Part 2 — CHAPTER IV. Concerning the infallible teaching of the Roman Pontiff: (continued 19)

H. Bradley, Story of the Goths, chapters 16-20.

"Theodoric professed a great reverence for the Roman civilization. He had asked for and obtained from the Emperor Anastasius the imperial insignia that Odovakar had disdainfully sent back to Constantinople, and he gave up the dress of the barbarians for the Roman purple. Although he lived at Ravenna he was accustomed to consult the Roman senate, to whom he wrote: 'We desire, conscript fathers, that the genius of liberty may look with favor upon your assembly.' He established a consul of the West, three prætorian prefects, and three dioceses,—that of northern Italy, that of Rome, and that of Gaul. He retained the municipal government, but appointed the decurions himself. He reduced the severity of the taxes, and his palace was always open to those who wished to complain of the iniquities of the judges. … Thus a barbarian gave back to Italy the prosperity which she had lost under the emperors. The public buildings, aqueducts, theatres, and baths were repaired, and palaces and churches were built. The uncultivated lands were cleared and companies were formed to drain the Pontine marshes and the marshes of Spoleto. The iron mines of Dalmatia and a gold mine in Bruttii were worked. The coasts were protected from pirates by numerous flotillas. The population increased greatly. Theodoric, though he did not know how to write, gathered around him the best literary merit of the time,—Boethius, the bishop Ennodius, and Cassiodorus. The latter, whom he made his minister, has left us twelve books of letters. Theodoric seems in many ways like a first sketch of Charlemagne. Though himself an Arian, he respected the rights of the Catholics from the first. … When, however, the Emperor Justin I. persecuted the Arians in the East, he threatened to retaliate, and as a great commotion was observed among his Italian subjects, he believed that a conspiracy was being formed against himself. … The prefect Symmachus and his son-in-law, Boethius, were implicated. Theodoric confined them in the tower of Pavia, and it was there that Boethius wrote his great work, The Consolations of Philosophy. They were both executed in 525. Theodoric, however, finally recognized their innocence, and felt such great regret that his reason is said to have been unbalanced and that remorse hastened his end."

V. Duruy, History of the Middle Ages, book 1, chapter 3.

"The personal greatness of Theodoric overshadowed Emperor and Empire; from his palace at Ravenna, by one title or another, by direct dominion, as guardian, as elder kinsman, as representative of the Roman power, as head by natural selection of the whole Teutonic world, he ruled over all the western lands save one; and even to the conquering Frank he could say, Thus far shalt thou come and no further. In true majesty such a position was more than Imperial; moreover there was nothing in the rule of Theodoric which touched the Roman life of Italy. … As far as we can see, it was the very greatness of Theodoric which kept his power from being lasting. {2740} Like so many others of the very greatest of men, he set on foot a system which he himself could work, but which none but himself could work. He sought to set up a kingdom of Goths and Romans, under which the two nations should live side by side, distinct but friendly, each keeping its own law and doing its own work. And for one life-time the thing was done. Theodoric could keep the whole fabric of Roman life untouched, with the Goth standing by as an armed protector. He could as he said, leave to the Roman consul the honours of government and take for the Gothic king only the toils. Smaller men neither could nor would do this. … It was the necessary result of his position that he gave Italy one generation of peace and prosperity such as has no fellow for ages on either side of it, but that, when he was gone, a fabric which had no foundation but his personal qualities broke down with a crash."

E. A. Freeman, Chief Periods of European History, lecture 3.

ALSO IN: E. A. Freeman, The Goths at Ravenna (Historical Essays, volume 3, chapter 4).

T. Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, book 4, chapters 6-13 (volume 3).

Cassiodorus, Letters, translated and edited by T. Hodgkin.

H. F. Stewart, Boethius, chapter 2.

ROME: A. D. 527-565. The reign of Justinian.

"In the year after the great Theoderic died (526), the most famous in the time of Eastern emperors, since Constantine, began his long and eventful reign (527-567). Justinian was born a Slavonian peasant, near what was then Sardica, and is now Sofia; his original Slave name, Uprawda, was latinized into Justinian, when he became an officer in the imperial guard. Since the death of the second Theodosius (450), the Eastern emperors had been, as they were continually to be, men not of Roman or Greek, but of barbarian or half barbarian origin, whom the imperial city and service attracted, naturalized, and clothed with civilized names and Roman character. Justinian's reign, so great and so unhappy, was marked by magnificent works, the administrative organization of the empire, the great buildings at Constantinople, the last and grandest codification of Roman law.

See CORPUS JURIS CIVILIS.

But it was also marked by domestic shame, by sanguinary factions, by all the vices and crimes of a rapacious and ungrateful despotism.

See CIRCUS, FACTIONS OF THE ROMAN.

Yet it seemed for a while like the revival of the power and fortune of Rome. Justinian rose to the highest ideas of imperial ambition; and he was served by two great masters of war, foreigners in origin like himself, Belisarius the Thracian, and Narses the Armenian, who were able to turn to full account the resources, still enormous, of the empire, its immense riches, its technical and mechanical skill, its supplies of troops, its military traditions, its command of the sea. Africa was wrested from the Vandals;

See VANDALS: A. D. 533-534;

Italy from the successors of Theoderic [see below]; much of Spain from the West Goths."

R. W. Church, The Beginning of the Middle Ages, chapter 6.

"In spite of the brilliant events which have given the reign of Justinian a prominent place in the annals of mankind, it is presented to us in a series of isolated and incongruous facts. Its chief interest is derived from the biographical memorials of Belisarius, Theodora, and Justinian; and its most instructive lesson has been drawn from the influence which its legislation has exercised on foreign nations. The unerring instinct of mankind has however fixed on this period as one of the greatest eras in man's annals. The actors may have been men of ordinary merit, but the events of which they were the agents effected the mightiest revolutions in society. The frame of the ancient world was broken to pieces, and men long looked back with wonder and admiration at the fragments which remained, to prove the existence of a nobler race than their own. The Eastern Empire, though too powerful to fear any external enemy, was withering away from the rapidity with which the State devoured the resources of the people. … The life of Belisarius, either in its reality or its romantic form, has typified his age. In his early youth, the world was populous and wealthy, the empire rich and powerful. He conquered extensive realms and mighty nations and led kings captive to the footstool of Justinian, the lawgiver of civilisation. Old age arrived; Belisarius sank into the grave suspected and impoverished by his feeble and ungrateful master; and the world, from the banks of the Euphrates to those of the Tagus, presented the awful spectacle of famine and plague, of ruined cities, and of nations on the brink of extermination. The impression on the hearts of men was profound."

G. Finlay, Greece under the Romans, chapter 3, section 1.

See PLAGUE: A. D. 542-594.

ALSO IN: Lord Mahon, Life of Belisarius.

ROME: A. D. 528-556. The Persian Wars and the Lazic War of Justinian.

See PERSIA: A. D. 226-627; also, LAZICA.

ROME: A. D. 535-553. Fall of the Gothic kingdom of Theodoric. Recovery of Italy by the Emperor Justinian. The long Gothic siege of Rome. The siege, capture and pillage by Totila. The forty days of lifeless desolation in the great city.

On the death of the great Theodoric, the Ostrogothic crown passed, not to his daughter, Amalasuntha, but to her son, Athalaric, a child of eight or ten years. The boy-king died at the age of sixteen, and Amalasuntha assumed the regal power and title, calling one of her cousins, named Theodatus, or Theodahad, to the throne, to share it with her. She had powerful enemies in the Gothic court and the ungrateful Theodatus was soon in conspiracy with them. Amalasuntha and her partisans were overcome, and the unhappy queen, after a short imprisonment on a little island in the lake of Bolsena, was put to death. These dissensions in the Gothic kingdom gave encouragement to the Eastern emperor, the ambitious Justinian, to undertake the reconquest of Italy. His great general, Belisarius, had just vanquished the Vandals and restored Carthaginian Africa to the imperial domain.

See VANDALS: A. D. 533-534.

With far smaller forces than that achievement demanded, Belisarius was now sent against the Goths. He landed, first, in Sicily (A. D. 535), and the whole island was surrendered to him, almost without a blow. The following spring (having crossed to Carthage meantime and quelled a formidable revolt), he passed the straits from Messina and landed his small army in Italy. Marching northwards, he encountered his first opposition at Neapolis—modern Naples—where he was detained for twenty days by the stout resistance of the city. {2741} It was surprised, at length, by a storming party which crept through one of the aqueducts of the town, and it suffered fearfully from the barbarians of the Roman army before Belisarius could recover control of his savage troops. Pausing for a few months to organize his easy conquest of southern Italy, he received, before he marched to Rome, the practical surrender of the capital. On the 9th of December, 536, he entered the city and the Gothic garrison marched out. The Goths, meantime, had deposed the cowardly Theodatus and raised to the throne their most trusty warrior, Witigis. They employed the winter of 537 in gathering all their available forces at Ravenna, and in the spring they returned to Rome, 150,000 strong, to expel the Byzantine invader. Belisarius had busily improved the intervening months, and the long-neglected fortifications of the city were wonderfully restored and improved. At the beginning of March, the Goths were thundering at the gates of Rome; and then began the long siege, which endured for a year and nine days, and which ended in the discomfiture of the huge army of the besiegers. Their retreat was a flight and great numbers were slain by the pursuing Romans. "The numbers and prowess of the Goths were rendered useless by the utter incapacity of their commander. Ignorant how to assault, ignorant how to blockade, he allowed even the sword of Hunger to be wrested from him and used against his army by Belisarius. He suffered the flower of the Gothic nation to perish, not so much by the weapons of the Romans as by the deadly dews of the Campagna." After the retreat of the Goths from Rome, the conquest of Italy would have been quickly completed, no doubt, if the jealousy of Justinian had not hampered Belisarius, by sending the eunuch Narses—who proved to be a remarkable soldier, in the end—to divide the command with him. As it was, the surrender to Belisarius of the Gothic capital, Ravenna, by the Gothic king, Witigis, in the spring of 540, seemed to make the conquest an accomplished fact. The unconquered Gothic warriors then held but two important cities—Verona and Pavia. Milan they had retaken after losing it, and had practically destroyed, massacring the inhabitants.

See MILAN: A. D. 539.

But now they chose a new king, Ildibad, who reigned promisingly for a year and was slain; then another, who wore the crown but five months; and, lastly, they found a true royal chief in the knightly young warrior Baduila, or Totila, by whose energy and valor the Gothic cause was revived. Belisarius had been recalled by his jealous master, and the quarrels of eleven generals who divided his authority gave every opportunity to the youthful king. Defeating the Roman armies in two battles, at Faenza and in the valley of Mugello, near Florence, he crossed the Apennines, passed by Rome, besieged and took Naples and Cumæ and overran all the southern provinces of Italy, in 542 and 543, finding everywhere much friendliness among the people, whom the tax-gatherers of Justinian had alienated by their merciless rapacity. In 544, Belisarius, restored to favor and command only because of the desperate need of his services, came back to Italy to recover what his successors had lost; but he came almost alone. Without adequate troops, he could only watch, from Ravenna, and circumscribe a little, the successes of his enterprising antagonist. The latter, having strengthened his position well, in central as well as in southern Italy, applied himself to the capture of Rome. In May, 546, the Gothic lines were drawn around the city and a blockade established which soon produced famine and despair. An attempt by Belisarius to break the leaguer came to naught, and Rome was betrayed to Totila on the 17th of December following. He stayed the swords of his followers when they began to slay, but gave them full license to plunder. When the great city had been stripped and most of its inhabitants had fled, he resolved to destroy it utterly; but he was dissuaded from that most barbarous design by a letter of remonstrance from Belisarius. Contenting himself, then, with throwing down a great part of the walls, he withdrew his whole army—having no troops to spare for an adequate garrison—and took with him every single surviving inhabitant (so the historians of the time declare), so that Rome, for the space of six weeks or more (January and February, 547), was a totally deserted and silent city. At the end of that time, Belisarius threw his army inside of the broken walls, and repaired them with such celerity that Totila was baffled when he hastened back to expel the intruders. Three times the Goths attacked and were repulsed; the best of their warriors were slain; the prestige of their leader was lost. But, once more, jealousies and enmities at Constantinople recalled Belisarius and the Goths recovered ground. In 549 they again invested Rome and it was betrayed to them, as before, by a part of the garrison. Totila now made the great city—great even in its ruins—his capital, and exerted himself to restore its former glories. His arms for a time were everywhere successful. Sicily was invaded and stripped of its portable wealth. Sardinia and Corsica were occupied; the shores of Greece were threatened. But in 552 the tide of fortune was turned once more in favor of Justinian,—this time by his second great general, the eunuch Narses. In one decisive battle fought that year, in July, at a point on the Flaminian Way where it crosses the Apennines, the army of the Goths was broken and their king was slain. The remnant which survived crowned another king, Teias; but, he, too, perished, the following March, in a battle fought at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, and the Ostrogothic kingdom was at an end. Rome was already recovered—the fifth change of masters it had undergone during the war—and one by one, all the strong places in the hands of the Goths were given up. The restoration of Italy to the Empire was complete.

T. Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, book 4, chapter 16; book 5, chapters 1-24.

"Of all ages in history the sixth is the one in which the doctrine that the Roman Empire came to an end at some time in the fifth sounds most grotesque. Again the Roman armies march to victory, to more than victory, to conquest, to conquests more precious than the conquests of Cæsar or of Trajan, to conquests which gave back Rome herself to her own Augustus. We may again be met with the argument that we have ourselves used so often; that the Empire had to win back its lost provinces does indeed prove that it had lost them; but no one seeks to prove that the provinces had not been lost; what the world is loth to understand is that there was still life enough in the Roman power to win them back again. {2742} I say the Roman power; what if I said the Roman commonwealth? It may startle some to hear that in the sixth century, nay in the seventh, the most common name for the Empire of Rome is still 'respublica.' No epithet is needed; there is no Deed to say that the 'respublica' spoken of is 'respublica Romano.' It is the Republic which wins back Italy, Africa, and Southern Spain from their Teutonic masters. … The point of the employment of the word lies in this, that it marks the unbroken being of the Roman state; in the eyes of the men of the sixth century the power which won back the African province in their own day was the same power which had first won it well-nigh seven hundred years before. The consul Belisarius was the true successor of the consul Scipio."

E. A. Freeman, The Chief Periods of European History, lecture 4.

ALSO IN: E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapters 41 and 43.

J. B. Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire, book 4, chapters 5-7 (volume 1).

R. H. Wrightson, The Sancta Respublica Romana, chapters 5-7.

Lord Mahon, Life of Belisarius.

ROME: A. D. 541. Extinction of the office of Consul.

See CONSUL, ROMAN.

ROME: A. D. 554-800. The Exarchate of Ravenna.

On the final overthrow and annihilation of the Gothic monarchy in Italy by the decisive victories of the eunuch Narses, its throne at Ravenna was occupied by a line of vice-royal rulers, named exarchs, who represented the Eastern Roman emperor, being appointed by him and exercising authority in his name. "Their jurisdiction was soon reduced to the limits of a narrow province; but Narses himself, the first and most powerful of the exarchs, administered above fifteen years the entire kingdom of Italy. … A duke was stationed for the defence and military command of each of the principal cities; and the eye of Narses pervaded the ample prospect from Calabria to the Alps. The remains of the Gothic nation evacuated the country or mingled with the people. … The civil state of Italy, after the agitation of a long tempest, was fixed by a pragmatic sanction, which the emperor promulgated at the request of the pope. Justinian introduced his own jurisprudence into the schools and tribunals of the West. … Under the exarchs of Ravenna, Rome was degraded to the second rank. Yet the senators were gratified by the permission of visiting their estates in Italy, and of approaching without obstacle the throne of Constantinople: the regulation of weights and measures was delegated to the pope and senate; and the salaries of lawyers and physicians, of orators and grammarians, were destined to preserve or rekindle the light of science in the ancient capital. … During a period of 200 years Italy was unequally divided between the kingdom of the Lombards and the exarchate of Ravenna. … Eighteen successive exarchs were invested, in the decline of the empire, with the full remains of civil, of military and even of ecclesiastical power. Their immediate jurisdiction, which was afterwards consecrated as the patrimony of St. Peter, extended over the modern Romagna, the marshes or valleys of Ferrara and Commachio, five maritime cities from Rimini to Ancona, and a second inland Pentapolis, between the Adriatic coast and the hills of the Apennine. Three subordinate provinces—of Rome, of Venice, and of Naples—which were divided by hostile lands from the palace of Ravenna, acknowledged, both in peace and war, the supremacy of the exarch. The duchy of Rome appears to have included the Tuscan, Sabine, and Latin conquests of the first 400 years of the city, and the limits may be distinctly traced along the coast, from Civita Vecchio, to Terracina, and with the course of the Tiber from Ameria and Narni to the port of Ostia. The numerous islands from Grado to Chiozza composed the infant dominion of Venice; but the more accessible towns on the continent were overthrown by the Lombards, who beheld with impotent fury a new capital rising from the waves. The power of the dukes of Naples was circumscribed by the bay and the adjacent isles, by the hostile territory of Capua, and by the Roman colony of Amalphi. … The three islands of Sardinia, Corsica, and Sicily still adhered to the empire. … Rome was oppressed by the iron sceptre of the exarchs, and a Greek, perhaps a eunuch, insulted with impunity the ruins of the Capitol. But Naples soon acquired the privilege of electing her own dukes; the independence of Amalphi was the fruit of commerce; and the voluntary attachment of Venice was finally ennobled by an equal alliance with the Eastern empire."

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapters 43 and 45.

{2742a} {2742b}

[IMAGE: EUROPE AT THE DEATH OF THE EMPEROR JUSTINIAN 565 A. D. EAST ROMAN EMPIRE RACE DIVISIONS CELTIC PEOPLES. SLAVIC PEOPLES. LITHUANIAN PEOPLES. URAL ALTAIC PEOPLES. SCANDINAVIANS. ANGLES, SAXONS, JUTES ETC. THE GERMANIC STATES AND PEOPLES ALL APPEAR IN DIFFERENT SHADES OF PINK.]

ROME: A. D. 565-628. Decline of the Eastern Empire. Thickening calamities. Reigns of Justinus II., Tiberius Constantinus, Maurice, and Phocas. Brief brightening of events by Heraclius. His campaigns against the Persians.

"The thirty years which followed the death of Justinian are covered by three reigns, those of Justinus II. (565-578), Tiberius Constantinus (578-582), and Maurice (582-602). These three emperors were men of much the same character as the predecessors of Justinian; each of them was an experienced official of mature age, who was selected by the reigning emperor as his most worthy successor. … Yet under them the empire was steadily going down hill: the exhausting effects of the reign of Justinian were making themselves felt more and more, and at the end of the reign of Maurice a time of chaos and disaster was impending, which came to a head under his successor. … The misfortunes of the Avaric and Slavonic war [see AVARS] were the cause of the fall of the Emperor Maurice. … Maurice sealed his fate when, in 602, he issued orders for the discontented army of the Danube to winter north of the river, in the waste marshes of the Slavs. The troops refused to obey the order, and chased away their generals. Then electing as their captain an obscure centurion, named Phocas, they marched on Constantinople. Maurice armed the city factions, the 'Blues' and 'Greens,' and strove to defend himself. But when he saw that no one would fight for him, he fled across the Bosphorus with his wife and children, to seck refuge in the Asiatic provinces, where he was less unpopular than in Europe. Soon he was pursued by orders of Phocas, whom the army had now saluted as emperor, and caught at Chalcedon. The cruel usurper had him executed, along with all his five sons, the youngest a child of only three years of age. … For the first time since Constantinople had become the seat of empire the throne had been won by armed rebellion and the murder of the legitimate ruler. … {2743} Phocas was a mere brutal soldier—cruel, ignorant, suspicious, and reckless, and in his incapable hands the empire began to fall to pieces with alarming rapidity. He opened his reign with a series of cruel executions of his predecessor's friends, and from that moment his deeds of bloodshed never ceased. … The moment that Phocas had mounted the throne, Chosroës of Persia declared war on him, using the hypocritical pretext that he wished to revenge Maurice, for whom he professed a warm personal friendship. This war was far different from the indecisive contests in the reigns of Justinian and Justin II. In two successive years the Persians burst into North Syria and ravaged it as far as the sea; but in the third they turned north and swept over the hitherto untouched provinces of Asia Minor. In 608 their main army penetrated across Cappadocia and Galatia right up to the gates of Chalcedon. The inhabitants of Constantinople could see the blazing villages across the water on the Asiatic shore. … Plot after plot was formed in the capital against Phocas, but he succeeded in putting them all down, and slew the conspirators with fearful tortures. For eight years his reign continued. … Africa was the only portion of the Roman Empire which in the reign of Phocas was suffering neither from civil strife nor foreign invasion. It was well governed by the aged exarch Heraclius, who was so well liked in the province that the emperor had not dared to depose him. Urged by desperate entreaties from all parties in Constantinople to strike a blow against the tyrant, and deliver the empire from the yoke of a monster, Heraclius at last consented." He sent his son—who bore the same name, Heraclius—with a fleet, to Constantinople. Phocas was at once abandoned by his troops and was given up to Heraclius, whose sailors slew him. "Next day the patriarch and the senate hailed Heraclius [the younger] as emperor, and he was duly crowned in St. Sophia on October 5, A. D. 610. … Save Africa and Egypt and the district immediately around the capital, all the provinces were overrun by the Persian, the Avar and the Slav. The treasury was empty, and the army had almost disappeared, owing to repeated and bloody defeats in Asia Minor. Heraclius seems at first to have almost despaired. … For the first twelve years of his reign he remained at Constantinople, endeavouring to reorganize the empire, and to defend at any rate the frontiers of Thrace and Asia Minor. The more distant provinces he hardly seems to have hoped to save, and the chronicle of his early years is filled with the catalogue of the losses of the empire. … In 614 the Persian army appeared before the holy city of Jerusalem, took it after a short resistance and occupied it with a garrison. But the populace rose and slaughtered the Persian troops, when Shahrbarz had departed with his main army. This brought him back in wrath: he stormed the city and put 90,000 Christians to the sword, only sparing the Jewish inhabitants. Zacharias, Patriarch of Jerusalem, was carried into captivity, and with him went what all Christians then regarded as the most precious thing in the world—the wood of the 'True Cross'. …

See JERUSALEM: A. D. 615.

The horror and rage roused by the loss of the 'True Cross' and the blasphemies of King Chosroës brought about the first real outburst of national feeling that we meet in the history of the Eastern Empire. … Heraclius made no less than six campaigns (A. D. 622-627) in his gallant and successful attempt to save the half-ruined empire. He won great and well-deserved fame, and his name would be reckoned among the foremost of the world's warrior-kings if it had not been for the misfortunes which afterwards fell on him in his old age. His first campaign cleared Asia Minor of the Persian hosts, not by a direct attack, but by skilful strategy. … In his next campaigns Heraclius endeavoured to liberate the rest of the Roman Empire by a similar plan: he resolved to assail Chosroës at home, and force him to recall the armies he kept in Syria and Egypt to defend his own Persian provinces. In 623-4 the Emperor advanced across the Armenian mountains and threw himself into Media. … Chosroës … fought two desperate battles to cover Ctesiphon. His generals were defeated in both, but the Roman army suffered severely. Winter was at hand, and Heraclius fell back on Armenia. In his next campaign he recovered Roman Mesopotamia. … But 626 was the decisive year of the war. The obstinate Chosroës determined on one final effort to crush Heraclius, by concerting a joint plan of operations with the Chagan of the Avars. While the main Persian army watched the emperor in Armenia, a great body under Shahrbarz slipped south of him into Asia Minor and marched on the Bosphorus. At the same moment the Chagan of the Avars, with the whole force of his tribe and of his Slavonic dependents, burst over the Balkans and beset Constantinople on the European side. The two barbarian hosts could see each other across the water, and even contrived to exchange messages, but the Roman fleet, sailing incessantly up and down the strait, kept them from joining forces. … In the end of July 80,000 Avars and Slavs, with all sorts of siege implements, delivered simultaneous assaults along the land front of the city, but they were beaten back with great slaughter." They suffered even more on trying to encounter the Roman galleys with rafts. "Then the Chagan gave up the siege in disgust and retired across the Danube." Meantime Heraclius was wasting Media and Mesopotamia, and next year he ended the war by a decisive victory near Nineveh, as the result of which he took the palace of Dastagerd, "and divided among his troops such a plunder as had never been seen since Alexander the Great captured Susa. … In March, 628, a glorious peace ended the 26 years of the Persian war. Heraclius returned to Constantinople in the summer of the same year with his spoils, his victorious army, and his great trophy, the 'Holy Wood.' … The quiet for which he yearned was to be denied him, and the end of his reign was to be almost as disastrous as the commencement. The great Saracen invasion was at hand, and it was at the very moment of Heraclius' triumph that Mahomet sent out his famous circular letter to the kings of the earth, inviting them to embrace Islam."

C. W. C. Oman, The Story of the Byzantine Empire, chapters 9-10.

ALSO IN: J. B. Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire, book 4, part 2, and book 5, chapters 1-3 (volume 2).

See, also, PERSIA: A. D. 226-627.

ROME: A. D. 568-573. Invasion of the Lombards. Their conquest of northern Italy. Their kingdom.

See LOMBARDS: A. D. 568-573; and 573-754.

{2744}

ROME: A. D. 590-640. Increasing influence and importance of the Bishop of Rome. Circumstances under which his temporal authority grew.

"The fall of the shadowy Empire of the West, and the union of the Imperial power in the person of the ruler of Constantinople, brought a fresh accession of dignity and importance to the Bishop of Rome. The distant Emperor could exercise no real power over the West. The Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy scarcely lasted beyond the lifetime of its great founder Theodoric. The wars of Justinian only served to show how scanty were the benefits of the Imperial rule. The invasion of the Lombards united all dwellers in Italy in an endeavour to escape the lot of servitude and save their land from barbarism. In this crisis it was found that the Imperial system had crumbled away, and that the Church alone possessed a strong organisation. In the decay of the old municipal aristocracy the people of the towns gathered round their bishops, whose sacred character inspired some respect in the barbarians, and whose active charity lightened the calamities of their flocks. In such a state of things Pope Gregory the Great raised the Papacy [A. D. 590] to a position of decisive eminence, and marked out the course of its future policy. The piety of emperors and nobles had conferred lands on the Roman Church, not only in Italy, but in Sicily, Corsica, Gaul, and even in Asia and Africa, until the Bishop of Rome had become the largest landholder in Italy. To defend his Italian lands against the incursions of the Lombards was a course suggested to Gregory by self-interest; to use the resources which came to him from abroad as a means of relieving the distress of the suffering people in Rome and Southern Italy was a natural prompting of his charity. In contrast to this, the distant Emperor was too feeble to send any effective help against the Lombards, while the fiscal oppression of his representatives added to the miseries of the starving people. The practical wisdom, administrative capacity, and Christian zeal of Gregory I. led the people of Rome and the neighbouring regions to look upon the Pope as their head in temporal as well as in spiritual matters. The Papacy became a national centre to the Italians, and the attitude of the Popes towards the Emperor showed a spirit of independence which rapidly passed into antagonism and revolt. Gregory I. was not daunted by the difficulties nor absorbed by the cares of his position at home. When he saw Christianity threatened in Italy by the heathen Lombards, he boldly pursued a system of religious colonisation. While dangers were rife at Rome, a band of Roman missionaries carried Christianity to the distant English, and in England first was founded a Church which owed its existence to the zeal of the Roman bishop. Success beyond all that he could have hoped for attended Gregory's pious enterprise. The English Church spread and flourished, a dutiful daughter of her mother-church of Rome. England sent forth missionaries in her turn, and before the preaching of Willibrod and Winifred heathenism died away in Friesland, Franconia, and Thuringia. Under the new name of Boniface, given him by Pope Gregory II., Winifred, as Archbishop of Mainz, organised a German Church, subject to the successor of S. Peter. The course of events in the East also tended to increase the importance of the See of Rome. The Mohammedan conquests destroyed the Patriarchates of Antioch and Jerusalem, which alone could boast of an apostolical foundation. Constantinople alone remained as a rival to Rome; but under the shadow of the Imperial despotism it was impossible for the Patriarch of Constantinople to lay claim to spiritual independence. The settlement of Islam in its eastern provinces involved the Empire in a desperate struggle for its existence. Henceforth its object no longer was to reassert its supremacy over the West, but to hold its ground against watchful foes in the East. Italy could hope for no help from the Emperor, and the Pope saw that a breach with the Empire would give greater independence to his own position, and enable him to seek new allies elsewhere."

M. Creighton, History of the Papacy during the Period of the Reformation, introduction, chapter 1 (volume 1).

ALSO IN: T. W. Allies, The Holy See and the Wandering of the Nations, chapter 5.

See, also, CHRISTIANITY: A. D. 553-800; and PAPACY: A. D. 461-604, and after.

ROME: A. D. 632-709. The Eastern Empire. Its first conflicts with Islam. Loss of Syria, Egypt, and Africa.

See MAHOMETAN CONQUEST: A. D. 632-639, to 647-709.

ROME: A. D. 641-717. The Eastern Empire.

The period between the death of Heraclius and the advent of Leo III. (the Isaurian) is covered, in the Eastern Empire, by the following reigns:

Constantine III. and Heracleonas (641); Constans II. (641-668); Constantine IV. (668-685); Justinian II. (685-711); Leontius and Absimarus (usurpers, who interrupted the reign of Justinian II. from 695 to 698 and from 698 to 704); Philippicus (711-713); Anastasius II. (713-716); Theodosius III. (716-717).

ROME: A. D. 717-800. The Eastern Roman Empire: should it take the name of the Byzantine Empire?—and when?

"The precise date at which the eastern Roman empire ceased to exist has been variously fixed. Gibbon remarks, 'that Tiberius [A. D. 578-582] by the Arabs, and Maurice [A. D. 582-602] by the Italians, are distinguished as the first of the Greek Cæsars, as the founders of a new dynasty and empire.' But if manners, language, and religion are to decide concerning the commencement of the Byzantine empire, the preceding pages have shown that its origin must be carried back to an earlier period; while, if the administrative peculiarities in the form of government be taken as the ground of decision, the Roman empire may be considered as indefinitely prolonged with the existence of the title of Roman emperor, which the sovereigns of Constantinople continued to retain as long as Constantinople was ruled by Christian princes. … The period … at which the Roman empire of the East terminated is decided by the events which confined the authority of the imperial government to those provinces where the Greeks formed the majority of the population; and it is marked by the adoption of Greek as the language of the government, by the prevalence of Greek civilisation, and by the identification of the nationality of the people, and the policy of the emperors with the Greek church. For, when the Saracen conquests had severed from the empire all those provinces which possessed a native population distinct from the Greeks, by language, literature, and religion, the central government of Constantinople was gradually compelled to fall back on the interests and passions of the remaining inhabitants, who were chiefly Greeks. … {2745} Yet, as it was by no means identified with the interests and feelings of the native inhabitants of Hellas, it ought correctly to be termed Byzantine, and the empire is, consequently, justly called the Byzantine empire. … Even the final loss of Egypt, Syria, and Africa only reveals the transformation of the Roman empire, when the consequences of the change begin to produce visible effects on the internal government. The Roman empire seems, therefore, really to have terminated with the anarchy which followed the murder of Justinian II. [A. D. 711], the last sovereign of the family of Heraclius; and Leo III., or the Isaurian [A. D. 717-741], who identified the imperial administration with ecclesiastical forms and questions, must be ranked as the first of the Byzantine monarchs, though neither the emperor, the clergy, nor the people perceived at the time the moral change in their position, which makes the establishment of this new era historically correct. Under the sway of the Heraclian family [A. D. 610-711], the extent of the empire was circumscribed nearly within the bounds which it continued to occupy during many subsequent centuries. … The geographical extent of the empire at the time of its transition from the Roman to the Byzantine empire affords evidence of the influence which the territorial changes produced by the Saracen conquests exercised in conferring political importance on the Greek race. The frontier towards the Saracens of Syria commenced at Mopsuestia in Cilicia, the last fortress of the Arab power. It ran along the chains of Mounts Amanus and Taurus to the mountainous district to the north of Edessa and Nisibis, called, after the time of Justinian, the Fourth Armenia, of which Martyropolis was the capital. It then followed nearly the ancient limits of the empire until it reached the Black Sea, a short distance to the east of Trebizond. … In Europe, Mount Hæmus [the Balkans] formed the barrier against the Bulgarians, while the mountainous ranges which bound Macedonia to the north-west, and encircle the territory of Dyrrachium, were regarded as the limits of the free Sclavonian states. … Istria, Venice, and the cities on the Dalmatian coast, still acknowledged the supremacy of the empire. … In the centre of Italy, the exarchate of Ravenna still held Rome in subjection, but the people of Italy were entirely alienated. … The cities of Gaëta, Naples, Amalfi, and Sorento, the district of Otranto, and the peninsula to the south of the ancient Sybaris, now called Calabria, were the only parts [of southern Italy] which remained under the Byzantine government. Sicily, though it had begun to suffer from the incursions of the Saracens, was still populous and wealthy."

G. Finlay, Greece under the Romans, chapter 5, sections 1 and 7.

Dissenting from the view presented above, Professor Freeman says: "There is no kind of visible break, such as is suggested by the change of name, between the Empire before Leo and the Empire after him. The Emperor of the Romans reigned over the land of Romania after him as well as before him. … Down to the fall of Constantinople in the East, down to the abdication of Francis II. in the West, there was no change of title; the Emperor of the Romans remained Emperor of the Romans, however shifting might be the extent of his dominions. But from 800 to 1453 there were commonly two, sometimes more, claimants of the title. The two Empires must be distinguished in some way; and, from 800 to 1204, 'Eastern' and 'Western' seem the simplest forms of distinction. But for 'Eastern' it is just as easy, and sometimes more expressive, to say 'Byzantine'; only it is well not to begin the use of either name as long as the Empire keeps even its nominal unity. With the coronation of Charles the Great [800] that nominal unity comes to an end. The Old Rome passes away from even the nominal dominion of the prince who reigns in the New."

E. A. Freeman, Historical Essays, series 3, page 244.

See BYZANTINE EMPIRE.

ROME: A. D. 728-733. Beginnings of Papal Sovereignty. The Iconoclastic controversy. Rupture with the Byzantine Emperor. Practical independence assumed by the Pope.

See PAPACY: A. D. 728-774; and ICONOCLASTIC CONTROVERSY.

ROME: A. D. 751. Fall of the Exarchate of Ravenna.

See PAPACY: A. D. 728-774.

ROME: A. D. 754-774. Struggle of the Popes against the Lombards. Their deliverance by Pippin and Charlemagne. Fall of the Lombard kingdom.

See LOMBARDS: A. D. 754-774; also, PAPACY: A. D. 728-774, and 755-774.

ROME: A. D. 800. Coronation of Charlemagne. The Empire revived.

See FRANKS: A. D. 768-814; and GERMANY: A. D. 800.

ROME: A. D. 843-951. The breaking up of Charlemagne's Empire and founding of the Holy Roman Empire.

See ITALY: A. D. 843-951; FRANKS: A. D. 814-962; and GERMANY: A. D. 814-843, to 936-973.

ROME: A. D. 846-849. Attack by the Saracens.

"A fleet of Saracens from the African coast presumed to enter the mouth of the Tiber, and to approach a city which even yet, in her fallen state, was revered as the metropolis of the Christian world. The gates and ramparts were guarded by a trembling people; but the tombs and temples of St. Peter and St. Paul were left exposed in the suburbs of the Vatican and of the Ostian Way. Their invisible sanctity had protected them against the Goths, the Vandals, and the Lombards; but the Arabs disdained both the Gospel and the legend; and their rapacious spirit was approved and animated by the precepts of the Koran. The Christian idols were stripped of their costly offerings. … In their course along the Appian Way, they pillaged Fundi and besieged Gaeta." The diversion produced by the siege of Gaeta gave Rome a fortunate respite. In the interval, a vacancy occurred on the papal throne, and Pope Leo IV. by unanimous election, was raised to the place. His energy as a temporal prince saved the great city. He repaired its walls, constructed new towers and barred the Tiber by an iron chain. He formed an alliance with the cities of Gaeta, Naples, and Amalfi, still vassals of the Greek empire, and brought their galleys to his aid. When, therefore, in 849, the Saracens from Africa returned to the attack, they met with a terrible repulse. An opportune storm assisted the Christians in the destruction of their fleet, and most of the small number who escaped death remained captives in the hands of the Romans and their allies.

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 52.

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ROME: A. D. 903-964. The reign of the courtesans and their brood. Interference of Otho the Great. His revival of the Empire.

"During these changes [in the breaking up of the empire of Charlemagne], Rome became a sort of theocratic democracy, governed by women and priests; a state of things which, in the barbarism of the middle ages, was only possible at Rome. Theodora, a woman of patrician descent, equally celebrated for her beauty and her daring, obtained great power in Rome, which she prolonged by the charms of her two daughters. The city of Saint Peter was ruled by this trio of courtesans. The mother, Theodora, by her familiar commerce with several of the Roman barons, had obtained possession of the castle of Saint Angelo, at the entrance of Rome, on one of the principal bridges over the Tiber; and she had made it an abode of pleasure and a fortress, whence she corrupted and oppressed the Church. Her daughters, Marozia and Theodora, disposed of the pontificate by their own arts, or through their lovers, and occasionally bestowed it on the lovers themselves. Sergius III., after a contested election and seven years' exile, was recalled to the see of Rome by the interest of Marozia, by whom he had had a son, who afterwards became Pope. The younger Theodora was no less ambitious and influential than her sister. She loved a young clerk of the Roman Church, for whom she had first obtained the bishopric of Bologna, and then the archbishopric of Ravenna. Finding it irksome to be separated from him by a distance of 200 miles, she procured his nomination to the papacy, in order to have him near her; and he was elected Pope in 912, under the title of John X. … After a pontificate of fourteen years, John was displaced by the same means to which he owed his elevation." Marozia, who had married Guy, Duke of Tuscany, conspired with her husband against the Pope and he was put out of the way. That accomplished, "Marozia allowed the election of two Popes successively, whose pontificate was obscure and short; and then she raised to the papal see a natural son of hers, it is said, by Pope Sergius III., her former lover. This young man took the name of John XI., and Marozia, his mother, having soon after lost her husband, Guy, was sought in marriage by Hugh, King of Italy, and his brother by the mother's side. But it would appear that the people of Rome were growing weary of the tyranny of this shameless and cruel woman." King Hugh was driven from Rome by a revolt, in which another son of Marozia, named Alberic, took the lead. "Alberic, the leader of this popular rising, was proclaimed consul by the Romans, who still clung to the traditions of the republic; he threw his mother, Marozia, into prison, and set a guard over his brother, Pope John; and thus, invested with the popular power, he prepared to defend the independence of Rome against the pretensions of Hugh and the forces of Lombardy. Alberic, master of Rome under the title of patrice and senator, exercised, during twenty-three years, all the rights of sovereignty. The money was coined with his image, with two sceptres across; he made war and peace, appointed magistrates and disposed of the election and of the power of the Popes, who, in that interval, filled the See of Rome, John XI., Leo VII., Stephen IX., Martin III., and Agapetus II. The name of this subject and imprisoned papacy was none the less revered beyond the limits of Rome. … Alberic died lord of Rome, and had bequeathed his power to his son Octavian; who, two years afterwards, on the death of Agapetus II., caused himself, young as he was, to be named Pope by those who already acknowledged him as patrice."

A. F. Villemain, Life of Gregory VII., introduction, period 6.

"He [Octavian] was elected Pope on the 23d of March, A. D. 956. His promotion was a disgraceful calamity. He brought to the chair of St. Peter only the vices and dissolute morals of a young debauchee; and though Luitprand must have exaggerated the disorders of this Pope, yet there remains enough of truth in the account to have brought down the scandal of the pontificate through succeeding ages, like a loud blasphemy, which makes angels weep and hell exult. Octavian assumed the name of John XII. This first example of a change of name on ascending the pontifical chair has since passed into a custom with all the Sovereign Pontiffs."

Abbé J. E. Darras, General History of the Catholic Church, period 4, chapter 7.

Finding it hard to defend his independence against the king of Italy, Pope John XII. made the mistake, fatal to himself, of soliciting help from the German king Otho the Great. Otho came, made himself master of Italy, revived the empire of Charlemagne, was crowned with the imperial crown of Rome, by the Pope, and then purged the Roman See by causing the bestial young pope who crowned him to be deposed.

See ROMAN EMPIRE, THE HOLY; and GERMANY; A. D. 936-973.

John was subsequently reinstated by the Romans, but died soon after, A. D. 964.

H. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, book 5, chapter 12.

The state of things at Rome described in the above has been fitly styled by some writers "a pornocracy."

ROME: A. D. 962-1057. Futile attempts of the German Emperors to reform the Papacy. Chronic disorganization of the city.

"It had not been within the power of the Emperor Otto I. to establish a permanent reformation in Rome. … The previous scandalous scenes were renewed, and a slight amelioration of things under the Popes Gregory V. and Silvester II., whom Otto III. placed on the papal throne [A. D. 997-1003], was but transitory. … For the third time it became necessary for an emperor, in this instance Henry III., to constitute himself the preserver and purifier of the papacy, first at Sutri and afterwards at Rome. At that period the papal chair was occupied within twelve years by five German popes [Clement II. to Victor II.—A. D. 1046-1057], since amongst the Roman clergy no fitting candidate could be found. These popes, with one exception, died almost immediately, poisoned by the unhealthy atmosphere of Rome; one only, Leo IX., under Hildebrand's guidance, left any lasting trace of his pontificate, and laid the foundation of that Gregorian system which resulted in papal supremacy. … Rome was assuming more and more the character of a sacerdotal city; the old wealthy patrician families had either disappeared or migrated to Constantinople; and as the seat of government was either at Constantinople or Ravenna, there was no class of state officials in Rome. But the clergy had become rich upon the revenues of the vast possessions of St. Peter. … Without manufactures, trade, or industry of their own, the people of Rome were induced to rely upon exactions levied upon the foreigner, and upon profits derived from ecclesiastical institutions. … Hence the unvarying sameness in the political history of Rome from the 5th to the 15th century."

J. I. von Döllinger, Studies in European History, chapter. 3.

See PAPACY: A. D. 887-1046.

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NINTH CENTURY.

CONTEMPORANEOUS EVENTS.

A.D. 801. Conquest of Barcelona from the Moors by the Franks.

805. Charlemagne's subjugation of the Avars. Creation of the Austrian march.

806. Division of the Empire by Charlemagne between his sons formally planned.

809. Death of the Caliph Haroun al Raschid.

812. Civil war between the sons of the Caliph Haroun al Raschid; siege of Bagdad.

814. Death of Charlemagne, and accession of Louis the Pious, his only surviving son.

816. Death of Pope Leo III.; election of Stephen IV.

817. Partition of the Empire of the Franks by Louis the Pious.

826. Grant of a county between the Rhine and Moselle to Harold of Jutland, by the Emperor.

821. Beginning of Moslem conquest of Sicily.

830. First rebellion of the sons of the Emperor Louis the Pious.

833. Second rebellion of the Emperor's sons; the "Field of Lies"; deposition of the Emperor Louis the Pious. Death of the Caliph Mamun, son of Haroun al Raschid.

834. Restoration of Louis the Pious.

835. Invasion of the Netherlands and sacking of Utrecht by the Northmen.

836. Burning of Antwerp and ravaging of Flanders by the Northmen. Death of Ecgberht, the first king of all the English.

837. First expedition of the Northmen up the Rhine.

838. Asia Minor invaded by the Caliph Motassem; the Amorian War.

840. Third rebellion of the sons of the Frankish Emperor Louis the Pious; his death; civil war.

841. Expedition of the Northmen up the Seine; their capture of Rouen.

842. The Oath of Strasburg.

843. Conquest by the Mahometans of Messina in Sicily. Partition Treaty of Verdun between the sons of the Emperor Louis the Pious; formation of the realms of Louis the German and Charles the Bald, which grew into the kingdoms of Germany and France.

845. First attack of the Northmen on Paris; their destruction of Hamburg.

846. Rome attacked by the Moslems.

847. Siege and capture of Bordeaux by the Northmen.

849. Birth of Alfred the Great (d. 901).

852. Revolt against the Moslems in Armenia.

854. Ravages of the Northmen on the Loire checked at Orleans.

855. Death of Lothaire, Emperor of the Franks, and civil war between his sons. First footing of the Danes established in England.

851. Deposition of Ignatius, Patriarch of Constantinople, and elevation of Photius.

860. Discovery of Iceland by the Northmen. [Uncertain date.]

861. Formation of the Duchy of France; origin of the House of Capet. Paris surprised by the Northmen.

863. Papal decree against the Eastern Patriarch, Photius. Creation of the County of Flanders by Charles the Bald.

864. Mission of Cyril and Methodius to the Slavonians.

865. First Varangian or Russian attack on Constantinople.

866. Beginning of the permanent conquests of the Danes in England.

871. Moslem fortress of Bari, in southern Italy, surrendered to the Franks and Greeks. Accession of Alfred the Great to the throne of Wessex.

815. Death of Louis II., Emperor of the Franks and king of Italy; imperial coronation of Charles the Bald.

876. The Seine entered by the Northmen under Rollo.

817. Death of the Emperor, Charles the Bald, and accession of Louis the Stammerer. Founding of the kingdom of Provence by Count Boso.

878. Capture by the Moslems of Syracuse in Sicily.

880. Ravages of the Northmen in Germany; battles of the Ardennes and Ebbsdorf. Defeat of the Danes by the English King Alfred at Ethandun; Peace of Wedmore. [Uncertain date.]

881. Accession of Charles the Fat, king of Germany and Italy.

884. Temporary reunion of the Empire of the Franks under Charles the Fat.

885. Siege of Paris by the Northmen under Rollo.

881. Deposition of the Emperor, Charles the Fat.

888. Death of Charles the Fat and final disruption of the Empire of the Franks; founding of the kingdom of Transjurane Burgundy. The crown of France in dispute between Eudes, Count of Paris, and the Caroling heir, Charles the Simple.

889. Second siege of Paris by Rollo.

890. Third siege of Paris and siege of Bayeux by Rollo.

891. Defeat of the Danes at Louvain by King Arnulf.

894. Arnulf of Germany made Emperor.

890. Rome taken by the Emperor Arnulf.

898. Death of Eudes, leaving Charles the Simple sole king of France.

899. Death of the Emperor Arnulf; accession of Louis the Child to the German throne.

900. Italy ravaged in the north by the Hungarians.

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TENTH CENTURY.

CONTEMPORANEOUS EVENTS.

A.D. 901. Death of the English king, Alfred the Great, and accession of his son, Edward the Elder. Founding of the Samanide dynasty in Khorassan.

904. Sergius III. made Pope; beginning of the rule of the courtesans at Rome.

909. Founding of the Fatimite caliphate in Africa.

910. Founding of the monastery of Clugny in France.

911. Death of the Emperor Louis the Child, extinguishing the Carolingian dynasty in Germany, and election of Conrad the Franconian. Defeat of the Northmen at Chartres in France; cession of Normandy to Rollo.

912. Baptism of the Norman Duke Rollo.

914. Elevation of John X. to the papal throne by the courtesan, Theodora. [Uncertain date.]

916. Imperial coronation in Italy of Berengar.

919. Election of the Saxon Duke, Henry the Fowler, to the kingship of Germany. Establishment of the Danish kingdom of Dublin.

923. The crown of France disputed with Charles the Simple by Rudolph, of Burgundy.

924. Devastation of Germany by the Hungarians; truce agreed upon for nine years. Lapse of the imperial title on the death of Berengar. Commendation of Scotland to the West Saxon King.

925. Death of the English king, Edward the Elder, and accession of his son Ethelstan.

928. Overthrow and imprisonment of Pope John X. by the courtesan Marozia. [Uncertain date.]

929. Death of Charles the Simple in France.

931. John XI., son of the courtesan Marozia, made Pope. [Uncertain date.]

932. Domination of Rome by the Pope's brother, Alberic.

936. Election of Otho, called the Great, to the throne of Germany. Death of Rudolph of Burgundy and restoration of the Carolingians to the French throne.

937. Ethelstan's defeat of Danes, Britons and Scots at the battle of Brunnaburgh. Invasion of France by the Hungarians.

940. Death of the English king, Ethelstan, and accession of his brother Edmund.

946. Death of the English king, Edmund, and accession of his brother Edred.

951. First expedition of Otho the Great into Italy; founding of the Holy Roman Empire (afterwards so called).

954. Death of Alberic, tyrant of Rome, his son, Octavian, succeeding him. Death of the Carolingian king of France, Louis IV., called "d'Outremer"; accession of Lothaire.

955. Germany invaded by the Hungarians; their decisive defeat on the Lech. Death of the English king, Edred, and accession of his nephew, Edwig.

956. Assumption of the Papal throne by Octavian, as John XII.

957. Revolt against the English king Edwig; division of the kingdom with his brother Edgar. [Uncertain date.]

959. Death of Edwig and accession of Edgar; Abbot Dunstan made Archbishop of Canterbury.

961. The crown of Italy taken by Otho the Great, of Germany.

962. Imperial coronation of Otho the Great at Rome; revival of the Western Empire.

963. Expulsion and deposition of Pope John XII.; election of Leo VIII.

964. Expulsion of Pope Leo VIII.; return and death of John XII.; siege and capture of Rome by the Emperor.

965. Death of Pope Leo VIII.; election, expulsion, and forcible restoration of John XIII.

967. Conquest of Egypt by the Fatimite caliph. [Uncertain date.]

969. Murder of the Eastern Emperor Nicephorus Phocas by John Zimisces, his successor.

972. Marriage of Otho, the Western Emperor's son, to the Byzantine princess, Theophano. Death of Pope John XIII., and election of Pope Benedict VI.

973. Death of the Emperor Otho the Great; accession of Otho II.

974. Murder of Pope Benedict VI.

975. Election of Pope Benedict VII. Death of the English king Edgar; accession of his son Edward the Martyr.

979. Death of Edward the Martyr; accession of Ethelred the Unready. [Uncertain date.]

983. Death of the Emperor Otho II.; accession of Otho III. to the German throne, under the regency of his mother, Theophano. First visit of Erik the Red to Greenland.

984. Election of Pope John XIV.

985. Murder of Pope John XIV.; election of Pope John XV.

986. Death of Lothaire, king of France; accession of his son Louis V.

987. Death of Louis V., the last of the Carolingian kings; election of Hugh Capet.

988. Death of Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury. Cherson acquired by the Romans.

991. Invasion of England by Vikings from Norway; battle of Maldon.

996. Death of Hugh Capet, king of France; accession of his son, Robert II. Death of Pope John XV.; election of Gregory V. Imperial coronation of Otho III.

997. Insurrection of peasants in Normandy. Rebellion of Crescentius in Rome; expulsion of the Pope.

998. Overthrow of Crescentius at Rome. Excommunication of King Robert of France.

999. Gerbert raised by the Emperor to the Papal chair, as Sylvester II.

1000. Expectations of the end of the world. Pilgrimages of the Emperor Otho. Royal title conferred on Duke Stephen of Hungary, by the Pope. Christianity formally adopted in Iceland.

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ROME: A. D. 1077-1102. Donation of the Countess Matilda to the Holy See.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1077-1102.

ROME: A. D. 1081-1084. Surrender to Henry IV. Terrible Norman visitation.

Four years after his humiliation of himself before the pope at Canossa (see CANOSSA), Henry IV. ("King of the Romans" and claiming the imperial coronation, which the pope refused him), entered Italy with an army to enforce his demands. He had recovered his authority in Germany; the rival set up against him was slain; northern Italy was strong in his support. For three successive years Henry marched his army to the walls of Rome and made attempts to enter, by force, or intrigue, or by stress of blockade, and every year, when the heats of summer came, he found himself compelled to withdraw. At last, the Romans, who had stood firm by Gregory VII., tired of the siege, or the gold which purchased their fidelity (some say) gave out, and they opened their gates. Pope Gregory took refuge in his impregnable Castle of St. Angelo, and Henry, bringing with him the anti-pope whom his partisans had set up, was crowned by the latter in the Church of St. Peter. But the coveted imperial crown was little more than settled upon his head when news came of the rapid approach of Robert Guiscard, the Norman conqueror of southern Italy, with a large army, to defend the legitimate pope. Henry withdrew from Rome in haste and three days afterwards Robert Guiscard's army was under its walls. The Romans feared to admit these terrible champions of their pope; but the vigilance and valor of the Normans surprised a gate, and the great city was in their power. They made haste to conduct Gregory to his Lateran Palace and to receive his blessing; then they "spread through the city, treating it with an the cruelty of a captured town, pillaging, violating, murdering, wherever they met with opposition. The Romans had been surprised, not subdued. For two days and nights they brooded over their vengeance; on the third day they broke out in general insurrection. … The Romans fought at advantage, from their possession of the houses and their knowledge of the ground. They were gaining the superiority; the Normans saw their peril. The remorseless Guiscard gave the word to fire the houses. … The distracted inhabitants dashed wildly into the streets, no longer endeavouring to defend themselves, but to save their families. They were hewn down by hundreds. … Nuns were defiled, matrons forced, the rings cut from their living fingers. Gregory exerted himself, not without success, in saving the principal churches. It is probable, however, that neither Goth nor Vandal, neither Greek nor German, brought such desolation on the city as this capture by the Normans. From this period dates the desertion of the older part of the city, and its gradual extension over the site of the modern city, the Campus Martius. … Many thousand Romans were sold publicly as slaves; many carried into the remotest parts of Calabria." When Guiscard withdrew his destroying army from the ruins of Rome, Gregory went with him and never returned. He died not long after at Salerno.

H. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, book 7, chapter 3.

ALSO IN: A. F. Villemain, Life of Gregory VII., book 9.

See, also, GERMANY: A. D. 973-1122, and PAPACY: A. D. 1056-1122.

ROME: A. D. 1122-1250. Conflict of the Popes with the Hohenstaufen Emperors.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1122-1250; and GERMANY: A. D. 1138-1268.

ROME: A. D. 1145-1155. The Republic of Arnold of Brescia.

Arnold of Brescia—so-called from his native city in Lombardy—was a disciple of Abelard, and not so much a religious as a political reformer. "On all the high mysterious doctrines of the Church, the orthodoxy of Arnold was unimpeachable; his personal life was that of the sternest monk; he had the most earnest sympathy with the popular religion. … He would reduce the clergy to their primitive and apostolic poverty; confiscate all their wealth, escheat all their temporal power. … His Utopia was a great Christian republic, exactly the reverse of that of Gregory VII." In 1145, Arnold was at Rome, where his doctrines had gone before him, and where the citizens had already risen in rebellion against the rule of the pope. "His eloquence brought over the larger part of the nobles to the popular side; even some of the clergy were infected by his doctrines. The re~public, under his influence, affected to resume the constitution of elder Rome. … The Capitol was rebuilt and fortified; even the church of St. Peter was sacrilegiously turned into a castle. The Patrician took possession of the Vatican, imposed taxes, and exacted tribute by violence from the pilgrims. Rome began again to speak of her sovereignty of the world." The republic maintained itself until 1155, when a bolder pope —the Englishman, Adrian or Hadrian IV.—had mounted the chair of St. Peter, and confronted Arnold with unflinching hostility. The death of one of his Cardinals, killed in a street tumult, gave the pope an opportunity to place the whole city under an interdict. "Religion triumphed over liberty. The clergy and the people compelled the senate to yield. Hadrian would admit of no lower terms than the abrogation of the republican institutions; the banishment of Arnold and his adherents. The republic was at an end, Arnold an exile; the Pope again master in Rome." A few months later, Arnold of Brescia, a prisoner in the hands of Frederick Barbarossa, then coming to Rome for the imperial crown, was given up to the Pope and was executed in some summary way, the particulars of which are in considerable dispute.

H. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, book 8. chapters 6-7.

ALSO IN: J. Miley, History of the Papal States, book 6.

ROME: A. D. 1155. Tumult at the coronation of Frederick Barbarossa.

See ITALY: A. D. 1154-1162.

ROME: A. D. 1167. The taking of the city by Frederick Barbarossa.

See ITALY: A. D. 1166-1167.

ROME: A. D. 1198-1216. The establishing of Papal Sovereignty in the States of the Church.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1198-1216.

ROME: A. D. 1215. The beginning in Italy of the strife of the Guelphs and Ghibellines.

See ITALY: A. D. 1215.

{2748}

ROME: 13-14th Centuries. The turbulence of the Roman nobles. The strife of the Colonna and the Ursini.

"In the beginning of the 11th century Italy was exposed to the feudal tyranny, alike oppressive to the sovereign and the people. The rights of human nature were vindicated by her numerous republics, who soon extended their liberty and dominion from the city to the adjacent country. The sword of the nobles was broken; their slaves were enfranchised; their castles were demolished; they assumed the habits of society and obedience. … But the feeble and disorderly government of Rome was unequal to the task of curbing her rebellious sons, who scorned the authority of the magistrate within and without the walls. It was no longer a civil contention between the nobles and plebeians for the government of the state. The barons asserted in arms their personal independence; their palaces and castles were fortified against a siege; and their private quarrels were maintained by the numbers of their vassals and retainers. In origin and affection they were aliens to their country; and a genuine Roman, could such have been produced, might have renounced these haughty strangers, who disdained the appellation of citizens, and proudly styled themselves the princes of Rome. After a dark series of revolutions, all records of pedigree were lost; the distinction of surnames was abolished; the blood of the nations was mingled in a thousand channels; and the Goths and Lombards, the Greeks and Franks, the Germans and Normans, had obtained the fairest possessions by royal bounty or the prerogative of valour. … It is not my design to enumerate the Roman families which have failed at different periods, or those which are continued in different degrees of splendour to the present time. The old consular line of the Frangipani discover their name in the generous act of breaking or dividing bread in a time of famine; and such benevolence is more truly glorious than to have enclosed, with their allies the Corsi, a spacious quarter of the city in the chains of their fortifications. The Savelli, as it should seem a Sabine race, have maintained their original dignity; the obsolete surname of the Capizucchi is inscribed on the coins of the first senators; the Conti preserve the honour, without the estate, of the counts of Signia; and the Annibaldi must have been very ignorant, or very modest, if they had not descended from the Carthaginian hero. But among, perhaps above, the peers and princes of the city, I distinguish the rival houses of Colonna and Ursini [or Orsini]. … About the end of the thirteenth century the most powerful branch [of the Colonna] was composed of an uncle and six brothers, all conspicuous in arms or in the honours of the Church. Of these Peter was elected senator of Rome, introduced to the Capitol in a triumphant car, and hailed in some vain acclamations with the title of Cæsar; while John and Stephen were declared Marquis of Ancona and Count of Romagna by Nicholas IV., a patron so partial to their family that he has been delineated in satirical portraits, imprisoned, as it were, in a hollow pillar. After his decease their haughty behaviour provoked the displeasure of the most implacable of mankind. The two cardinals, the uncle and the nephew, denied the election of Boniface VIII.; and the Colonna were oppressed for a moment by his temporal and spiritual arms. He proclaimed a crusade against his personal enemies; their estates were confiscated; their fortresses on either side of the Tiber were besieged by the troops of St. Peter and those of the rival nobles; and after the ruin of Palestrina, or Præneste, their principal seat, the ground was marked with a ploughshare, the emblem of perpetual desolation. …

See PAPACY: A. D. 1294-1348].

Some estimate may be formed of their wealth by their losses, of their losses by the damages of 100,000 gold florins which were granted them against the accomplices and heirs of the deceased pope. All the spiritual censures and disqualifications were abolished by his prudent successors; and the fortune of the house was more firmly established by this transient hurricane. … But the first of the family in fame and merit was the elder Stephen, whom Petrarch loved and esteemed as a hero superior to his own times and not unworthy of ancient Rome. … Till the ruin of his declining age, the ancestors, the character, and the children of Stephen Colonna exalted his dignity in the Roman republic and at the Court of Avignon. The Ursini migrated from Spoleto; the sons of Ursus, as they are styled in the twelfth century, from some eminent person who is only known as the father of their race. But they were soon distinguished among the nobles of Rome by the number and bravery of their kinsmen, the strength of their towers, the honours of the senate and sacred college, and the elevation of two popes, Celestin III. and Nicholas III., of their name and lineage. … The Colonna embraced the name of Ghibellines and the party of the empire; the Ursini espoused the title of Guelphs and the cause of the Church. The eagle and the keys were displayed in their adverse banners; and the two factions of Italy most furiously raged when the origin and nature of the dispute were long since forgotten. After the retreat of the popes to Avignon they disputed in arms the vacant republic; and the mischiefs of discord were perpetuated by the wretched compromise of electing each year two rival senators. By their private hostilities the city and country were desolated."

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 69.

"Had things been left to take their natural course, one of these families, the Colonna, for instance, or the Orsini, would probably have ended by overcoming its rivals, and have established, as was the case in the republics of Romagna and Tuscany, a 'signoria,' or local tyranny, like those which had once prevailed in the cities of Greece. But the presence of the sacerdotal power, as it had hindered the growth of feudalism, so also it stood in the way of such a development as this, and in so far aggravated the confusion of the city."

J. Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire, chapter 16.

ROME: A. D. 1300. The Jubilee.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1294-1348.

ROME: A. D. 1305-1377. Withdrawal of the Papal court from Rome and settlement at Avignon. The "Babylonish Captivity."

See PAPACY: A. D. 1294-1348, to 1352-1378.

ROME: A. D. 1312. Resistance to the entry and coronation of Henry VII.

See ITALY: A. D. 1310-1313.

ROME: A. D. 1328. Imperial coronation of Louis IV. of Bavaria.

See ITALY: A. D. 1313-1330.

{2749}

ROME: A. D. 1347-1354. The revolution of Rienzi, the last Tribune.

"The Holy City had no government. She was no longer the Imperial Rome, nor the Pontifical Rome. The Teutonic Cæsars had abandoned her. The Popes had also fled from the sacred hill of the Vatican to the slimy Gallic city, Avignon. … The real masters of the city were the princes or barons, who dwelt in their fortified castles in the environs, or their strong palaces within. The principal among them were masters of different parts of the city. The celebrated old family of the Colonnas reigned, it may be said, over the north of the city, towards the Quirinal. … The new family of the Orsini extended their sway along the Tiber from the Campo-di-Fiore, to the Church of St. Peter, comprising the castle of St. Angelo. The Savelli, less powerful, possessed a part of the Aventine, with the theatre of Marcellus, and the Conti, the huge tower which bears their name, on Cæsar's Forum. Other members of the nobility, in the country, were possessors of small fortified cities, or castles. … Rome, subjected to such a domination, had become almost deserted. The population of the seven-hilled city had come down to about 30,000 souls. When the barons were at peace with each other, which, however, was a rare occurrence, they combined to exercise their tyranny over the citizens and the serfs, to rob and plunder the farmers, travellers, and pilgrims. Petrarch wrote to the Pope at this period, that Rome had become the abode of demons, the receptacle of all crimes, a hell for the living. … Rienzi was then 28 years old. … His function of notary (assessore) to the Roman tribunals, would seem to infer that he was considered a peaceful, rational citizen. It appears, however, that he brought in the exercise of his official duties, the excited imagination and generosity of heart which characterized his nature. He gloried in being surnamed the Consul of orphans, of widows, and of the poor. His love for the humble soon became blended with an intense hatred for the great: one of his brothers was killed accidentally by a Roman baron, without his being able to obtain any satisfaction. … Rienzi had always been noted for his literary and poetical taste; he was considered as deeply versed in the knowledge of antiquity, and as the most skilful in deciphering and explaining the numerous inscriptions with which Rome abounded. … The least remains of antiquity became for him a theme of declamatory addresses to the people, on the present state of Rome, on the iniquities that surrounded him. Followed by groups that augmented daily, and which listened to him with breathless interest, he led them from ruin to ruin, to the Forum, to the tombs of the Christian martyrs, thus associating every glory, and made the hearts of the people throb by his mystical eloquence. … No remedy being brought to the popular grievances, an insurrection broke out. The senator was expelled; thirteen good men (buoni uomini) were installed in the Capitol and invested with dictatorial powers. It was a Guelfic movement; Rienzi was mixed with it; but without any preeminent participation. This new government resolved to send an embassy to the Pope, at Avignon, and Rienzi formed part of it. Such was the first real public act in the life of Cola di Rienzi. The embassy was joined by Petrarch. … The Pope would not hear of leaving his new splendid palace, and the gentle population of Avignon, for the heap of ruins and the human turbulence of Rome." But "Cardinal Aymeric was named to represent the Pope at Rome, as Legate, and a Colonna and an Orsini invested with the senatorial dignity, in order to restore order in the Eternal City, in the name of the Pontiff. Rienzi indulged in the most extravagant exultation. He wrote a highly enthusiastic address to the Roman people. But his illusion was not of long duration. The new Legate only attended to the filling of the Papal Treasury. The nobility, protected by the new senators, continued their course of tyranny. Rienzi protested warmly against such a course of iniquities, in the council. One day he spoke with a still greater vehemence of indignation, when one of the members of the council struck him in the face, others hissed out at him sneeringly, calling him the Consul of orphans and widows. From that day he never appeared at any of its meetings; his hatred had swollen, and must explode. … He went straight to the people (popolo minuto), and prepared a revolution. To render his exhortations to the people more impressive, he made use of large allegorical pictures, hastily drawn, and which form a curious testimony of his mystical imagination, as well as of his forensic eloquence. … Finally, he convoked the people at the Capitol for the 20th of May, 1347, the day of Pentecost, namely, under the invocation of the Holy Ghost. Rienzi had heard, with fervour, thirty masses during the preceding night. On that day he came out at 12 o'clock armed, with his head uncovered, followed by 25 partisans; three unfurled standards were carried before him, bearing allegorical pictures. This time his address was very brief—merely stating, that from his love for the Pope and the salvation of the people, he was ready to encounter any danger. He then read the laws which were to insure the happiness of Rome. They were, properly speaking, a summary of reforms, destined to relieve the people from their sufferings, and intended to realize, what he proclaimed, must become the good state [or Good Estate], il buono stato. … By this outline of a new constitution, the people were invested, with the property and government of the city as well as of its environs; the Pontifical See, bereft of the power it had exercised during several centuries; and the nobility deprived of what they considered as their property, to assist the public poverty. The revolution could not be more complete; and it is needless to add, that Rienzi was clamorously applauded, and immediately invested with full powers to realize and organize the buono stato, of which he had given the programme. He declined the title of Rector, and preferred the more popular name of Tribune. Nothing was fixed as to the duration of this extraordinary popular magistracy. The new government was installed at the Capitol, the Senators expelled, and the whole revolution executed with such rapidity, that the new Tribune might well be strengthened in his belief that he was acting under the protection of the Holy Ghost. He was careful, nevertheless, not to estrange the Pontifical authority, and requested that the apostolical vicar should be offered to be adjoined to him, which the prelate accepted, however uncertain and perilous the honour appeared to be. {2750} During the popular enthusiasm, old Stephen Colonna, with the more formidable of the barons, who had been away, returned to Rome in haste; he expressed publicly his scorn, and when the order came from Rienzi for him to quit the city, he replied that he would soon come and throw that madman out of one of the windows of the Capitol. Rienzi ordered the bells to be rung, the people instantly assembled in arms, and that proudest of the barons was obliged to fly to Palestrina. The next day it was proclaimed that all the nobles were to come, to swear fealty to the Roman people, and afterwards withdraw to their castles, and protect the public roads. John, the son of old Colonna, was the first who presented himself at the Capitol, but it was with the intention of braving and insulting the Tribune. When he beheld the popular masses in close array, he felt awed, and took the oath to protect the people—protect the roads—succour the widows and orphans, and obey the summons of the Tribune. The Orsini, Savelli, Gaetani, and many others, came after him and followed his example. Rienzi, now sole master, without opponents, gave a free course to the allurements of authority. … The tolls, taxes, and imposts which pressed upon the people were abolished by Rienzi, in the first instance, and afterwards, the taxes on the bridges, wine, and bread; but he endeavoured to compensate such an enormous deficit by augmenting the tax on salt, which was not yet unpopular, besides an impost on funded property. He was thus making hasty, serious, even dangerous engagements with the people, which it might not be in his power to keep. … For the present, calmness and security were reigning in the city. … The Tribune received the congratulations of all the ambassadors; the changes he had effected appeared miraculous. … He believed implicitly that he was the founder of a new era. The homage profusely lavished upon him by all the Italian Republics, and even by despotic sovereigns confirmed him in his conviction. … One nobleman alone, the Prefect of Vico, secretly supported by the agent of the Pontifical patrimony, refused to submit and to surrender the three or four little cities in his jurisdiction. Rienzi led rapidly against him an army of 8,000 men, and attacked the rebellious Prefect so suddenly and skilfully, that the latter surrendered unconditionally. This success inflamed the head and imagination of Rienzi, and with it commenced the mystical extravagances and follies which could not fail to cause his ruin."

Prof. De Vericour, Rienzi, the last of the Tribunes Dublin University Magazine, 1860.

Eclectic Magazine, September, 1860.

"Rienzi's head was turned by his success. He assumed the pomp of a sovereign. He distributed titles, surrounded himself with ceremonies, and multiplied feasts and processions. … He desired to be ennobled, and to have the title of Knight, as well as Tribune. To celebrate his installation as Knight, a splendid series of ceremonies was arranged," at the end of which he "made an address, in which he cited the Pope, and Lewis of Bavaria, and Charles of Bohemia, to give reasons for any claims they had on Rome; and pointing his sword to three points of the compass, he exclaimed, 'This is mine, and this is mine, and this is mine.' … Folly had quite got the better of him now, and his vanity was leading him swiftly to ruin. … Shortly afterwards he issued a proclamation that he had discovered a conspiracy against the people and himself, and declared that he would cut off the heads of all those concerned in it. The conspirators were seized and brought forward, and among them were seen the chief of the princely families of Rome. Solemn preparations were made for their execution, when Rienzi, suddenly and without reason, not only pardoned them all, but conferred upon them some of the most important charges and offices of the state. No sooner were these nobles and princes free out of Rome than they began seriously to conspire to overthrow Rienzi and his government. They assembled their soldiers, and, after devastating the country, threatened to march upon Rome itself. The Tribune, who was no soldier, attempted to intimidate his enemies by threats; but finding that the people grew clamorous for action, he at last took up arms, and made a show of advancing against them. But after a few days, during which he did nothing except to destroy still more of the Campagna, he returned to Rome, clothed himself in the Imperial robes,. and received a legate from the Pope. … His power soon began to crumble away under him; and when, shortly afterwards, he endeavoured to prevail upon the people to rise and drive out the Count of Minorbino, who had set his authority at defiance, he found that his day was past. … He then ordered the trumpets of silver to sound, and, clothed in all his pomp, he marched through Rome, accompanied by his small band of soldiers, and on the 15th October, 1347, intrenched himself in the Castle St. Angelo. Still the influence of his name and his power was so great, that it was not till three days after that the nobles ventured to return to Rome, and then they found that Cola's power had vanished. It faded away like a carnival pageant, as that gay procession entered the Castle St. Angelo. There he remained until the beginning of March, and then fled, and found his way to Civita Vecchia, where he stayed with a nephew of his for a short time. But his nephew having been arrested, he again returned to Rome secretly, and was concealed in Castle St. Angelo by one of the Orsini who was friendly to him and his party. … Cola soon after fled to Naples, fearing lest he should be betrayed into the hands of the Cardinals. Rome now fell into a state of anarchy and confusion even worse than when he assumed the reins of power. Revolutions occurred. Brigandage was renewed. … In 1353 Rienzi returned with Cardinal Albornos, the legate of the Pope. He was received with enthusiasm, and again installed in power. But he was embarrassed in all his actions by the Cardinal, who sought only to make use of him, while he himself exercised all the power. The title of Senator of Rome was conferred on him, and the people forgave him. … But Rienzi had lost the secret of his power in losing his enthusiasm. … At last, in October 1353, a sedition broke out, and the mob rushed to the Capitol with cries of 'Death to the traitor Rienzi!' … He appeared on the balcony clothed in his armour as Knight, and, with the standard of the people in his hand, demanded to be heard. But the populace refused to listen to him. … At last he decided to fly. Tearing off his robes, he put on the miserable dress of the porter, rushed down the flaming stairs and through the burning chambers, … and at last reached the third floor. … At this very moment his arm was seized, and a voice said, 'Where are you going?' He saw that all was lost. {2751} But, at bay, he did nothing mean. Again there was a flash of heroic courage, not unworthy of him. He threw off his disguise, and disdaining all subterfuges, said, 'I am the Tribune!' He was then led out through the door … to the base of the basalt lions, where he had made his first great call upon the people. Standing there, undaunted by its tumultuous cries, he stood for an hour with folded arms, and looked around upon the raging crowd. At last, profiting by a lull of silence, he lifted his voice to address them, when suddenly an artisan at his side, fearing perhaps the result of his eloquence, and perhaps prompted by revenge, plunged his pike in his breast, and he fell. The wild mob rushed upon his corpse."

W. W. Story, Castle St. Angelo, chapter 4.

ALSO IN: H. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, book 12, chapters 10-11 (volume 5).

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 70.

ROME: A. D. 1367-1369. Temporary return of Urban V. from Avignon.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1352-1378.

ROME: A. D. 1377-1379. Return of the Papal court. Election of Urban VI. and the Great Schism. Battles in the city. Siege and partial destruction of Castle St. Angelo.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1377-1417.

ROME: A. D. 1405-1414. Rising in the city and flight of Pope Innocent VII. Sacking of the Vatican. Surrender of the city to Ladislas, king of Naples. Expulsion of the Neapolitans and their return.

See ITALY (SOUTHERN): A. D. 1386-1414.

ROME: A. D. 1447-1455. The pontificate of Nicolas V. Building of the Vatican Palace and founding of the Vatican Library. The Porcaro revolt.

See ITALY: A. D. 1447-1480.

ROME: A. D. 1492-1503. Under the Borgias.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1471-1513.

ROME: A. D. 1494. Charles VIII. and the French army in the city.

See ITALY: A. D. 1494-1496.

ROME: A. D. 1526. The city taken and the Vatican plundered by the Colonnas and the Spaniards.

See ITALY: A. D. 1523-1527.

ROME: A. D. 1527. The capture and the sacking of the city by the army of Constable Bourbon. Captivity of the Pope.

See ITALY: A. D. 1523-1527; 1527; and 1527-1529.

ROME: A. D. 1537-1563. Inclinations towards the Reformation. Catholic reaction.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1537-1563.

ROME: A. D. 1600-1656. The great families and the Roman population.

"A numerous, powerful, and wealthy aristocracy surrounded the papal throne; the families already established imposed restraints ou those that were but newly rising; from the self-reliance and authoritative boldness of monarchy, the ecclesiastical sovereignty was passing to the deliberation, sobriety, and measured calmness of aristocratic government. … There still flourished those old and long-renowned Roman races, the Savelli, Conti, Orsini, Colonna, and Gaetani. … The Colonna and Orsini made it their boast, that for centuries no peace had been concluded between the princes of Christendom, in which they had not been included by name. But however powerful these houses may have been in earlier times, they certainly owed their importance in those now before us to their connection with the Curia and the popes. … Under Innocent X., there existed for a considerable time, as it were, two great factions, or associations of families. The Orsini, Cesarini, Borghesi, Aldobrandini, Ludovisi, and Giustiniani were with the Pamfili; while opposed to them, was the house of Colonna and the Barberini. … In the middle of the seventeenth century there were computed to be fifty noble families in Rome of three hundred years standing, thirty-five of two hundred, and sixteen of one hundred years. None were permitted to claim a more ancient descent, or were generally traced to an obscure, or even a low origin. … But by the side of the old families there rose up various new ones. All the cardinals and prelates of the Curia proceeded according to the pope's example, and each in proportion to his means employed the surplus of his ecclesiastical revenue for the aggrandizement of his kindred, the foundation of a new family. There were others which had attained to eminence by judicial appointments, and many were indebted for their elevation to being employed as bankers in the affairs of the Dataria. Fifteen families of Florence, eleven from Genoa, nine Portuguese, and four French, are enumerated as having risen to more or less consideration by these means, according to their good fortune or talents; some of them, whose reputation no longer depended on the affairs of the day, became monarchs of gold; as for example, the Guicciardini and Doni, who connected themselves, under Urban VIII., with the Giustiniani, Primi, and Pallavicini. But even, without affairs of this kind, families of consideration were constantly repairing to Rome, not only from Urbino, Rieti, and Bologna, but also from Parma and Florence. … Returns of the Roman population are still extant, and by a comparison of the different years, we find a most remarkable result exhibited, as regards the manner in which that population was formed. Not that its increase was upon the whole particularly rapid, this we are not authorized to assert. In the year 1600 the inhabitants were about 110,000; fifty-six years afterwards they were somewhat above 120,000, an advance by no means extraordinary; but another circumstance here presents itself which deserves attention. At an earlier period, the population of Rome had been constantly fluctuating. Under Paul IV. it had decreased from 80,000 to 50,000; in a score or two of years it had again advanced to more than 100,000. And this resulted from the fact that the court was then formed principally of unmarried men, who had no permanent abode there. But, at the time we are considering, the population became fixed into settled families. This began to be the case towards the end of the sixteenth century, but took place more particularly during the first half of the seventeenth. … After the return of the popes from Avignon, and on the close of the schism, the city, which had seemed on the point of sinking into a mere village, extended itself around the Curia. But it was not until the papal families had risen to power and riches—until neither internal discords nor external enemies were any longer to be feared, and the incomes drawn from the revenues of the church or state secured a life of enjoyment without the necessity for labour, that a numerous permanent population arose in the city."

L. Ranke. History of the Popes, book 8, section 7 (volume 2).

ROME: A. D. 1797-1798. French intrigues and occupation of the city. Formation of the Roman Republic. Expulsion of the Pope.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1797-1798 (DECEMBER-MAY).

{2752}

ROME: A. D. 1798 (November). Brief expulsion of the French by the Neapolitans.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1798-1799 (AUGUST-APRIL).

ROME: A. D. 1799. Overthrow of the Roman Republic. Expulsion of the French.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1799 (AUGUST-DECEMBER).

ROME: A. D. 1800. The Papal government re-established by Napoleon.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1800-1801 (JUNE-FEBRUARY).

ROME: A. D. 1808-1809. Napoleon's quarrel with the Pope. Captivity of Pius VII. French occupation. Declared to be a free and imperial city.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1808-1814.

ROME: A. D. 1810. The title of King of Rome given to Napoleon's son.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1808-1814.

ROME: A. D. 1813. Papal Concordat with Napoleon.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1808-1814.

ROME: A. D. 1814. Occupation by Murat for the Allies. Return of the Pope.

See ITALY: A. D. 1814: and PAPACY: A. D. 1808-1814.

ROME: A. D. 1815. Restoration of the works of art taken by Napoleon.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1815 (JULY-NOVEMBER).

ROME: A. D. 1831-1832. Revolt of the Papal States, suppressed by Austrian troops.

See ITALY: A. D. 1830-1832.

ROME: A. D. 1846-1849. Liberal reforms of Pope Pius IX. His breach with the extremists. Revolution, and flight of the Pope. Intervention of France. Garibaldi's defense of the city. Its capture and occupation by the French. Overthrow of the Roman Republic.

See ITALY: A. D. 1848-1849.

ROME: A. D. 1859-1861. First consequences of the Austro-Italian war. Absorption of the Papal States in the new kingdom of Italy.

See ITALY: A. D. 1859-1861.

ROME: A. D. 1867-1870. Garibaldi's attempt. His defeat at Mentana. Italian troops in the city. The king of Italy takes possession of his capital.