Girolamo Savonarola, an Italian reformer, born in Ferrara, Sept. 21, 1452, executed in Florence, May 23, 1498. In 1475 he became a Dominican at Bologna; and having completed his theological studies and received orders, he was sent in 1482 to the convent of San Marco in Florence to preach the Lenten station. His diminutive stature and harsh voice having caused him to fail in this, he was removed to the convent of Brescia, where he achieved such success as a pulpit orator that in 1489 he was recalled to San Marco in Florence. Applying the visions and prophetical denunciations of the Apocalypse to the vices and corruptions of the pagan renaissance in Italy, he assumed the character of a prophet. In 1493 he was appointed vicar general of his order in northern Italy, and was encouraged by the court of Rome to carry out a thorough reform in all Dominican houses. Soon afterward the pope made the reformed Dominicans of Tuscany an independent body under Savonarola. After the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent in 1492, the friar allied himself with the political party which favored the French domination in Lombardy, and his discourses pointed plainly to the speedy arrival of one who should liberate Florence from the yoke of the Medici and the corruptions of paganism.

He was appointed one of a deputation to welcome Charles VIII. of France as the saviour of Italy, and to invite him to Florence in 1494. Thenceforward his influence was for a time all-powerful in the city. When the French evacuated Florence, a theocratic republic was proclaimed by his advice, in which Christ alone was to be sovereign, and legislation and public order were regulated on the ascetic principles of monastic life. He made war upon all amusements, proposed a rigid censorship of morals, and even demanded the deposition of the pope. A sentence of excommunication, which he disregarded, only increased his popularity. He continued his harangues, organized processions, and held public autos da fé, in which beautiful and licentious works of art were destroyed. But after a time the combination of the Medici with other powerful families, the hostility of the Franciscans, Savonarola's extravagant interpretations of Scripture, and the censure of the court of Rome, caused a sentence of banishment to be issued against him. He shut himself up in his convent of San Marco, but surrendered after a violent contest.

Pope Alexander VI. demanded that he and his companions, Domenico Buon-vicini and Silvestro Maruffi, should be sent to Rome. The Florentine council refused, but allowed the papal delegates to share in the trial. The prisoners were sentenced to death and strangled, and their bodies burned. Monuments to Savonarola's memory were erected in the convent of San Marco in 1873, and in Ferrara on the anniversary of his death, May 23, 1875. He left numerous ascetic and political writings and religious poems. In his Triumphus Cruris he strives to prove the truths of religion by philosophical arguments, and to bring the natural and supernatural together. In his work De Divisione omnium Scientiarum he rejects all pagan authors, and would substitute for these the study of the fathers. His works were partly published at Lyons (6 vols., 1633-'40), and portions have been translated into various languages. Among recent publications of his writings are Prediche (Florence, 1845), and Poesie (1862). His life has been written by Carle (Paris, 1842), Madden (London, 1853), and many others.

The best biographies are by Perrens (2 vols., Paris, 1853; 3d ed., 1859), and by Villari (2 vols., Florence, 1859-'61; French translation by Gustave Gruyer, with collections of Savonarola's correspondence and poetry, 2 vols., 1874). Villari corrects the exaggerated accounts of his execution.