Medieval Papacy and the State

Question 1

Donation of Pepin

Answer 1

• Pepin III or Pepin the Short
• 8th-century Frankish ruler
• his legitimacy (replacing the hereditary monarch) was sanctioned by the pope
• in turn, Pepin defended the pope against the Lombards
• the “Donation of Pepin” is a document stating that this Frankish king gave the pope the whole of Italy as a possession

Question 2

Charlemagne

and the Carolingian Renaissance

Answer 2

• Charles the Great
• crowned Holy Roman Emperor by Pope Leo III at St. Peter’s in Rome on Christmas Day in the year 800
• late 8th and early 9th centuries
• palace at Aachen in Germany
• expanded original Frankish kingdom to something more like Europe in extent
• created a Christian empire based on Roman and Byzantine ideals
• concern for strong central government, learning and wide-ranging moral, legal, and church reforms produced a “Carolingian Renaissance”
• Laid the foundation of medieval “Christendom”

Question 3

Pope Gregory VII

and the Gregorian Reforms

Answer 3

• influential reform-minded pope of the 11th century
• sought moral reform of the clergy, supremacy of the papacy, and the transformation of the secular order as a righteous domain, superintended by the church
• faced off against Emperor Henry IV over lay appointment of bishops (the “investiture controversy”)
• Elevated legal order (natural equality) over feudalism (natural inequality)

Question 4

Emperor Henry IV

and the Humiliation of Canossa

Answer 4

• conflicted with Pope Gregory VII over lay appointment of bishop in 11th century
• The pope released his subjects from any loyalty to him and forced his submission
• In 1077, Henry IV travelled to Canossa and waited barefoot in the snow for three days until the pope granted sacramental forgiveness
• imperial and papal antagonism would continue

Question 5

Pope Innocent III

Answer 5

• Advanced the authority, claims, and centrality of the papacy in Europe
• late 12th and early 13th centuries
• called the important 4th Lateran council
• reserved the right to interfere in secular affairs and claimed a universal feudal overlordship
• patronized the new menidanct religious orders–the Dominicans and Franciscans
• probably the zenith of papal power

Question 6

Pope Boniface VIII

Answer 6

• late 13th- and very early 14th-century pope
• sharp conflicts with Philip IV (“the fair”) of France
• issues Unam Sanctam (1302), decrying the tearing up of the fabric of the church by this emerging nationalism
• “It is altogether necessary to salvation for every human creature to be subject to the Roman pontiff.”
• a time of “losing power and screaming louder”

Question 7

Avignon Papacy

Answer 7

• the period in the 14th century when the papal residence was in an enclave in France
• 1309-77
• associated with luxury, abuse of power and confiscatory taxation
• Petrarch called it the “Babylonian captivity” of the church
• the francophonization of the papal court and administration
• centralization and “fiscalism”–taxing every possible transaction

Question 8

The Great Schism

or Western Schism or Papal Schism

Answer 8

• the division of Western Christendom over allegiance to rival popes from 1378 to 1417
• led to the rise of conciliarism as attempt to resolve crisis of authority through councils
• at one point there were three rival popes
• schism ended by Council of Constance in 1417
• the term “Great Schism” on its own can also refer to the breach between East and West in 1054

Question 9

The Crusades

Answer 9

• expeditions from Western Europe to Eastern Mediterranean, beginning in 1095, aiming to recover the Holy Land from Islam, then retain it in Christian hands
• a merging of just war, holy war, pilgrimage, and penance
• Further “numbered” crusades through to the fall of Acre in 1291 (historians differ in numbering), but continuous smaller and larger expeditions throughout the middle ages
• “crusades” later called, by analogy, against internal enemies: as weapon against heretics, especially the Cathars or Albigensians