2 JEROME CARDAN 



church at Gallarate. 1 He asserts that as far back as 

 1189 Milo Cardano was Governor of Milan for more 

 than seven years, and according to tradition Franco 

 Cardano, the commander of the forces of Matteo 

 Visconti, 2 was a member of the family. If the claim of 

 the Castillione ancestry be allowed the archives of the 

 race would be still farther enriched by the name of Pope 

 Celestine IV., Godfrey of Milan, who was elected Pope 

 in 1241, and died the same year. 



Cardan's immediate ancestors were long-lived. The 

 sons of Fazio Cardano, his great-grandfather, Joanni, 

 Aldo, and Antonio, lived to be severally ninety-four, 

 eighty-eight, and eighty-six years of age. Of these 

 Joanni begat two sons : Antonio, who lived eighty-eight 

 years, and Angelo, who reached the age of eighty-six. 

 To Aldo were born Jacopo, who died at seventy-two ; 

 Gottardo, who died at eighty-four; and Fazio, the father 

 of Jerome, who died at eighty. 3 



Fazio, albeit he came of such a long-lived stock, and 

 lived himself to be fourscore, suffered much physical 

 trouble during his life. On account of a wound which 

 he had received when he was a youth, some of the 

 bones of his skull had to be removed, and from this 

 time forth he never dared to remain long with his head 

 uncovered. When he was fifty-nine he swallowed a 

 certain corrosive poison, which did not kill him, but 

 left him toothless. He was likewise round-shouldered, 

 a stammerer, and subject to constant palpitation of the 



1 De Utilitate ex adversis Capienda (Franeker, 1648), p. 357. 



2 Matteo Visconti was born in 1250, and died in 1322. He was 

 lord of Novara Vercello Como and Monferrato, and was made 

 Vicar Imperial by Adolphus of Nassau. Though he was worsted 

 in his conflict with John XXII. he did much to lay the foundations 

 of his family. 



3 De Vita Propria (Amsterdam, 1654), ch. i. p. 4. 



