Editing Girolamo Savonarola (section)

== Early years ==
[[File:Portrait of Girolamo Savonarola 1524.jpg|thumb|Fantasy portrait of Savonarola by [[Moretto da Brescia]], {{Circa|1524}}]]
Savonarola was born on 21 September 1452 in [[Ferrara]] to Niccolò di Michele and Elena. His father, Niccolò, was born in Ferrara to a family originally from [[Padua]]; his mother, Elena, claimed a lineage from the Bonacossi family of [[Mantua]]. She and Niccolò had seven children, of whom Girolamo was third. His grandfather, [[Michele Savonarola]], a noted and successful physician and [[polymath]], oversaw Girolamo's education. The family amassed a great deal of wealth from Michele's medical practice. After his grandfather's death in 1468 Savonarola may have attended the public school run by Battista Guarino, son of [[Guarino da Verona]], where he would have received his introduction to the classics as well as to the poetry and writings of [[Petrarch]], father of [[Renaissance humanism]]. Earning an arts degree at the [[University of Ferrara]], he prepared to enter medical school, following in his grandfather's footsteps. At some point, however, he abandoned his career intentions.

In his early poems he expresses his preoccupation with the state of the Church and of the world. He began to write poetry of an apocalyptic bent, notably "On the Ruin of the World" (1472) and "On the Ruin of the Church" (1475), in which he singled out the papal court at Rome for special obloquy.<ref>"English translations in Savonarola ''A Guide to Righteous Living and Other Works'' ed. Konrad Eisenbichler (Toronto, Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2003) 61–68</ref> About the same time he seems to have been thinking about a life in religion. As he later told his biographer, a sermon he heard by a preacher in Faenza persuaded him to abandon the world.<ref>, Gianfrancesco Pico Della Mirandola, ''Vita Hieronymi Savonarolae'' ed. Elisabetta Schisto (Florence, 1999) 114.</ref> Most of his biographers reject or ignore the account of his younger brother and follower, Maurelio (later fra Mauro), that in his youth Girolamo had been spurned by a neighbour, Laudomia Strozzi, to whom he had proposed marriage.<ref>Reported by fra Benedetto Luschino in his ''Vulnera Diligentis'' ed. Stefano Dall' Aglio (Florence, 2002) pp. 22–33, 301.</ref> True or not, in a letter he wrote to his father when he left home to join the [[Dominican Order]] he hints at being troubled by desires of the flesh.<ref>"Like you, I am made of flesh and my sensuality wars against my reason; I have a cruel fight to keep the devil from my back." Translated from Girolamo Savonarola, ''Lettere e Scritti apologetici'' eds. Ridolfi, Romano, Verde (Rome, 1984), p. 6.</ref> There is also a story that on the eve of his departure he dreamed that he was cleansed of such thoughts by a shower of icy water, which prepared him for the ascetic life.<ref>La Vita del Beato Girolamo Savonarola ed. Roberto Ridolfi (Florence, 1937) p. 8.</ref> In the unfinished treatise he left behind, later called "De contemptu Mundi" or "On Contempt for the World", he calls upon readers to fly from this world of adultery, sodomy, murder, and envy.

Savonarola studied [[Augustine of Hippo|Augustine]] and [[Thomas Aquinas]].  He also studied the scriptures and memorised parts.<ref name=":0" /> On 25 April 1475, Savonarola went to [[Bologna]], where he knocked on the door of the Friary of San Domenico, of the Order of Friars Preacher, and asked to be admitted. As he told his father in his farewell letter, he wanted to become a knight of Christ.