faith that seemed to be contradicted by science and logic.

The statue of Girodano Bruno in Rome's
Campo de' Fiori, where he was killed

On learning that an indictment was being prepared against him in 1576, he fled Naples, casting off his monk's habit in the hope that he would be less easily recognised.

For the next 15 years, he travelled around Europe, initially in what is now northern Italy, where he spent time in Genoa, Turin, Venice, Padua and Bergamo, and then in Switzerland, France, England and Germany.

He taught at a number of universities but his views often brought him into conflict with his superiors and inevitably meant his postings were short-lived.  In London he courted controversy by his association with magicians and astrologers.

His most settled time was in Paris, where he made money by demonstrating his immense powers of memory, which he honed using techniques that were ahead of his time and appeared to give him superhuman qualities.

Bruno's fatal mistake, it turned out, was to accept an invitation from Giovanni Mocenigo, a wealthy Venetian, to return to Venice as his personal tutor.

Mocenigo had been impressed by some of Bruno's writings, published while he was in Paris, and had heard of his prodigious memory, but after a while the two fell out, Mocenigo accusing Bruno of paying too much attention to his wife and of failing to pass on his most effective memory tricks.

A relief of the trial of Bruno by the Roman Inquisition
forms part of Ettore Ferrari's moment in Rome

Bruno gave notice of his intention to quit and planned to move to Germany but Mocenigo locked him in an attic, threatening to hand him to the Inquisition if he did not reveal the secrets behind his feats of memory.

He refused to do so and Mocenigo promptly summoned the authorities, not only handing over Bruno but a three-page letter alleging various acts of blasphemy and heresy.  The Inquisition required the testimony of more than one individual to mount a successful prosecution. No one came forward to support Mocenigo's claims but it seems Bruno damned himself by admitting that he had always harboured doubts over Jesus's claim to be the son of God.

Although he retracted the beliefs attributed to him in Mocenigo's statement, Bruno remained in custody long enough for the authorities in Rome to apply successfully for his extradition.  He was imprisoned in Castel Sant'Angelo for the next eight years and regularly invited to recant but refused to budge on most of his beliefs, challenging Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, the chief Inquisitor, to prove that he was wrong.

Years after his death, he was hailed as a martyr of science and revered for standing up to the power of the papacy.

Travel tip:

In the spot in the Campo de' Fiori where Giordano was executed there now stands a monument to him in the form of a statue created in 1889 by Ettore Ferrari, the Grand master of the Grande Oriente d'Italia, the Masonic jurisdiction of Italy, who were strong supporters of the unification of Italy over the previous Papal rule of Rome. The statue shows Giordano dressed in his monk's habit but wearing a defiant expression on his face.  Each year, on the anniversary of his death, the statue becomes a site of pilgrimage for groups of Masons, atheists and pantheists, for whom Giordano has become a cult hero.

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The church of San Domenico Maggiore can be found in the
square of the same name, just off Spaccanapoli in Naples

Travel tip:

The church of San Domenico Maggiore, founded by the friars of the Dominican Order, is located in the square with the same name off Via Benedetto Croce, a section of the street known as Spaccanapoli. In the centre of the square is an obelisk topped by a statue of Saint Dominic, founder of the Dominican Order, erected after the plague of 1656.  The monastery annexed to the church was the original seat of the University of Naples.

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More reading:

How Galileo Galilei was placed under house arrest for supporting belief that sun was at the center of the universe

Why Girolamo Savanarola was hanged and burned at the stake

What led to Antonio Moscheni becoming a well-known name in India

Also on this day:

1653: The birth of musician and composer Arcangelo Corelli

1796: The birth of opera composer Giovanni Pacini

1916: The birth of actor Raf Vallone

(Picture credits: Giordano statue by Georges Jansoone; via Wikimedia Commons)

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