^{Thirteenth Century:Seventeen Popes}

177.Honorius III, 1216-1227. Mild, peaceloving, elderly and in poor health, he was a superb administrator who put the Church's finances on a sound footing. He energetically supported the fifth crusade, and missionary efforts in the Baltic. In 1218 he undertook a crusade against the Moors in Spain. He intensified the campaign against the Albigensians, approved the Dominican Order in 1216 and that of the Franciscans in 1223, and that of the Carmelites in 1226. Roman aristocrat.

178. Gregory IX, 1227-1241. Son of the Count of Segni, he was dynamic, resolute and deeply religious, and a friend of St Dominic and St Francis, both of whom he canonized in 1234 and 1228 respectively. He fostered the growth of the Poor Clares. He re-established the University of Paris in 1231 and founded the University of Toulouse in 1233. He had almost continual conflict with Frederick II of Germany, and died of exhaustion in the August heat of 1241 as the armies of Germany encircled Rome. Italian from Anagni .

179. Celestine IV, October 25 - November 10, 1241. Two days after his election, the Pope fell ill, and died on November 10. Milanese aristocrat .

180. Innocent IV, 1243-1254. A Canon lawyer, not skilled in handling political affairs, Innocent carried on a relentless war against Frederick II and his ambitions in southern Italy. In 1252 he established the Inquisition in Italy. His efforts to convert the Great Khan of the Mongols, and to reunite East and West with Emperor John III Vatatzes, came to nothing. But he did succeed in establishing four dioceses in newly converted provinces of Prussia. From Genoa .

181. Alexander IV, 1254-1261. Indecisive, he lost almost the whole of the Papal States to the German Emperor through his temporising. He founded the Augustinian hermits in 1256. He canonized Clare of Assisi in 1255, and decided in favour of the mendicant friars in their dispute with the secular clergy at the University of Paris, when the latter challenged their right to teach. But during his pontificate, the prestige of the Papacy suffered many setbacks as secular powers whittled away its base. Roman .

182. Urban IV, 1261-1264. Patriarch of Jerusalem, the son of a shoemaker, he had been a legate in Poland, Prussia and Pomerania and in 1255 named by Alexander IV as Patriarch of Jerusalem. A born diplomat, he soon recovered the lost parts of the Papal States, consolidated what gains Alexander had made, but was eventually responsible for handing over Sicily and southern Italy to Carles, Count of Arjou, with disastrous results for the Holy See and Italy. He worked hard to reunite East and West, and in 1263/4 reached an agreement with Emperor Michael Paleologus who was prepared to recognize the Primacy of Rome and make other concessions, but the Pope died without signing any pact. Urban extended the feast of Corpus Christi to the whole Church in 1264, and asked St Thomas Aquinas to write the office and Mass. Frenchman .

183. Clement IV, 1265-1268. A married man, with two daughters he had studied for the priesthood after his wife's death, and in 1261 was created Cardinal by Urban IV. In 1263 he was sent as legate to England to support King Henry III against the barons. As Pope he found that the House of Anjou was to prove an even more painful thorn in the side of Italy and the Holy See than the Hohenstaufens had. He continued the work of Urban for reunion with the East; exchanges continued, but nothing concrete came of them. Frenchman .

184. Blessed Gregory X, 1271-1276. When Tedaldo Visconti, archdeacon of Liege heard that he had been elected Pope, he was at Acre in Palestine, on crusade with the future of King Edward I of England. He was a confidante of both the English and French Royal families, and in Paris had studied under St Bonaventure and St Thomas of Aquin. After being ordained priest, he was consecrated Pope in St Peter's Basilica on March 27, 1271. He worked strenuously for reunion with the East, a crusade to liberate the Holy Land and reform of the Church. On June 24, 1274 a Greek delegation arrived at Lyons for the Fourteenth Ecumenical Council, and there signed a decree of union with the Church of Rome, accepting the primacy of the Pope. His untimely death in Arrezzo on January 10, 1276 frustrated the great hopes for the solution of outstanding problems facing the Church in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. From Piacenza.

185. Blessed Innocent V, January 21 - June 22, 1276. He had as a Master of theology in Paris collaborated with St Albert the Great, and St Thomas Aquinas in drawing up a rule of studies for the Dominican Order. The first Dominican to become Pope. He was not astute politically, but did work for reunion with the East, and was instrumental in ending much in-fighting among Italian parties and states. From Savoy .

186. Hadrian V, July 11 - August 18, 1276. A few days after his election he left Rome to escape the oppressive summer heat. Falling ill at Viterbo, he died without having been ordained priest, consecrated bishop or crowned Pope. Genoa.

187. John XXI, September 8, 1276 - May 20, 1277. Son of a doctor in Lisbon, the new Pope was a brilliant scholar, who wrote among other things a famous treatise on ophthalmology called The Eye, a popular manual for curing diseases of the eye. More of a scholar than an administrator, he retired to a cell at Viterbo and left the governing of the Church to Cardinal Orsini. John XXI died suddenly when the roof of his hastily built study fell in on him. Portuguese.

188. Nicholas III, 1277-1280. He set out to restore the independence of the Holy See from the House of Anjou now well-established in Sicily. He worked for Church unity, and was the first Pope to make the Vatican his residence. He sanctioned the union of the houses of Anjou and Hapsburg through the marriage of Rudolph of Hapsburg's daughter Clementina and King Charles of Sicily's grandson Charles. Roman .

189. Martin V, 1280 - 1285. Too closely allied to the Anjou family, his actions undid most of the good work of his predecessors towards unity of the East and West. Politically naïve, he put French interests before the interests of the Holy See and the Catholic Church. French.

190. Honorius IV, 1285 - 1287. Elderly, and racked with arthritis, he tried to resolve the Sicilian question. A keen supporter of Religious Orders, he condemned the 'Apostolics' - a sect that had arisen with extreme views of poverty. He promoted the study of Oriental languages as the University of Paris as a help towards reunion of East and West. Roman.

191. Nicholas IV, 1288 - 1292. First Franciscan to become Pope. When Tripoli in Lebanon fell to the Muslims in April 1289, he called for a crusade, in fact sending a small fleet himself. But the fall of Acre in May 1291 was met with procrastination by the European Christian states who missed their opportunity of repelling the Muslims. Il-Khan Arghun of Iran had sent them urgent requests for joint action, but they delayed until it was too late. The Pope sent a Franciscan friar to the court of Kubla Khan, which lied to the establishment of the Catholic Church in China. Previously the only Christians there had been Nestorian heretics. Giovanni di Monte Corvino was appointed first Archbishop of Peking in 1307. Italian, from Ascoli.

192. St Peter Celestine V, 1294-1296. 85 years old when elected, the eleventh child of a peasant family, he had entered the Benedictine Monastery and eventually became a hermit. Not at all well educated (Italian had to be used in conversing with him, not Latin as was the custom), he abdicated the Papal throne on December 13, 1296. Italian, from Isernia.

193. Boniface VIII, 1296-1303. Famous for his assertion of the supremacy of the spiritual over the secular, and his conflict with the French court and king, he was a skilful jurist. He brought order into the Papal administration, catalogued the Vatican library and organized the Vatican archives. He founded a University in Rome in 1303. He was not popular with his people, and had an overbearing manner that alienated many. Despite political errors, Boniface VIII was a child of his age, who attempted to reassert the independence of the Church from the secular powers. His reign stands at the end of the thirteenth century, and ushers in the Renaissance. Italian, from Anagni.