Pope Clement IV

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Saint-Gilles-du-Gard, County of Toulouse, Kingdom of France
Died29 November 1268(1268-11-29) (aged 78)
Viterbo, Papal States
Previous post(s)
Coat of armsClement IV's coat of arms
Other popes named Clement
Ordination history of
Pope Clement IV
History
Episcopal consecration
Consecrated byRaymond Amaury
Date1257
Episcopal succession
Bishops consecrated by Pope Clement IV as principal consecrator
Paperone de’ Papareschi, O.P.27 June 1265
Marino de Eboli?? ???? 1266
Giacomo de CastiglioneMarch 1266
Ugolino Acquaviva?? ???? 1266
Pedro Morella12 October 1266
Pierre de Charny?? ???? 1267
Nicolas Lis [pl]?? ???? 1267
Archbishop Nicola?? ???? 1267
Archbishop Hugues20 June 1268
Jean (Jon) Rufus (Raude)24 June 1268
Juan Villahoz3 September 1268

Pope Clement IV (

His election as pope occurred at a conclave held at Perugia that lasted four months while cardinals argued over whether to call in Charles I of Anjou, the youngest brother of Louis IX of France, to carry on the papal war against the Hohenstaufens. Pope Clement was a patron of Thomas Aquinas and of Roger Bacon, encouraging Bacon in the writing of his Opus Majus, which included important treatises on optics and the scientific method
.

Life before election

Clement was born in

Saint-Gilles-du-Gard in the County of Toulouse, to a successful lawyer, Pierre Foucois, and his wife Marguerite Ruffi. At the age of nineteen, he enrolled as a soldier to fight the Moors in Spain. He then pursued the study of law in Toulouse, Bourges and Orleans, becoming a noted advocate in Paris. In the latter capacity he acted as secretary to King Louis IX, to whose influence he was chiefly indebted for his elevation to the cardinalate. He married the daughter of Simon de Malbois and had two daughters. Upon the death of his wife, he followed his father's example and gave up secular life for the Church.[2]

His rise was rapid. Ordained in the abbey of Saint-Magloire, Paris, he became pastor of Saint-Gilles in 1255. In 1257, he was appointed

See of Sabina.[3] He was the papal legate in England between 1262 and 1264.[2] He was named a cardinal (grand penitentiary) in 1263.[4]

Pontificate

In this period, the

Ghibelline party was so firmly in control there.[2]

Then, fortified with papal money and supplies, Charles marched into Naples. Having defeated and slain Manfred in the great

Gregorovius that Clement IV became an accomplice by refusing to intercede for the unfortunate Conradin whom Charles had beheaded in the marketplace of Naples seems contentious. However, Gregorovius may be basing this conclusion on the position of Urban IV's predecessors, Innocent IV and Alexander IV, who were Conradin's official guardians.[5]

Acts

Collection of writings by Clemens, published in Paris between 1893 and 1945[6]

In 1264, Clement IV renewed the prohibition of the Talmud promulgated by Gregory IX, who had it publicly burnt in France and in Italy. Though Clement did not condemn to death at the stake those who harboured copies of it,[7] and, responding to a denunciation of the Talmud by Pablo Christiani,[8] he ordered that the Jews of Aragon submit their books to Dominican censors for expurgation.[9]

In February 1265 Clement summoned

Michael VIII Palaeologos (Abaqa's father-in-law). Pope Clement welcomed Abaqa's proposal in a non-committal manner, but did inform him of an upcoming Crusade. In 1267, Pope Clement IV and King James I of Aragon sent an ambassador to the Mongol ruler Abaqa in the person of Jayme Alaric de Perpignan.[12]
In his 1267 letter written from Viterbo, the Pope wrote:

The kings of France and Navarre, taking to heart the situation in the Holy Land, and decorated with the Holy Cross, are readying themselves to attack the enemies of the Cross. You wrote to us that you wished to join your father-in-law (the Greek emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos) to assist the Latins. We abundantly praise you for this, but we cannot tell you yet, before having asked to the rulers, what road they are planning to follow. We will transmit to them your advice, so as to enlighten their deliberations, and will inform your Magnificence, through a secure message, of what will have been decided.[13]

Although Clement's successors continued to engage in diplomatic contacts with the Mongols for the rest of the century, they were never able to coordinate an actual alliance.[14]

Death and burial

Within months Clement IV was dead as well, and was buried at the Dominican convent, Santa Maria in Gradi, just outside

remained vacant for nearly three years
.

Clement IV's private character was praised by contemporaries for his asceticism, and he is especially commended for his indisposition to promote and enrich his own relatives. He also ordered the Franciscan scholar Roger Bacon to write the Opus Majus, which is addressed to him.

See also

References

Citations

  1. ^ "Clemens ⟨Papa, IV.⟩", Personal Names of the Middle Ages, p. 129.
  2. ^ a b c Loughlin, James. "Pope Clement IV." The Catholic Encyclopedia Archived April 17, 2016, at the Wayback Machine Vol. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. 2 January 2016
  3. ^ Rockwell, William Walker (1911). "Clement s.v. Clement IV" . In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 6 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 483.
  4. ^ "Miranda, Salvador. "Foucois, Gui", Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church". Archived from the original on May 20, 2013. Retrieved January 2, 2016.
  5. ^ P. Touron, "Alexandre IV contre Manfred," Le Moyen Âge 69 (1963), pp. 391–99.
  6. ^ Registres de Clément IV (in French). Paris: Thorin & fils. 1893–1945.
  7. ^ As reported, for example in Arsene Damestetter, The Talmud, 1897:94.
  8. ^ Shlomo Simonsohn, The Apostolic See and the Jews (Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies) 1991:311.
  9. ^ Popper, William (1889). The Censorship of Hebrew Books. Knickerbocker Press. pp. 13–14..
  10. ^ A Biographical Study of the Angelic Doctor, by Placid Conway, O.P., Longmans, Green and Co., 1911, Part III: Evening, Chapter VI - His Writings: Second Period, "Saint Thomas Aquinas, by Placid Conway, OP". Archived from the original on May 1, 2013. Retrieved February 5, 2013. Accessed October 27, 2012
  11. ^ Acta Capitulorum Provincialium, Provinciae Romanae Ordinis Praedicatorum, 1265, n. 12, in Corpus Thomisticum, http://www.corpusthomisticum.org/a65.html Accessed 4-8-2011
  12. ^ Runciman, p. 330–331
  13. ^ Quoted in Grousset, p. 644
  14. ^ "Despite numerous envoys and the obvious logic of an alliance against mutual enemies, the papacy and the Crusaders never achieved the often-proposed alliance against Islam". Atwood, "Western Europe and the Mongol Empire" Encyclopedia of Mongolia and the Mongol Empire, p. 583
  15. ^ Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, (HarperCollins, 2000), 218.
  16. ^ Richard P. McBrien, 218.

Bibliography

External links

Catholic Church titles
Preceded by Pope
1265–68
Succeeded by
Gregory X