The anniversary of Galileo’s silencing by the Church coincides with the founding of the Vatican Observatory Note from a Special Injunction of the Roman Inquisition, 26 February 1616: “At the palace of the usual residence of the said Most Illustrious Lord Cardinal Bellarmine … the Reverend Father Michelangelo Segizzi of Lodi, O.P. and Commissary General of the Holy Office … in the name of His Holiness the Pope and the whole Congregation of the Holy Office, ordered and enjoined the said Galileo, who was himself still present, to abandon completely the above-mentioned opinion that the sun stands still at the centre of the world and the earth moves, and henceforth not to hold, teach, or defend it in any way whatever … The same Galileo acquiesced in this injun