This concerns the papacy during the early to mid 10th century, which for the most part is well past the period this Web site is most interested in. However, as a student of medieval history, it’s something I don’t think I can fail to address. Aside from the Cadaver Synod (which as it happened occurred less than a decade prior to the start of this period), it’s the most scandalous time in papal history.
To be clear, this era isn’t as well documented as we’d like. It’s treated as scandalous mostly due to the quill of Liutprand, a bishop of Cremona in Italy during the latter part of the era. He was embroiled in ecclesiastical affairs and the geopolitics of that time, so his accounts aren’t unbiased. He was also fussy and puritanical. There’s more than a little exaggeration in play here.
What’s not in doubt, though, is that the papacy, during this time, was critically weak and had been fundamentally compromised by its political, military and diplomatic environments. The reasons for that are several, as I’ll get to shortly.
Although this period is typically defined as beginning in 904 CE with the elevation of Pope Sergius III and ending with the death of Pope John XII in 964, the years leading up to 904 and the brief reign of Benedict V, John’s controversial successor, ought to be included, as will be explained here.
As with everything else, there’s a backstory here, one which happens to be important in order to understand how this era unfolded. At its beginning, the papacy — like any and all other ecclesiastical offices — were subjects of the states they resided in. At its origin, it had been subject to the Roman Empire, and later its western half when the Empire divided under Emperor Diocletian in the late 3rd century.
About two centuries after that split, the Ostrogoths under their King Theodoric conquered the region around Rome, meaning the papacy became subject to their kingdom. The Byzantine emperor Justinian I and his generals (first Belisarius, then Narses) destroyed the Ostrogoths’ kingdom in the middle of the 6th century; thus, the papacy became subjects of the Byzantines (aka the eastern Roman Empire) at that time.
It wasn’t long before the Germanic tribe known as Lombards invaded northern Italy and began eating slowly away at Byzantine holdings there. In the middle of the 8th century the Byzantines’ outpost in Italy, based in Ravenna on the Adriatic coast but reaching across the peninsula as far as the area of Naples, collapsed. Rome and the papacy was left wide open for Lombard conquest.
Pope Zachary at that point ventured to France and crowned Pepin “the Short” (up to then, “mayor of the palace” or the king’s executive officer) King of the Franks, displacing the last Merovingian monarch. An alliance with the Franks was natural, since they’d been rivals of the Lombards for control of Italy (but the Franks’ military ventures there, prior to this, had been abortive).
That alliance proved momentous, just a few years later, when Pepin invaded Italy, extinguished the Lombard threat, and set then-Pope Stephen II up as sovereign over what had been the Byzantines’ Ravenna exarchate (which as noted had included Rome).
Pepin sold this move as a “gift” to Christendom and the Popes by a devout Christian, but it was a shrewd geopolitical bet. With the Lombards defeated, he might certainly have set himself up as ruler of the region, effectively extending the Frankish kingdom down into the middle of Italy. But by handing sovereignty of it over to the Popes, he relieved himself of the obligation to maintain a significant and consistent military presence in Italy. Yet, he could count on the Popes’ allegiance (for lack of a better term) since his regime was the only one who could assist them.
The Popes’ alliance with the Franks remained in force for quite some time. Frankish king Charlemagne, Pepin’s son, put down the remnants of the Lombards by 774 and set himself up as their King. On Christmas Day in 800 CE, Pope Leo III put the frosting on the cake of the papal/Frankish alliance when he crowned Charlemagne Emperor of the Romans.
While setting up the papacy as sovereign in northern and central Italy had been a clever maneuver for the Franks, it placed the Popes in a precarious position. Every regime that had controlled the region prior to them had at least some military capability; in the case of the Roman and Byzantine regimes, standing armies with the ability to bring in allied forces, if needed; in the case of the Ostrogoths, a small standing corps with the ability to raise a true army within just a few weeks.
The Popes, on the other hand, had no such capability. Any military power they had, depended on the local Italian nobility, some of whom (like the Ostrogoths) had a small corps of their own with ability to raise levies. Some of the towns, as well as cities like Rome and Naples, also had militias which were controlled by regional nobles, but these were generally small, and defensive in nature.
The arrangement worked, so long as the Frankish Carolingian dynasty (named for Pepin’s father, Charles Martel) alliance held out and as long as the Carolingians were masters of western and central Europe. That fell apart in the middle of the 9th century when their empire fractured in three after the death of Charlemagne’s son and successor Louis “the Pious.” Its middle portion which bordered the Papal States to its north — a kingdom known as Middle Francia or Lotharingia (for its king, Lothar) — collapsed under the weight of a civil war among Charlemagne’s three grandsons.
At that point, the alliance between the Franks and the papacy became the object of a contest between the two remaining Carolingian kingdoms in France and Germany. The Popes could no longer count on clear, unquestioned military assistance from either. They went from being masters of their demesne allied with a powerful regime, to something of a pawn within a larger chess game being played by remaining powers.
Those “remaining powers” included the Italian regional nobility, both those residing inside the borders of the Papal States (i.e. the Popes’ own vassals) and their external neighbors, especially the dukes of Tuscany (to the north and west) and Spoleto (to the south and east). Among the Popes’ most powerful vassals were the counts of Tusculum inside the Papal States, with their seat very close to Rome.
The most important figure in the
He held this office because Louis had set himself up as a papal benefactor (as Pepin and Charlemagne had done before him) and Theophylact had assisted Louis in a previous military campaign. This is an indication that Theophylact had no small amount of influence, already, within the region of northern Italy (both inside and outside the Papal States), despite having been unremarked previously. He may have held other offices in addition to being a count and militia commander.
A number of chronicles identify Theophylact as a “senator” of Rome, although there was no Roman Senate as existed during the Roman Republic or even the Imperial era. It’s sometimes presumed that he’d descended from an old Roman senatorial family, but that can’t be confirmed at this point (nor is much else known with certainty about his family’s origins). If there was a Roman “senate” at this time, it’d have been a localized legislative and/or consultative body for the city of Rome and its close vicinity.
Somehow, probably as an agent of Louis the Blind, Theophylact was involved in the overthrow of Pope Christopher, now counted as an antipope, who’d forcibly deposed Pope Leo V likely with the assistance of an otherwise-unnamed regional militia. Pope Sergius III replaced Christopher in 904 after Theophylact effectively cleared the way for his election.
A consequence of Sergius’s elevation was Theophylact being named vestararius (an executive officer in charge of the Roman regional curia or court) and magister militum (at that time, that meant commander of Rome’s militia, which may have been small but could be a serious fighting force), among other titles. About a decade later, Theophylact was named consul or ruler of the city and environs of Rome, although that appears to have been only for a fixed duration (perhaps in the same way as the Roman republican consuls held office only for a year at a time).
It’s just when Theophylact becomes the master of Rome and pretty much the whole of northern Italy, considering his influence within the remnant Carolingian kingdom of Italy in addition to the offices he held within the Papal States, that our story takes a scandalous turn.
The scandalous nature of all this turns on Theodora, Theophylact’s wife, as well as their daughter, Marozia. The latter, as far as we know, became the mistress — in 905 when she was around the age of 15 — of the recently-elevated Pope Sergius. They reportedly had a son who would, later, be named Pope (as John XI).
That Marozia was Sergius’s mistress is more certain than that she’d given birth to an illegitimate son of his who later became Pope. Even so, the latter is attested by two sources; the aforementioned Bishop Liutprand, as well as a later chronicle. A third chronicle, more contemporary than these, identifies John XI as being Marozia’s son by her husband Alberic I, duke of Spoleto, an ally and successor of Theophylact.
According to Liutprand, Theodora had multiple additional lovers (he describes her as a prostitute) who were later named Pope — namely, Anastasius III (Sergius’s immediate successor), Lando (who followed) and John X (after him).
The reign of John X was longer than most of this era — running from 914 into 928 — and controversial, to say the least. He meddled more than once in the affairs of the Carolingian kingdom of Italy and for a short time their German kingdom, having a great deal of influence due to his alliance with Theophylact which lasted until the latter’s death, in spite of Theodora supposedly being his mistress and his having fallen out with Marozia.
Theophylact’s death in the middle of the 920s proved John’s undoing. In 928, Margrave Guy of Tuscany, at that time Marozia’s husband (her second), pounced on an opportunity literally to attack him in Rome and have him killed. Supposedly (that is, according to Liutprand) this was in order to raise Marozia’s son John XI to the papacy. Her son would become Pope, to be sure, but he wasn’t chosen as John X’s successor. In fact, with Marozia’s apparent blessing, two other popes were elevated in succession to John X (to wit, Leo VI and Stephen VII) before her son was chosen in 931.
At this point, a bit more needs to be said of Theodora and Marozia. It’s true they held a great deal of influence, especially Marozia, but any power they had was through Theophylact (husband of the former and father of the latter) and two of the latter’s three husbands (Alberic I of Spoleto and Guy of Tuscany).
Marozia also had been awarded the titles of senatrix and patricia which appear to have been honorifics only, although Liutprand attaches more meaning to them and even treats them as scandalous (since, previously, women had supposedly never been titled as senators or patricians). Then again, he treats everything about Marozia and her mother as scandalous.
Aside from love affairs they may or may not have had, and while it’s true both women held significant influence over the region, whatever authority they wielded was through Theophylact, Alberic, Guy, and their issue.
Notably, one of Marozia’s sons, Alberic II of Spoleto, turned out to be her undoing. He’d been very much a “second son” in her eyes. He opposed her marriage to her third husband Hugh of Arles, king of Italy, and disrupted their wedding in 932. Either during the festivities or immediately after, he roused a crowd to attack. Hugh managed to escape but Marozia was imprisoned by the mob and died a few years later. Ironically, some time after that, Alberic II reached an accommodation with Hugh and ended up marrying his daughter Alda of Vienne (although later there was another rupture between the two).
Let’s be clear about this: Liutprand’s accusation that Theodora was a prostitute is historically unsupported and makes little sense. A woman as well off as she wouldn’t need to be part of that profession (or, really, any other). It appears she was a manipulator, and a successful one at that, and she also may have carried on multiple affairs, but that’s the limit of her villainy. The same is largely true of her daughter Marozia.
The break with his mother and stepfather Hugh ended up working to Alberic II’s favor. He took control over all the offices — and more importantly, the military forces — that had been held by Theophylact’s family. Although John XI, Marozia’s oldest son, was Pope, meaning he was ostensibly his brother’s sovereign, John effectively became Alberic’s subject, and was all but set aside.
John remained Pope only ceremonially. In all other respects, Alberic commanded the office. When John died at the age of 25 (for no reported reason, oddly enough), Alberic chose a monk of his acquaintance to replace him, as Leo VII. The next several Popes were also selected by Alberic or chosen with his approval. That included his own son Octavian (most likely born to Alda, but may have been the son of an unnamed concubine) who became Pope John XII in 955.
By this time, Alberic had died and it appears Octavian/John achieved office merely by weight of his heritage as one of the Theophylacti; a promise Alberic had extracted from local nobility to elevate him; and the assistance of his brother Gregory I, count of Tusculum.
By 960 Pope John found himself involved with a struggle against the Lombards (who’d risen from the ashes of their post-Carolingian demise). It appears neither he nor his brother Gregory could equal the martial, political, or diplomatic prowess of their father Alberic or grandfather Theophylact. John appealed to the king of Germany, Otto I “the Great,” for assistance. Emulating Leo III, he crowned Otto as Roman Emperor. It is this event that gave rise to the kingdom of Germany being called “the Holy Roman Empire.”
To a greater extent than either Pepin or Charlemagne had done before him, Otto presented himself as the grand (and even divinely-ordained) protector of the papacy. It’s true he affirmed the sovereignty of the Popes over their own state, but in other ways he attempted to present himself as the “big brother” of the Pope and, really, tried to act as the Pope’s controller. His defeat of the Lombards and absorption of the remnant kingdom of Italy into his own, made John realize that Otto had simply used his alliance with the papacy to seize control over all of the peninsula. He was, naturally, alarmed at that prospect.
Honestly, there was nothing standing in the way of Otto simply marching back into Rome any time he wanted to, and setting John aside. John knew it, and less than two years later made overtures to other powers (such as the Byzantines) to ally against Otto. Word of this triggered exactly the scenario that John had feared; Otto marched on Rome and assumed control, at which time John fled the city.
Otto convened a Roman regional synod to depose John. Otto and this synod named Leo VIII to replace him. The nobility and people of the region of Rome did not take this well. Yet another ad hoc synod was convened after Otto and his forces left. This one condemned Otto and Leo, and reinstated John XII. At this point, the Theophylacti — though considerably less powerful than they had been — were sufficient to drive Leo out of the city.
John was returned to power, and having been supported by a local uprising, he was able to re-establish something close to the regional power base he’d enjoyed around the time he’d originally been elevated.
But it was not to last. He died in his late 20s or early 30s. According to Liutprand he was caught in the middle of “doing the deed” with a mistress and thrown from a window by the woman’s angry husband or fiancé. Another story claimed he’d been killed by a jealous male lover. Neither of these tales can be affirmed, but there’s no question he died at a young age under questionable circumstances.
A new pope was elected by local Romans, Benedict V. Otto had had enough of the locals deciding on their own Popes; his armies returned, blockading the city. Several months of what amounted to a siege were enough to force them to capitulate. Leo was re-established as Pope and assumed control, under Otto’s auspices. Benedict was tried by Leo and convicted, then exiled to Germany where he died the next year. Leo’s second elevation as Pope was affirmed (begrudgingly) by a regional Roman synod.
All of this means Leo VIII was both an antipope (while John XII was on the run but still alive) and a legitimate Pope (after his reinstatement). He was succeeded a few years later by John XIII who reportedly had descended from a family that had intermarried with the Theophylacti. Because of that, he technically was one of the Theophylacti himself, but his own family was the Crescentii and he set about placing them in positions of authority.
The Theophylacti family waned in power but their descendants continued to contend for control of northern and central Italy. Other members of the of House of Theophylact who would later be Pope included Benedict VII, Benedict VIII, John XIX, and Benedict IX.
It’s at this point — the reinstatement of Otto’s chosen Pope Leo — that the period of “the Pornocracy” ends. The papacy stabilized somewhat under the influence of Otto and later Holy Roman Emperors, at least for a while. That, of course, would change over time, to the Emperors’ chagrin, but the papacy itself only grew stronger and more resilient.
Inside the Church, reforms were imposed, slowly, which brought some order to the papal chaos. The Church as an institution began asserting control over the process of naming Popes, making it an internal one.
Ironically, Church reforms happened due to the largesse shown by some of the “pornocracy” popes (including the widely reviled John XI) to the Abbey of Cluny in France. The favors heaped on the monks of Cluny, over the latter half of the 10th century and into the 11th, helped them build something of an internal reform movement within the Church.
Clunaic monks campaigned to rework the Church in their own image; one of them, named Hildegard, was named Pope Gregory VII in 1073. From there he was able to impose many reforms, making the secular clergy (i.e. parish priests and hierarchs) much more like regular clergy (i.e. monks) than they’d ever been.
It was Gregory who flipped the script of papal relations with the Holy Roman Empire, when he bested Emperor Henry IV during the Investiture Controversy. The Popes no longer depended on the German Emperors’ support; if anything, it was now the other way around.
The modern papal election scheme focusing on a conclave of cardinals was established in 1274. But long before then, other reforms in the process had removed local Italian politics — as well as others (including the Holy Roman Emperors) — from the equation.
Keep in mind that both of the labels “pornocracy” and Saeculum Obscurum are later, relatively modern, monikers identifying this period. At the time these events unfolded and immediately after, they did so naturally and no specific term was used to describe it. While some observers, including Liutprand of Cremona, were incensed by what they saw as depravity, corruption and debauchery, for the most part, what happened was accepted as routine.
Historians since have had many different views of this time; as many as there are historians who’ve studied it. The papacy emerged from it stronger than it had been, to the point where it dominated European geopolitics, at least for a time. That, of course, came to a screeching halt with the issuance of the papal bull Unam sanctam (the papacy’s zenith) followed almost immediately by the Avignon Papacy, which was yet another dark time in its history.
But that’s another story for another time.
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