Antonio Possevino (Antonius Possevinus) (10 July 1533 – 26 February 1611) was a Jesuit protagonist of Counter Reformation as a papal diplomat and a Jesuit controversialist, encyclopedist and bibliographer. He was the first Jesuit to visit Muscovy, Sweden, Denmark, Livonia, Hungary, Pomerania, and Saxony in amply documented papal missions between 1578 and 1586 where he championed the enterprising policies of Pope Gregory XIII. Life Mantua, Rome, and Ferrara: Renaissance humanist and tutor Recent scholarship has identified Antonio Possevino's family as New Christians admitted to the learned circles of the court of Renaissance Mantua and its Gonzaga dukes. His father was Piedmontese from Asti and moved to Mantua where he joined the guild of goldsmiths. The family name was changed from Cagliano (Caliano) and had three sons, Giovanni Battista, Antonio and Giorgio. His mother nursed her son Antonio in 1533 together with Francesco III Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua. His older brother, Giovanni Battista Possevino (1522–1552) arrived in the mid-1540s in the Rome of Paul III Farnese, first in the service of the Mantuan cardinal reformer Gregorio Cortese, then of the papal "cardinal nipote" Alessandro Farnese (cardinal) and finally of cardinal Ippolito II d'Este. In 1549 at seventeen Antonio came to study with his brother in Rome and met the leading intellectuals at the Renaissance court of pope Julius III (1550–1555), the patron of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and the builder of Villa Giulia. These included Fulvio Orsini and Paulus Manutius. In 1553 he published posthumously the Dialogo dell'Honore of Giovanni Battista who died not yet thirty. In Rome he dedicated the Centones ex Vergilio published under the name of Lelio Capilupi, to the French poet Joachim Du Bellay and in 1556 in Due Discorsi he defended his brother against accusations of plagiarism and defended the writings of Giovanni Battista Giraldi. His brilliance and literary skills made the young humanist much in demand. When he left Rome he was engaged in service to Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga as tutor to the sons of his brother Ferrante Gonzaga, Francesco Gonzaga and Gian Vincenzo Gonzaga, both future cardinals. He moved with them to the literary capital of Italy, the city of Ferrara ruled by the House of Este. Possevino was connected with the Aristotelian revival associated with Francis Robortello and Vincenzo Maggi (1498–1564) that generated many treatises on literary and courtly matters including his brother's Dialogo dell'honore and his early works. When the University closed