1.
Pope Gregory IV
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Pope Gregory IV was Pope from October 827 to his death in 844. His pontificate was notable for the attempts to intervene in the quarrels between the emperor Louis the Pious and his sons. It also saw the breakup of the Carolingian Empire in 843, the son of a Roman patrician called John, Gregory was apparently an energetic but mild churchman, renowned for his learning. Consecrated a priest during the pontificate of Pope Paschal I, at the time of Pope Valentine’s death in 827, like his predecessor, Gregory was nominated by the nobility, and the electors unanimously agreed that he was the most worthy to become the Bishop of Rome. Gregory’s elevation to the see is believed to represent a continuation of the attempts to control the local political situation in Rome which had begun during Pope Eugene II’s pontificate. His consecration was delayed, however, until March 29,828 and it was said that the emperor reprimanded Gregory for attempting to have himself consecrated before receiving the approval of the emperor. Gregory complied with demands of imperial supremacy, and in 828 and 829. In January 829, Gregory was involved in a dispute with Farfa Abbey over the ownership of local monastic land by the Roman church, the imperial representative made a ruling in favour of the abbey, and that the lands were to be restored to the monastery. Although Gregory refused to accept the ruling, there is no evidence that he managed to get the decision overturned, when the war between father and sons resumed in Easter 833, Gregory was approached by Lothair, seeking his intervention to bring about reconciliation between Lothair and his father. Suspicious of Gregory’s intent, they refused to obey the Pope, and threatened to excommunicate him, were he to excommunicate them, annoyed by their actions, Gregorys response was to insist upon the primacy of St Peters successor, the papacy being superior to the Emperor. But you ought to have regarded an order from the Apostolic See as not less weighty than one from the emperor, besides, it is false that the emperors prohibition preceded your receiving mine. The government of souls, which belongs to bishops, is more important than the imperial, which is only concerned with the temporal. With regards to the oaths I have taken to the emperor, I will avoid perjury by pointing out to the emperor what he has done against the unity and peace of the Church and his kingdom. With regards to the bishops, in opposing my efforts in behalf of peace, what they threaten has not been done and their position was clear, that the equality of all the bishops outranked the leadership of the pope. The armies of Louis and two of his sons met at Rotfeld, near Colmar, on June 24,833, the sons persuaded Gregory to go to Louiss camp to negotiate, and initially Louis refused to treat Gregory with any honour. However, Gregory managed to convince Louis of his good faith, however, Gregory soon learned that he had been deceived by Lothair. Following these events, Gregory returned to Rome, while Louis was subsequently restored in 834, Gregory swore an oath that his intentions were honourable, and that he had always sought to achieve a peaceful solution to the conflict between Louis and his sons. Accepting Gregory’s word, the returned to Louis
2.
Pope Leo IV
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Pope Saint Leo IV was Pope from 10 April 847 to his death in 855. He is remembered for repairing Roman churches that had damaged during Arab raids on Rome. A Roman by birth, he was chosen to succeed Sergius II. When he was elected, on 10 April 847, he was cardinal of Santi Quattro Coronati and had been subdeacon of Gregory IV, the Saracens were besieging Gaeta, which led to Leos order that the walls of the city be restored and strengthened between 848 and 849. When the Muslims approached Portus, he summoned the Repubbliche Marinare – Naples, Gaeta, the command of the unified fleet was given to Cesarius, son of Duke Sergius I of Naples. The district enclosed by the walls is known as the Leonine City. Following the restoration of St. Peters, Leo appealed to the Christian kingdoms to confront the Arab raiders, Leo IV held three synods, one in 850 that was distinguished by the presence of Holy Roman Emperor Louis II, but the other two of little importance. The history of the struggle with Hincmar of Reims, which began during Leos pontificate. Leo IV died on 17 July 855 and was buried in St. Peters Basilica, benedict III was Leos immediate successor. A medieval tradition claimed that a woman, Pope Joan, succeeded him, disguising herself as a man, Leo IV was originally buried in his own monument, however some years after his death, his remains were put into a tomb that contained the first four Pope Leos. In the 18th century, the relics of Leo the Great were separated from the other Leos, Leo IV had the figure of a rooster placed on the Old St. It is reputed that Pope Gregory I had previously said that the cock was the most suitable emblem of Christianity, being the emblem of St Peter. After Leo IV, Pope Nicholas I, who had made a deacon by Leo IV. List of Catholic saints List of popes Cheetham, Nicolas, Keepers of the Keys, New York, ISBN 0-684-17863-X Catholic Encyclopedia, Pope St. Leo IV Opera Omnia by Migne Patrologia Latina with analytical indexes Colonnade Statue in St Peters Square
3.
Rome
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Rome is a special comune and the capital of Italy. Rome also serves as the capital of the Lazio region, with 2,873,598 residents in 1,285 km2, it is also the countrys largest and most populated comune and fourth-most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. It is the center of the Metropolitan City of Rome, which has a population of 4.3 million residents, the city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio, along the shores of the Tiber. Romes history spans more than 2,500 years, while Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at only around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe. The citys early population originated from a mix of Latins, Etruscans and it was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, and the expression was also taken up by Ovid, Virgil, and Livy. Rome is also called the Caput Mundi, due to that, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, and then the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters, sculptors and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, in 1871 Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, and in 1946 that of the Italian Republic. Rome has the status of a global city, Rome ranked in 2014 as the 14th-most-visited city in the world, 3rd most visited in the European Union, and the most popular tourist attraction in Italy. Its historic centre is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, monuments and museums such as the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum are among the worlds most visited tourist destinations with both locations receiving millions of tourists a year. Rome hosted the 1960 Summer Olympics and is the seat of United Nations Food, however, it is a possibility that the name Romulus was actually derived from Rome itself. As early as the 4th century, there have been alternate theories proposed on the origin of the name Roma. There is archaeological evidence of occupation of the Rome area from approximately 14,000 years ago. Evidence of stone tools, pottery and stone weapons attest to about 10,000 years of human presence, several excavations support the view that Rome grew from pastoral settlements on the Palatine Hill built above the area of the future Roman Forum. Between the end of the age and the beginning of the Iron age. However, none of them had yet an urban quality, nowadays, there is a wide consensus that the city was gradually born through the aggregation of several villages around the largest one, placed above the Palatine. All these happenings, which according to the excavations took place more or less around the mid of the 8th century BC. Despite recent excavations at the Palatine hill, the view that Rome has been indeed founded with an act of will as the legend suggests in the middle of the 8th century BC remains a fringe hypothesis. Traditional stories handed down by the ancient Romans themselves explain the earliest history of their city in terms of legend and myth
4.
Papal States
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The Papal States, officially the State of the Church, were territories in the Italian Peninsula under the sovereign direct rule of the pope, from the 8th century until 1870. They were among the states of Italy from roughly the 8th century until the Italian Peninsula was unified in 1861 by the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia. At their zenith, they covered most of the modern Italian regions of Lazio, Marche, Umbria and Romagna and these holdings were considered to be a manifestation of the temporal power of the pope, as opposed to his ecclesiastical primacy. By 1861, much of the Papal States territory had been conquered by the Kingdom of Italy, only Lazio, including Rome, remained under the Popes temporal control. In 1870, the pope lost Lazio and Rome and had no physical territory at all, Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini ended the crisis between unified Italy and the Vatican by signing the Lateran Treaty, granting the Vatican City State sovereignty. The Papal States were also known as the Papal State, the territories were also referred to variously as the State of the Church, the Pontifical States, the Ecclesiastical States, or the Roman States. For its first 300 years the Catholic Church was persecuted and unrecognized and this system began to change during the reign of the emperor Constantine I, who made Christianity legal within the Roman Empire, and restoring to it any properties that had been confiscated. The Lateran Palace was the first significant new donation to the Church, other donations followed, primarily in mainland Italy but also in the provinces of the Roman Empire. But the Church held all of these lands as a private landowner, the seeds of the Papal States as a sovereign political entity were planted in the 6th century. Beginning In 535, the Byzantine Empire, under emperor Justinian I, launched a reconquest of Italy that took decades and devastated Italys political, just as these wars wound down, the Lombards entered the peninsula from the north and conquered much of the countryside. While the popes remained Byzantine subjects, in practice the Duchy of Rome, nevertheless, the pope and the exarch still worked together to control the rising power of the Lombards in Italy. As Byzantine power weakened, though, the took a ever larger role in defending Rome from the Lombards. In practice, the papal efforts served to focus Lombard aggrandizement on the exarch, a climactic moment in the founding of the Papal States was the agreement over boundaries embodied in the Lombard king Liutprands Donation of Sutri to Pope Gregory II. When the Exarchate of Ravenna finally fell to the Lombards in 751, the popes renewed earlier attempts to secure the support of the Franks. In 751, Pope Zachary had Pepin the Younger crowned king in place of the powerless Merovingian figurehead king Childeric III, zacharys successor, Pope Stephen II, later granted Pepin the title Patrician of the Romans. Pepin led a Frankish army into Italy in 754 and 756, Pepin defeated the Lombards – taking control of northern Italy – and made a gift of the properties formerly constituting the Exarchate of Ravenna to the pope. The cooperation between the papacy and the Carolingian dynasty climaxed in 800, when Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne Emperor, the precise nature of the relationship between the popes and emperors – and between the Papal States and the Empire – is disputed. Events in the 9th century postponed the conflict, the Holy Roman Empire in its Frankish form collapsed as it was subdivided among Charlemagnes grandchildren
5.
Pope
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The pope is the Bishop of Rome and, therefore, the leader of the worldwide Catholic Church. The current pope is Francis, who was elected on 13 March 2013, the office of the pope is the papacy. The pope is considered one of the worlds most powerful people because of his diplomatic and he is also head of state of Vatican City, a sovereign city-state entirely enclaved within the Italian capital city of Rome. The papacy is one of the most enduring institutions in the world and has had a prominent part in world history, the popes in ancient times helped in the spread of Christianity and the resolution of various doctrinal disputes. In the Middle Ages, they played a role of importance in Western Europe. Currently, in addition to the expansion of the Christian faith and doctrine, the popes are involved in ecumenism and interfaith dialogue, charitable work, Popes, who originally had no temporal powers, in some periods of history accrued wide powers similar to those of temporal rulers. In recent centuries, popes were gradually forced to give up temporal power, the word pope derives from Greek πάππας meaning father. The earliest record of the use of title was in regard to the by then deceased Patriarch of Alexandria. Some historians have argued that the notion that Peter was the first bishop of Rome, the writings of the Church Father Irenaeus who wrote around AD180 reflect a belief that Peter founded and organised the Church at Rome. Moreover, Irenaeus was not the first to write of Peters presence in the early Roman Church, Clement of Rome wrote in a letter to the Corinthians, c. 96, about the persecution of Christians in Rome as the struggles in our time and presented to the Corinthians its heroes, first, the greatest and most just columns, the good apostles Peter and Paul. St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote shortly after Clement and in his letter from the city of Smyrna to the Romans he said he would not command them as Peter and Paul did. Given this and other evidence, many agree that Peter was martyred in Rome under Nero. Protestants contend that the New Testament offers no proof that Jesus established the papacy nor even that he established Peter as the first bishop of Rome, others, using Peters own words, argue that Christ intended himself as the foundation of the church and not Peter. First-century Christian communities would have had a group of presbyter-bishops functioning as leaders of their local churches, gradually, episcopacies were established in metropolitan areas. Antioch may have developed such a structure before Rome, some writers claim that the emergence of a single bishop in Rome probably did not occur until the middle of the 2nd century. In their view, Linus, Cletus and Clement were possibly prominent presbyter-bishops, documents of the 1st century and early 2nd century indicate that the Holy See had some kind of pre-eminence and prominence in the Church as a whole, though the detail of what this meant is unclear. It seems that at first the terms episcopos and presbyter were used interchangeably, the consensus among scholars has been that, at the turn of the 1st and 2nd centuries, local congregations were led by bishops and presbyters whose offices were overlapping or indistinguishable
6.
Pope Paschal I
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Pope Saint Paschal I was Pope from 25 January 817 to his death in 824. According to the Liber Pontificalis, Paschal was native of Rome and son of Bonosus, the Liber Censuum says that Paschal was from the Massimo family, as was his predecessor Pope Stephen IV. Paschal may have been a subdeacon, priest, and abbot of the monastery of St Stephen of the Abyssinians during the papacy of Pope Leo III, according to early modern accounts, Leo III may have elevated Paschal as the cardinal of Santa Prassede. Goodson attributes this account to a desire to explain the attention that the pope so lavishly and prominently paid to that later in his career. Paschal became pope on January 25,817, just one day after the death of Pope Stephen IV. This decision occurred before the sanction of the emperor Louis the Pious had been obtained, Paschal advised the emperor that the decision had been made to avoid factional strife in Rome. This document was challenged by historians as a forgery. At the time of Paschals reign, Rome was in a tumult, neither the papacy nor the nobles of the ever held control for very long. Paschal gave shelter to exiled monks from the Byzantine Empire who were persecuted for their opposition to iconoclasm and this is known because Byzantine Emperor Michael II wrote to Frankish King Louis the Pious in an attempt to stop it. In 822, he gave the legateship over the North to Ebbo and he licensed him to preach to the Danes, though Ebbo failed in three different attempts to convert them. Only later did Saint Ansgar succeed with them, in 823, Paschal crowned and anointed Lothair I as King of Italy, which set the precedent for the pope’s right to crown kings, and to do so in Rome. The decision outraged the Roman nobility, and led to an uprising against the authority of the Roman Curia in northern Italy, led by Paschal’s former legate, Theodore, and his son Leone. The revolt was suppressed, and the two leaders who were about to testify were seized at the Lateran, blinded and afterwards beheaded. Suspicious that the deaths were to cover up the involvement of the pope in the revolt, Paschal refused to submit to the authority of the imperial court, but issued an oath in which he denied all personal complicity in the crime. The commissioners returned to Aachen, and Emperor Louis let the matter drop, Paschal rebuilt three basilicas of Rome, Santa Prassede, Santa Maria in Domnica, and Santa Cecilia in Trastevere. Paschal also undertook significant renovations on Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore, in addition, Paschal added two oratories to Old St. Peters Basilica, SS. Xistus et Fabianus, which did not survive the 16th century renovation of St. Peters, Paschal is also sometimes credited with the renovation of Santo Stefano del Cacco in early modern sources, but this renovation was actually undertaken by Pope Paschal II. According to Goodson, Paschal used church-building to express the authority of the papacy as an independent state, Santa Cecilia in Trastevere Paschal is credited with finding the body of Saint Cecilia in the Catacomb of Callixtus and translating it to the rebuild the basilica of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere
7.
Holy Roman Emperor
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The Holy Roman Emperor was the ruler of the Holy Roman Empire. From an autocracy in Carolingian times the title evolved into an elected monarchy chosen by the Prince-electors, until the Reformation the Emperor elect was required to be crowned by the Pope before assuming the imperial title. The title was held in conjunction with the rule of the Kingdom of Germany, in theory, the Holy Roman Emperor was primus inter pares among the other Catholic monarchs, in practice, a Holy Roman Emperor was only as strong as his army and alliances made him. Various royal houses of Europe, at different times, effectively became hereditary holders of the title, after the Reformation many of the subject states and most of those in Germany were Protestant while the Emperor continued to be Catholic. The Holy Roman Empire was dissolved by the last Emperor as a result of the collapse of the polity during the Napoleonic wars, from the time of Constantine I the Roman emperors had, with very few exceptions, taken on a role as promoters and defenders of Christianity. In the west, the title of Emperor was revived in 800, as the power of the papacy grew during the Middle Ages, popes and emperors came into conflict over church administration. The best-known and most bitter conflict was known as the Investiture Controversy. After Charlemagne was crowned Emperor of the Romans by Pope Leo III, no pope appointed an emperor again until the coronation of Otto the Great in 962. Under Otto and his successors, much of the former Carolingian kingdom of Eastern Francia fell within the boundaries of the Holy Roman Empire, the various German princes elected one of their peers as King of the Germans, after which he would be crowned as emperor by the Pope. After Charles Vs coronation, all succeeding emperors were called elected Emperor due to the lack of papal coronation, the term sacrum in connection with the medieval Roman Empire was first used in 1157 under Frederick I Barbarossa. Charles V was the last Holy Roman Emperor to be crowned by the Pope, the final Holy Roman Emperor-elect, Francis II, abdicated in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars that saw the Empires final dissolution. The standard designation of the Holy Roman Emperor was August Emperor of the Romans, the word Holy had never been used as part of that title in official documents. In German-language historiography, the term Römisch-deutscher Kaiser is used to distinguish the title from that of Roman Emperor on one hand, the English term Holy Roman Emperor is a modern shorthand for emperor of the Holy Roman Empire not corresponding to the historical style or title. Successions to the kingship were controlled by a variety of complicated factors, elections meant the kingship of Germany was only partially hereditary, unlike the kingship of France, although sovereignty frequently remained in a dynasty until there were no more male successors. The Electoral council was set at seven princes by the Golden Bull of 1356, another elector was added in 1690, and the whole college was reshuffled in 1803, a mere three years before the dissolution of the Empire. After 1438, the Kings remained in the house of Habsburg and Habsburg-Lorraine, with the exception of Charles VII. Maximilian I and his successors no longer travelled to Rome to be crowned as Emperor by the Pope, Maximilian therefore named himself Elected Roman Emperor in 1508 with papal approval. This title was in use by all his uncrowned successors, of his successors only Charles V, the immediate one, received a papal coronation
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Sergius". Encyclopædia Britannica. 24 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 667.
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). 
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Pope Sergius II". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton.
