Ignazio Busca

Ignazio Busca (31 August 1731 – 12 August 1803) was an Italian Catholic prelate who served as Secretary of State of the Holy See. He was made a cardinal in 1789.

Biography Busca was born in Milan on 31 August 1731, in Milan.

He was the last son of Lodovico Busca, marquess of Lomagna and Bianca Arconati Visconti.

He took a degree in utroque iure in 1759 at the Università La Sapienza of Rome.

Busca later was governor of Rome and Vice-Camerlango from 1785 until 1789. He was succeeded as Secretary of State by Ercole Consalvi. In February 1798, after the French military invaded Rome, Busca was forced to flee to Naples.

He participated in the Papal conclave of 1799-1800. The government of the Austrian Empire, which controlled Venice, the extraordinary site of the Conclave, let it be known that they did not want Busca, and several other Cardinals, to be the next Pope; thus he was stricken from the list of papabili. After one of the longest conclaves of modern times, Barnaba Chiaramonti was elected Pius VII.

From 1800 to 1803, he was prefect of the Congregation of Good Government,

He died on 12 August 1803 in Rome.