687 



STEPHEN IV. (OF ROME). 



STEPHEN X. (OF ROME). 



should be made over to St. Peter and tbe Roman see. Pepin, accom- 

 panied by Stephen, marched with an army into Italy, defeated Astol- 

 phuf, besieged him in Pavia, and obliged him to promise to give up 

 Ravenna with the Exarchate, which embraced the actual provinces 

 called the Papal Legations, and the Pentapolis or present March of 

 Ancona, including Urbino and Pesaro. Astolphus made the promise, 

 and gave hostages to Pepin, who quickly returned to France (A.D. 

 754). In the following year however Astolphus, having recruited his 

 forces, marcbed straight to Rome, to which he laid siege, devastating 

 the country around. Pope Stephen now wrote to Pepin in the most 

 urgent manner, in the name of St. Peter: "Petrus vocatus Apostolus 

 a Jesu Christo Dei vivi filio : Viris excellentissimis Pipino, Carlo et 

 Carolomanno tribus regibus," &c., promising them and all the French 

 people eternal life, if they would support the rights of St. Peter's see, 

 but threatening them with eternal perdition if they neglected so to do. 

 These remarkable letters of Pope Stephen are in Baronius, Duchesne, 

 and the Codex Carolinus. Pepin quickly repaired to Italy, again 

 defeated Astolphus, who had been obliged to raise the siege of Rome 

 in order to oppose him, and besieged him in Pavia. While Pepin 

 was encamped before that city, an envoy appeared before him, sent 

 by Constantino Copronymus, emperor of the East, who, after praising 

 Pepin for having driven the Longobards out of the Exarchate, 

 demanded its restitution to its former sovereign the emperor. Pepin 

 replied, that the Exarchate had belonged to the Longobards by right 

 of conquest, and also by the will of the people, who had given them- 

 selves up to King Luitprand, in consequence of the persecution of the 

 images ordered by the Greek emperors ; and that now by the same 

 right those provinces belonged to Pepin, who had taken them from 

 the Longobards, and that he had thought it expedient to give them 

 to the pope for the honour and advancement of the Catholic church, 

 and to keep it free both from the heresies of the Greeks and from the 

 ambition and rapacity of the Longobards. (Anastasius 'in Yita 

 Stephani III.') Pepin, having dismissed the envoy with this answer, 

 continued to press the siege of Pavia, and Astolphus was obliged to 

 sue for peace. Pepin required him immediately to deliver to his com- 

 missioner Fulrad, abbot of St. Denis, the towns of the Exarchate and 

 Pentapolis, and to cause them to be evacuated by the Longobards. 

 This being done, Fulrad carried the keys of those towns to Rome, and 

 deposited them on the sepulchre of the holy Apostle, together with 

 the solemn deed of donation signed by Pepin, his two sons, and the 

 principal barons and prelates of France. This act of donation is lost, 

 but from some of the expressions, gathered from Pope Stephen's 

 letters, it appears that it was made to " the blessed Peter, and the 

 holy church of God," and "to the Roman republic." The city and 

 duchy of Rome were therefore not included in the donation, as they 

 had not been conquered either by the Lougobards or by Pepin. The 

 pope then entrusted the administration of the Exarchate to the arch- 

 bishop of Ravenna. Some critics, especially French, and Sigonius 

 himself, assume that Pepin gave to the pope only the " utile domi- 

 mum " of the Exarchate and Pentapolis, and retained for himself and 

 his successors the "jus imperii," or sovereign rights. 



Soon after this memorable transaction Abtolphus died of an accident 

 while hunting, and Desiderius, king of Tuscany, was chosen by the 

 Longobards for their king. Ratchis, brother of Astolphus, who had 

 formerly abdicated the crown and turned monk, left his convent and 

 aspired again to the throne. Desiderius applied to Pope Stephen, 

 who ordered Ratchis to return to his convent. Ratchis obeyed, and 

 Desiderius was acknowledged king. In the following year (April 757) 

 Pope Stephen died, and was succeeded by Paul I. We have of Pope 

 Stephen's writings, besides his letters in the Codex Carolinus, his 

 ' Responsa ad Gallos,' in Harduin's ' Concilia.' 



STEPHEN IV., styled III. by some, a Sicilian by birth, was elected 

 pope in 768, more than a year after the death of Paul I., during which 

 tune one Constantino, a layman, and brother of Toto, king of Nepi, 

 intruded himself by force on the papal see, having obliged Gregory, 

 bishop of Pneneste, to ordain and consecrate him. At last, part of the 

 Roman clergy, supported by the Longobard duke of Spoleto, who sent 

 an armed force to Rome, overcame the faction of Constantino, who 

 was deposed, deprived of his eyes, and shut up in a convent, and 

 Stephen was elected. The new pope convoked a council in the 

 Lateran, in which all the abettors of Constantino were degraded. 

 Shortly after, new disturbances broke out in Rome, which induced 

 Desiderius, king of the Longobards, to go thither with some troops. 

 He had several interviews with Pope Stephen in the Vatican Basilica 

 outside of the walls, and assisted him in quelling the insurrection, the 

 leaders of which had their eyes put out. 



King Pepin being dead, the kingdom of the Franks was divided 

 between his two sons, Charles and Carlomann. Bertha, Pepin's 

 widow, having made a journey into Jtaly, saw King Desiderius, and - 

 arranged with him a matrimonial alliance between two of his daughters 

 and her two sons. Pope Stephen, upon hearing this, wrote to the two 

 kings of the Franks a very violent letter, which is contained in the 

 Codex Carolinus, dissuading them from the proposed alliance, and 

 asserting that it would be "arrant folly to contaminate their Loble 

 legal race with the perfidious and infected race of the Longobards, 

 who had brought leprosy into Italy, and who did not deserve to be 

 reckoned among nations; that having promised to St. Peter to be 

 friends of hie friends, and enemies to his enemies, they ought to shim 



the alliance of the Longobards, who were enemies to Rome," adding 

 several scriptural passages which he made to bear upon the subject : 

 he concluded by stating that he wrote this letter upon the sepulchre 

 of the holy Apostle, and he threatened them with excommunication if 

 they spurned his advice. The alliance however took place, at least in 

 part ; for Charles (afterwards Charlemagne) married Hermengarda, 

 daughter of Desiderius, whom he repudiated a year after, to marry 

 Hildegard, a German princess. 



Sergius, archbishop of Ravenna, being dead, the Archduke Leo wa 

 elected his successor ; but Mauritius, duke of Rimini, went to Ravenna 

 with an armed force, and violently placed in the archiepiscopal see the 

 archivist Michael, a layman. Pope Stephen refused to consecrate 

 Michael, who, after having stripped the church and treasury of many 

 valuables, at last retired, and made room for Leo. It is said that King 

 Desiderius favoured Michael. Pope Stephen, in the latter part of his 

 pontificate, was at open variance with the king of the Longobards, 

 who kept or recovered possession of Ferrara, Comacchio, and Faenza, 

 which formed part of tho long-disputed Exarchate. Pope Stephen 

 died at the beginning of 772, and was succeeded by Adrian I. 



STEPHEN V., a native of Rome, succeeded Leo III. in 816. 

 Shortly after his consecration he went to France to confer with the 

 Emperor Louis the Pious, whom he met at Orleans, and who received 

 him with great honour. On his return to Rome, he died in the 

 seventh month of his pontificate. He founded at Rome the monastery 

 of Santa Prassede, which he gave to a congregation of Greek monks, 

 who retained their own liturgy. 



STEPHEN VI., a Roman, succeeded Adrian III. in 885. He found, 

 on his succession, the Lateran palace stripped of its treasures and other 

 valuables by the relatives and attendants of the late pope, according 

 to the practice of those times. The public granaries were also empty, 

 and the people of Rome were suffering from famine resulting from A 

 bad harvest and from swarms of locusts which had desolated the 

 country. Stephen ordered the fields to be sprinkled with holy water ; 

 but at the same time he promised a bounty in money for every 

 measure of dead locusts which the peasants should bring him, and this 

 had the effect of clearing the country of that scourge. He also sold 

 his own property to relieve the poor. Pope Stephen had beeii 

 consecrated by John, bishop of Pavia, who was one of the imperial 

 'missi; ' but the Emperor Charles the Fat was angry because the new 

 pope had not waited for his approbation, and he sent some of his 

 officers to Rome to arrest him. Stephen however having forwarded 

 the report of his election, made according to the canonical forms, and 

 numerous attestations of both clergy and laity, the emperor was 

 pacified. In the year 887 Charles the Fat was deposed, and his vast 

 monarchy parcelled out. Berengarius, duke of Friuli, was elected by 

 part of the Italian barons king of Italy ; but he found a rival in Guy, 

 duke of Spoleto, who overthrew. Berengarius iu battle, and was 

 crowned at Rome by the pope, in February 891, with the title of 

 emperor, ' Wido Imperator Augustus.' Soon after this solemnity 

 Pope Stephen died, and was succeeded by Formosus. Pope Stephen is 

 said by Gulielmus Bibliothecarius to have been a man of learning : he 

 collected manuscripts, which he gave to the Basilica of St. Paul. 



STEPHEN VII., Bishop of Anagni, and a native of Rome, succeeded 

 in 896 Benedict VI., who had not lived a month after his election, 

 which took place on the death of Formosus. Stephen, from what 

 motive is not clearly ascertained, persecuted with the greatest bitter- 

 ness the memory of Pope Formosus, caused his body to be disinterred 

 and stripped of its pontifical garments, and thrown into a common 

 grave among laymen. He justified himself by the fact that Formosus, 

 before his elevation to the papacy, had been excommunicated by Pope 

 John VIII., in consequence of the frequent factious strifes which often 

 broke out at Rome. Stephen also annulled all the acts and decrees 

 of Formosus. This affair of Formosus gave rise to much controversy, 

 which lasted during several successive pontificates; and a contemporary 

 writer called Auxilius wrote in defence of the memory of Formosus, 

 'De Ordinatione Formosi Libri Duo.' In 897 an insurrection of the 

 friends of Formosus broke out at Rome, and Pope Stephen was seized, 

 cast into prison, and strangled. He was succeeded by Romanus, who 

 annulled all Stephen's acts as to Formosus. 



STEPHEN VIII., succeeded Leo VI. in 928. This was the period 

 when Marozia, and her husband Guido, duke of Tuscany, ruled in 

 Rome. They had put to death Pope John X., and are said to have 

 done the eame to his successor Leo VI., whose pontificate lasted only 

 seven months. The election of Stephen is supposed therefore to 

 have been effected with their approbation ; but we have no historical 

 record concerning the particulars of his pontificate. The 10th century 

 is the truly dark ago of Italian history. Stephen VIII., styled by 

 some VII., died in December 930, and was succeeded by John XL, 

 son of Marozia. 



STEPHEN IX., succeeded Leo VII. in 939. Rome was then governed 

 by Alberic, son of Marozia, who assumed the title of " prince and 

 senator of all the Romans." Little or nothing is known of Stephen IX. 'a 

 pontificate. Martinus Polonus alone, a chronicler of dubious authority, 

 says he was roughly handled by the Romans in a popular tumult, and 

 was crippled for the rest of his life. He died in 942, and was succeeded 

 by Martinus III. 



STEPHEN X., styled IX. by some, CARDINAL FREDERIC, abbot of 

 Monte Casino, and brother of Godfrey, duke of Tuscany, succeeded 



