Avignon Papacy

Throughout the Middle Ages, popes resided outside of Rome in cities like Viterbo or Anagni, often finding temporary refuge from the summer heat or Roman revolts. But Avignon, in Provence near the Comtat Venaissin papal territory since 1274, kept a pope for some four generations between 1309 and 1403, a reminder that “Rome is where the pope is.” There popes founded their legitimacy on reinforcement and centralization of papal authority, grounded on tight fiscal oversight. From 1309 to 1377 seven legitimate popes ruled before returning to Rome and the subsequent Great Western Schism (1378–1417), when two and even three popes ruled their own respective obediences. In 1305 cardinals elected Bertrand de Got, a Gascon, who took the name Clement V after a lengthy conclave that lasted for almost a year. An astute diplomat, traveling in France at the time of his election, the pope was crowned in Lyon and decided to remain north of the Alps to settle pressing matters like the Council of Vienne, the Templars’ affair, and the French-English rivalry. Within a few years, he remodeled the cardinalate, naming a majority of French cardinals, and in 1309 settled his court in Avignon, a city that lay close to French Vienne where its council was ready to open. Over the span of some seventy years, the six popes who succeeded him and chose to remain in the city fought as best as they could secular encroachments on their prerogatives, quite successfully tightening and reforming the ecclesiastical administration and finances, regaining papal territories, and engaging with secular leaders. However, returning the papacy to Rome always remained a pressing concern. After Urban V’s failed attempt in 1367, Gregory XI effectively brought back the papacy to Rome, entering the city in grand pomp in January 1377. He died a few months later in March 1378. A College of still largely French cardinals elected Pope Urban VI in April 1378, but after a few weeks of a disastrous relationship, cardinals reneged on the legitimacy of their April election and named in September a counterpope, Clement VII. Urban never stepped down and the Great Western Schism was consummated. States each followed one of the two popes, who maintained their respective obediences and courts in Rome and Avignon. The schism lasted until 1417 when the Council of Constance, after the deposition of two concurrent popes, elected Martin V unique sovereign of Christianity and first pope of the Renaissance.

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