Gerolamo Cardano was an Italian physician and mathematician who fought against a number of prejudices and superstitions of the middle ages. He wrote more than 200 works on medicine, mathematics, physics, philosophy, religion, and music. In 1570 he was imprisoned for a few months by the Catholic Inquisition for heresy. Among other things, he had cast the horoscope of
Jesus of Nazareth and attributed the events of his life to the influence of the stars.