Pope Innocent IX |
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Bishop of Rome | |
Papacy began | 29 October 1591 |
Papacy ended | 30 December 1591 |
Predecessor | Gregory XIV |
Successor | Clement VIII |
Orders | |
Ordination | 11 March 1544 |
Consecration | 1560 |
Created Cardinal | 12 December 1583 by Pope Gregory XIII |
Personal details | |
Birth name | Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti |
Born |
Bologna, Papal States |
20 July 1519
Died | 30 December 1591 Rome, Papal States |
(aged 72)
Previous post |
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Coat of arms | |
Papal styles of Pope Innocent IX |
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Reference style | His Holiness |
Spoken style | Your Holiness |
Religious style | Holy Father |
Posthumous style | None |
Pope Innocent IX (Latin: Innocentius IX; 20 July 1519 – 30 December 1591), born Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti, was Pope from 29 October to 30 December 1591.
Prior to his short papacy, he had been a canon lawyer, diplomat, and chief administrator during the reign of Pope Gregory XIV (1590–1591).
Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti, whose family came from Crodo, in the diocese of Novara, northern Italy, was born in Bologna on 20 July 1519. He was the son of Antonio Facchinetti and Francesca Cini.
He studied at the University of Bologna - which was pre-eminent in jurisprudence - where he obtained a doctorate in both civil and canon law in 1544. He was later ordained to the priesthood on 11 March 1544 and was appointed a canon of the church of Saints Gervasio and Protasio of Domodossola in 1547.
He travelled to Rome and he became the secretary to Cardinal Nicolò Ardinghelli before entering the service of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, brother of the Duke of Parma and grandson of Pope Paul III (1534–1549), one of the great patrons of the time. The cardinal, who was the Archbishop of Avignon, sent Facchinetti there as his ecclesiastical representative and subsequently recalled him to the management of his affairs at Parma, where he was acting governor of the city, from 1556 to 1558. He was also made the Referendary of the Apostolic Signatura in 1559 and held that post for a year.
In 1560, Facchinetti was named as the Bishop of Nicastro, in Calabria, and in 1562 was present at the Council of Trent. He was the first bishop to actually reside in the diocese in three decades. Pope Pius V (1566–1572) sent him as papal nuncio to Venice in 1566 to further the papal alliance with Spain and Venice against the Turks, which ultimately resulted in the victory of Lepanto in 1571. He was recalled from Venice in 1572 and was made the Prior Commendatario of S. Andrea di Carmignano in the diocese of Padua from 1576 to 1587.