Image credit: Council of Trent, the Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

The Council of Trent (1545–1563) marked a turning point in Church censorship, placing many scientific and esoteric texts—including palmistry—under scrutiny. 

 Andreas Corvus—The Surgeon-Chiromancer of Renaissance Venice (c. late 1400s–early 1500s)

Key Work: Chiromantiae Compendium (Venice, 1513)

Core Contributions:

• One of the earliest printed palmistry texts, Chiromantia, blending Galenic medicine with hand analysis
• Focused on palmistry for medical and surgical applications
• Dedicated to Gianfrancesco II Gonzaga, Marquess of Mantua
• Introduced mount correspondences (e.g., a flat Mount of Venus = unemotional temperament)

Documented Claims:

Life Line: "Si linea vitae est profunda et continua, significat corporis fortitudinem."
Source: 1513 Latin ed., Wellcome Library MS. 893, f. 4v

Medical Focus:
Linked hand features to humoral imbalances, not timed events.

Notes:
Corvus’ system was diagnostic, not predictive—a distinction later palmists blurred. This likely helped his work avoid censorship. 

 Johannes ab Indagine—The Monk’s Forbidden Science (c. 1467–1537)

Key Work: Introductiones Apotelesmaticae (Strasbourg, 1522)

Core Contributions:

• A monk, later called the most respected German palmist of the 1500s
• Employed by Cardinal Albert of Brandenburg
• First to merge palmistry, astrology, and physiognomy in a single printed work
• Planetary assignments: mapped planets to fingers (e.g., Saturn = middle finger)

Documented Claims:

Life Line: "So die Linie des Lebens lang unzerbrochen ist / bedeutet sie langes Leben."
Source: 1523 German ed., Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Rar. 2885, f. 23r

Church Condemnation:
Branded as diabolical divination in the 1559 Index of Forbidden Books of the Inquisition. His work was kept in private libraries by elites and preserved by astrologers.
Source: Vatican Library, Stamp. Barb. JJJ. 12, p. 89

Notes:
Like other writers of the time, Indagine did not yet map time onto hand lines. 

 Jean Taisnier—The Court Palmist and Astrologer (1508–1562)

Key Work: Opus Mathematicum (Cologne, 1562)

Core Contributions:

• Six of eight sections devoted to palmistry and divination
• Written for Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his court
• Combined palmistry with astrology, physiognomy, and mathematics

Censorship:
Purged by the Spanish Inquisition in 1583; preserved in Habsburg intellectual circles
Source: British Library, Index of Prohibited Books, 1583 ed.

Documented Claims:

Fate Line: "Linea Saturni, si stella Martis earn transierit, pericula bellorum significat."
Source: 1562 ed., British Library 719.k.10, p. 112

Notes:
Taisnier’s method relied on astrological charts—his palmistry was not meant to stand alone. 

 
Rudolf Goclenius the Younger — The Professor’s Method (1572–1621)

Key Works:

• Aphorisma Chiromantica (1592)
• Uranoscopia, Chiroscopia et Metoposcopia (1603)

Core Contributions:

• Linked hand analysis to Galenic medical theories
• Professor at Marburg University; blended medicine and astrology

Documented Claims:

Heart Line: "Linea cordis interrupta melancholiam indicat."
Source: 1603 ed., ETH Zurich Rar 4567, p. 89

Censorship:
Faced heresy investigations at Marburg but was shielded by Lutheran patrons
Source: University of Marburg Archives, Theol. MSS 412

Notes:
Influenced by and the son of Rudolf Goclenius the Elder, who coined the term psychology. 

 Conclusion

Numerous palmists wrote during the 1500s and these four highlight the trends in Europe as palmistry was moving beyond just fortune-telling.

• Corvus made it a medical tool.
• Taisnier turned it into a courtly art.
• Indagine and Goclenius treated it as a secret science.

They wrote during a time when publishing work like this could lead to prison—or worse. In parts of Europe, the cost of palmistry wasn’t just rejection but was execution.

—This series is now a monthly posting—