§ 11. The Re-establishment of the Papacy in Rome. 1377.
Of the nineteen cardinals who entered the conclave at the death of Urban V., all l)ut four were Frenchmen. The choice immediately fell on (liegorv XL, the sou oC a French count. At 17 he had been made cardiiial by his uncle, Clement VI.
^ The accounts are published entire by Kirsch, pp. ix sqq. xxx, 109-165.
2 Diillinger, The Church and the Churches^ Engl- trans., 18G2, p. 353, puts the population at 17,000. Gregorovius, VI. 438, makes the estimate somewhat higher.
§ 11. RE-ESTABLISHMENT OF THE PAPACY IN ROME. 107
His contemporaries praised him for his moral purity, affability, and piety. He showed his national sympathies by appointing 18 Frenchmen cardinals and filling papal appointments in Italy with French officials. In English history he is known for his condemnation of Wyclif. His pontificate extended from 1370-1378.
With Gregory's name is associated the re-establishmeiit of the papacy in its proper home 0];^_tlie Tiber. For this change the pope deserves no^credit. It was consummated against his will. He went to Rome, but was engaged in preparations to return to Avignon, when death suddenly overtook him.
That which principally moved Gregory to return to Rome was the flame of rebellion which filled Central and Nortliern Jtaly^and threatened the papacy with the permanent loss of its dominions. The election of an anti-pope was contemplated by the Italians, as a delegation from Rome informed him. One remedy was open to crush revolt on the banks of the Tiber. It was the presence of the pope himself.^
Gregory had carried on war for five years with the^disturbing elements in Italy. In the northern parts of the peninsula, political_ anarchy swept from city to city. Soldiers of fortune, the most famous of whom was the Englishman, John Hawkwood, spread terror wherever they went. In Milan, the tyrant Bernabo was all-powerful and truculent. In Florence, the revolt was against the priesthood itself, and a red flag was unfurled, on which was inscribed the word " Liberty." A league of 80 cities was formed to abolish the pope's secular power. The interdict hurled against the Florentines, March 31, 1376, for the part they were taking in the sedition, contained atrocious clauses, giving every one the right to plunder the city and to make slaves of her people wherever they might be found. ^ Genoa and Pisa
1 Pastor, Hergenrother-Kirsch, Kirsch, Bilckkehr, p. xvii ; Mirot, p. viii, 7 sq., and other Catholic historians agree that this was Gregory's chief motive. Mirot, pp. 10-18, ascribes to Gregory three controlling ideas — the reform of the Church, the re-establishment of peace with the East as a preliminary to a new crusade against the Turks, and the return of the papacy to Rome.
2 Baluz, I. 435, Gieseler, IV. 1, p. 90 sq., give the bull.
108 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
followed Florence and incurred a like papal malediction. The papal city, Bologna, was likewise stirred to rebellion in 1376 by its sister city on the Arno.
Florence fanned the flames of rebellion in Rome and the other papal towns, calling upon them to throw off the yoke of tyranny and return to their pristine liberty. What Italian, its manifesto proclaimed, " can endure the sight of so many noble cities, serving barbarians appointed by the pope to devour the goods of Italy ? " -^ ^ But Rome remained true to the pope, as did Ancona. On the other hand, Perugia, Narni, Viterbo, and Ferrara, in 1375, raised the banner of rebellion until revolt threatened to spread over the whole of the papal patrimony. The bitter feeling against the French officials was intensified by a detachment of 10,000 Breton mercenaries which the pope sent to crush the revolution. They were under the leadership of Cardinal Robert of Geneva, — afterward Clement VII., — an iron-liearted soldier and pitiless priest. It was as plain as day. Pastor says, that Gregory's return was the only thing that could save Rome to the papacy.
To the urgency of these civil commotions were added the pure voices of jjrophetessea. which rose above the confused sounds of revolt and arms, the voices of Brigitta of Sweden and Qa^herine_^f_Siena, both canonized saints.
Petrarch, wlio for nearly half a century had been urging the pope's return, now, in his last days, replied to a French advocate who compared Rome to Jericho, the town to which the man was going who fell among thieves, and stigmatized Avignon as the sewer of the earth. He died 1374, without seeing the consuming desire of his life fulfilled. Guided by patriotic instincts, he had carried into his appeals the feeling of an Italian's love of his country. Brigitta antl Catherine made their appeals to Gregory on higher than national grounds, the utility of Christendom and the advantage of the kingdom of God. Emerging from visions and ecstatic moods of devotion, they called upon the Church's chief bishop to be faithful to the obligations of his holy office.
^ Quoted by Mirot, p. 48, and Grcgorovius, VI. 40G sqq.