Marco Antonio de Dominis

Marco Antonio de Dominis (; 15607 September 1624) was a Dalmatian ecclesiastic, polymath, man of science and sometime archbishop of Split and Primate of Dalmatia and all Croatia, and man of science, who later joined the Church of England.

Early life He was born on the island of Rab Croatia, off the coast of Dalmatia, in a noble family of Dalmatian origin. Educated at the at Loreto and at the University of Padua, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1579 and taught mathematics, logic, and rhetoric at Padua and Brescia, Italy.

He was educated by the Jesuits in their colleges at Loreto and Padua, and is supposed by some to have joined the Society; the more usual opinion, however, is that he was dissuaded from doing so by Cardinal Aldobrandini. For some time he was employed as a teacher at Verona, a professor of mathematics at Padua, and a professor of rhetoric and philosophy at Brescia.

Religious politics In 1596 he was, through imperial influence, appointed Bishop of Senj and Modruš in Croatia in August 1600, and transferred in November 1602 to the archiepiscopal see of Split. His endeavors to reform the church soon brought him into conflict with his suffragans; and the interference of the papal court with his rights as metropolitan, an attitude intensified by the quarrel between the Papacy and Venice, made his position intolerable. This, at any rate, is the account given in his own apology, the Consilium profectionis in which he also states that it was these troubles that led him to those researches into ecclesiastical law, church history, and dogmatic theology, which, while confirming him in his love for the ideal of the true Catholic Church, convinced him that the papal system was far from approximating to it.

Even his death did not end his trial. His case was continued after his death, and on 20 December 1624 judgment was pronounced over his corpse in the Church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva. His heresy was declared manifest, and by order of the Inquisition his body was taken from the coffin, dragged through the streets of Rome, and publicly burned in the Campo di Fiore together with his works, on 21 December 1624.

By a strange irony, the publication of his Reditus consilium was subsequently forbidden in Venice because of its uncompromising advocacy of the supremacy of the Pope over the temporal powers. As a theologian and an ecclesiastic Dominis was thoroughly discredited; as a man of science he was more happy.

Religious On his way to England, he published at Heidelberg a violent attack on Rome: Scogli del Christiano naufragio, afterwards reprinted in England.

In England, he wrote a number of anti-Roman sermons: the Papatus Romanus, issued anonymously (London, 1617; Frankfort, 1618); the Scogli del naufragio Christiano, written in Switzerland (London, (?) 1618), of which English, French and German translations also appeared; and a Sermon preached in Italian before the king.

Representations De Dominis was caricatured in Thomas Middleton's 1624 play A Game at Chess. He is portrayed as the cynical 'Fat Bishop of Spalato' who changes faiths as much as it suits him.