Giuseppe Francesco Borri
Giuseppe Francesco Borri (4 May 1627 in Milan – 20 August 1695 in Rome) was an alchemist, prophet, freethinker, physician and eye doctor.
His intolerance of ecclesiastical authority deteriorated his relationship with his teachers Sforza Pallavicino and Théophile Raynaud (Borri even led a collective rebellion of seminarists, provoking the replacement of Nicola Zucchi, the Rector, who was dismissed).
According to the legend, handed down in 1802 by scholar Francesco Cancellieri, one morning in 1657, a stranger was caught gathering herbs in the garden of Marquis Massimiliano Palombara.
The unknown stranger, after having performed various operations under Palombara's eyes, asked for hospitality in a room near the laboratory, to be able to watch over his work; then he asked the Marquis to give him the keys to the laboratory, promising that he would explain everything to the Marquis after having completed his work; but for the moment he needed solitude and peace.
During the night, the latter had sneaked away through a window, leaving in the adjoining laboratory only an upside-down crucible and, on the floor, a streak of gold, and a sheaf of papers covered with notes and hermetic symbols on the Great Work.
In Milan, Borri contacted the Palagians Quietist milieu, which was widely scattered in Lombardy, and centred on Saint Pelagio's church and the prophetic charisma of Giacomo Filippo Casola, a layman who was accused of heresy by the Inquisition and shortly after died in jail.
Very soon Borri became the figurehead of the Milanese movement and the fervour generated by his predication culminated in a public gathering in the square of Milan cathedral in 1658.
Meanwhile, after the verdict was read in public, Borri's effigy was brought in procession to Campo de' Fiori in Rome, where 60 years earlier, Giordano Bruno had been executed.
During this period, he met Henry Oldenburg, Robert Moray, Constantijn Huygens, Franciscus van den Enden, Theodor Kerckring and Olaus Borrichius, then living in Amsterdam for his studies.
[8] In April 1662 Borri borrowed 100,000 guilders from Gerard Demmer, a former Council of the Dutch Indies who had served the East India Company on Ambon Island, and in turn supplied him with his secret treatment.
In 1670, when Christian V ascended to the throne, Borri's fortunes again began to decline, and he resolved to leave Denmark and to move to Ottoman Empire.
While journeying, he was arrested in Goldingen, Moravia or the Carpathian Mountains, and thanks to pontifical pressure, was given by Leopold I, Emperor of Austria, into the hands of the Vatican.
Sentenced to life in prison on 25 September 1672, Borri, like his followers, was forced to perform a public act of abjuration and atonement.
His noble friends (in particular the French ambassador, the Duke of Estrées, who was healed by Borri under a papal dispensation that permitted him to visit the sick nobleman in his mansion palazzo Farnese) obtained for him a sort of semi-liberty.
From 1691 Borri was under house arrest in Castel Sant'Angelo, where he furnished a laboratory to continue his studies, and was able go out to practise his art in the mansions of his noble friends, the prince Borghese and Borromeo.
