Mino Cèlsi (1514 – c. 1576) was an
Italian ambassador and scholar; he was forced to flee to
Basel, Switzerland, for his defense of Protestant critics of Roman Catholicism.
Born in
Siena to an aristocratic family, he served in various roles in government, including as ambassador from the Republic to Milan (1545, 1555-1556) and as a representative (1563) of Siena in Florence. Suffering from financial difficulties, and in part because of his affiliation with others who fell to imprisonment by the
Roman Inquisition, he fled from Siena and ended up in Basel. He traveled to Vienna and Frankfort in search of employment. After his death a manuscript was published in Latin under his name, includin
De haereticis coercendis quatenus progredi liceat disputatio, by Mini Celsi Senensis, and Lelio Sozzini, Christalingae, (1577). (Translation: ''Highlighting the Progress in the Restrictions of Heresy''). The work argues for tolerance of alternative religious beliefs.
Treccani
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani - Volume 23 (1979) entry by Peter G. Bietenholz for Cèlsi, Mino.
References
1514 births
1570s deaths
16th-century Italian Roman Catholic theologians
Heresy in the Catholic Church
People from Siena
{{Italy-academic-bio-stub