Pope Benedict XIII (1649-1730)

Two men, one number

The name Benedict XIII was borne by two very different figures. The first, Pedro Martínez de Luna, an Aragonese cardinal, was elected at Avignon in 1394 in the schismatic obedience of the Western Great Schism; deposed by the Council of Constance on July 26, 1417, he obstinately maintained his claim until his death at Peñíscola in 1423 and is classified by the Church among the antipopes.^[10] The second, Pietro Francesco Orsini, is a legitimate pope of the 18th century, a Dominican, elected in 1724.

This distinction is not merely scholarly curiosity: it touches on the very legitimacy of apostolic succession. Recognizing Pedro de Luna as a true “Benedict XIII” would validate the Avignon line against Rome. By taking this number for himself, Orsini performed what may be read as a discreet canonical act: the “Benedict XIII” of Avignon never counted, and the seat was free.

Why Orsini chose the name Benedict XIII

According to sources, the newly elected pope first considered taking the name Benedict XIV, as if to acknowledge the number borne by the Aragonese. He quickly abandoned this: since Pedro de Luna had been only a schismatic, his title could not affect the legitimate numbering. Orsini therefore took the name Benedict XIII, both to claim the usurped number and to honor the memory of Benedict XI (Niccolò Boccasini, 1303–1304), also a friar preacher.^[11][12][13]

What may be read in this gesture is the mark of Orsini’s personality as the sources depict it: a man of order, attached to canonical rigor, who preferred to restore right rather than spare susceptibilities. For a Dominican, reclaiming the name of a Dominican pope while erasing that of an antipope had a double meaning: fidelity to the Order of Preachers and fidelity to the See of Peter.

The Orsini House of Gravina

Pietro Francesco Orsini was born on February 2, 1649, in Gravina, in Apulia, then a province of the Kingdom of Naples. He was the eldest son of Ferdinando III Orsini, eighth Duke of Gravina, and Giovanna Frangipani della Tolfa.^[14][15] The Orsini were among the oldest and most powerful families of the Roman aristocracy; they had already produced two popes in the Middle Ages — Celestine III and Nicholas III — and a multitude of cardinals. Pietro Francesco would be the third and last Orsini to ascend the Chair of Peter.^[16]

As the eldest son, he was destined to inherit the duchy. His education was that of a young prince: literature, philosophy, law. Nothing predisposed him to a religious life — except for an early and persistent piety, which his family long tried to oppose.

Entry into the Dominicans and Renunciation of the Inheritance

At eighteen, during a study trip to Venice, the young Orsini made a decision that scandalized his family: he entered the Order of Preachers on August 12, 1668, against the wishes of his mother and his uncle, Cardinal Virginio Orsini. He officially renounced his rights of primogeniture on February 9, 1669 in Rome, then made his religious profession four days later, on February 13, at the convent of Santa Sabina, taking the name Brother Vincenzo Maria.^[17][18]

This renunciation in favor of his brother Domenico^[19] was a radical gesture: the heir to a duchy abandoned title, lands, and fortune for the poverty of the cloister. This choice marked the rest of his life. Where other noble cardinals maintained the lifestyle of their rank, Orsini retained, even on the papal throne, the habits of a mendicant brother.

“He deliberately rejected his inheritance as eldest son of the Duke of Gravina to become Brother Vincenzo Maria of the Order of Preachers.” — according to the New Catholic Encyclopedia^[20]

Brother Vincenzo Maria

Having become a Dominican, Orsini taught philosophy, preached, and fully embraced the regular life. It was in this environment — scholastic study, preaching, asceticism — that the man who would one day govern the Church was formed. His devotion to Saint Philip Neri, to whom he later attributed his miraculous survival during an earthquake, was born in these years of religious youth.^[21]

This identity as a preacher brother is not a mere biographical detail: it explains both the spiritual greatness of his pontificate — love of liturgy, zeal for the sacraments, doctrinal rigor — and its political limitations — inexperience in temporal governance, naivety before courtiers, misunderstanding of European diplomatic games.

A Cardinal at Twenty-Three

Brother Vincenzo Maria never sought honors; they came to him through family politics. When his brother Domenico married Ludovica Altieri, niece of Pope Clement X, the Orsini family negotiated, as a condition of the marriage, the cardinalate for the young Dominican. Orsini was thus created cardinal on February 22, 1672, at the age of twenty-three, with the title of San Sisto, despite his resistance.^[22][23] He was ordained priest by Clement X himself.^[24]

The contrast is striking between the rapid promotion and the promoted man’s will. Orsini wanted neither the hat nor the fortune; he accepted out of obedience, as he would later accept the tiara.

Siponto, Cesena, Benevento

The young cardinal soon requested a real pastoral charge rather than a curial sinecure. He was appointed Archbishop of Manfredonia (the see of Siponto, in Apulia) on January 28, 1675, then Bishop of Cesena in 1680, and finally Archbishop of Benevento on March 18, 1686 — a see he would uniquely retain until his death, even after his elevation to the papacy.^[25][26][27]

In each of these dioceses, Orsini imposed the same method: systematic pastoral visits, diocesan synods, reform of clergy discipline, catechism, popular missions. At Siponto, he founded a seminary and a Monte frumentario, a form of agricultural credit designed to protect peasants from usury. This was the model of the Tridentine bishop applied to the letter, in the line of Saint Charles Borromeo.^[28]

Benevento: Thirty-Eight Years of Pastoral Governance

Benevento was the work of his life. An enclave of the Papal States deep within the Kingdom of Naples, the diocese was neglected: his predecessor, Cardinal Castaldi, had never resided there. Orsini found, according to Treccani, churches “in such deplorable condition that one could hardly believe it.”^[29] In thirty-eight years as bishop of Benevento before his election (1686–1724) — he then retained the see until his death in 1730 — he completely transformed the ecclesiastical province.

The material and spiritual achievements of this governance are considerable:

Source: Enciclopedia dei Papi, article Benedetto XIII.^[30]

The result was not merely administrative. Orsini aimed at a reform of morals, and he could believe it largely accomplished. In 1696, he wrote to Cardinal Fabrizio Spada that there was no longer “a single certain case of concubinage in the city, when previously there were hundreds.”^[31]

“There is no longer a single certain case of concubinage in the city, when previously there were hundreds.” — Pietro Francesco Orsini, letter to Cardinal Fabrizio Spada, 1696^[32]

The Earthquakes of 1688 and 1702

Two major earthquakes struck Benevento during his episcopate. On June 5, 1688, the archbishop was buried under the rubble of his apartments and survived; he attributed his survival to the intercession of Saint Philip Neri and published an account of the miracles he attributed to the saint.^[33] A second earthquake, in 1702, again devastated churches and buildings. Orsini financed the reconstruction through a Monte delle fabbriche ecclesiastiche created in 1703.^[34]

These trials completed the forging of his reputation: a bishop who shared the fate of his people, rebuilt with his own funds, and read supernatural meaning into disasters. It was this stature as a heroic pastor that, despite himself, designated him for Rome.

Two Months of Deadlock Between Bourbons and Habsburgs

At the death of Innocent XIII in March 1724, the conclave opened on March 20 in a Europe divided in two: on one side the Bourbon faction (France and Spain), on the other the Habsburg faction (the Emperor). For two months, each camp blocked candidates too closely associated with the other. Orsini, an elderly cardinal of seventy-five reputed for his political inexperience and detachment from state affairs, paradoxically became the only acceptable name to both sides: his election united the votes of both camps.^[35][36]

The Novena to Saint Philip Neri

Distressed by the length of the conclave, Orsini began a novena to his patron saint, asking that the election no longer be delayed. But before the novena ended, he realized with horror that it was himself who was about to be chosen.^[37]

“This long delay weighed heavily on Orsini’s soul, who began a novena of prayers to his patron, Saint Philip Neri, so that the election of a new pope would no longer be postponed. Before the novena ended, he saw with terror that he himself would be chosen.” — from Catholic Encyclopedia, art. Pope Benedict XIII^[38]

A Pope Who Refused the Tiara

Elected on May 29, 1724 despite his repeated protests, Orsini continued to refuse even after the vote, citing his age, physical weakness, incapacity, and his resolution never to become pope. He only yielded, “in tears,” when warned of the grave dangers to the Church that reopening the conclave would cause.^[39][40] It is said that the Master General of the Order of Preachers, Agustín Pipia, secured his submission in the name of religious obedience.^[41]

“Against his often-repeated protests, he was chosen on May 29, 1724, and even after the final vote he refused to yield, arguing that his age, physical weakness, and incapacity should exempt him from such a grave responsibility.” — from Catholic Encyclopedia^[42]

He was crowned on June 4, 1724 and took possession of the Lateran Basilica on September 24 of the same year.^[43] The man ascending the throne had all the appearance of a saint and none of a prince: this was the entire ambiguity of his reign.

Dominican Life at the Vatican

Upon becoming pope, Orsini did not change his lifestyle. He kept the habit and Dominican observances, ate frugally, increased fasting and prayer, maintained his fervent attachment to relics, and continued personally administering the sacraments. He retained the archbishopric of Benevento, which he administered through a vicar general and visited twice, in 1727 and 1729.^[44][45]

The future Benedict XIV (Cardinal Prospero Lambertini, whom Benedict XIII created cardinal) later summarized, with affectionate clarity, this gap between the man’s holiness and his incompetence as a ruler: Orsini, he said in essence, “had no idea how to govern.”^[46] The same tenderness is evident in Lambertini’s remark about him: one respects this pontiff who would rather have his carriage backed up than dispute the right of way with a cart driver.^[47]

The Liturgist and Pastor of Rome

What Benedict XIII loved was the altar. He took evident pleasure in consecrating churches, conferring orders, administering sacraments, and instructing the people. He personally consecrated at least 139 bishops—an episcopal lineage so vast that the immense majority of Catholic bishops alive at the beginning of the 21st century trace their succession through him, step by step, back to Cardinal Scipione Rebiba (1541).^[48] In 1725, he inaugurated the staircase of the Trinità dei Monti (the scalinata at the Spanish Steps), a Baroque masterpiece designed by Francesco de Sanctis and funded by the 20,000-écu legacy of the French diplomat Étienne Gueffier.^[49] He also refounded the University of Camerino in 1727—a medieval foundation which he reorganized by the bull Liberalium disciplinarum (July 15, 1727), with faculties of theology, law, medicine, and mathematics.^[50]

“He took joy in consecrating churches, administering sacraments, and giving religious instruction.” — from the New Catholic Encyclopedia^[51]

Reform of Ecclesiastical Discipline

Faithful to the reforming bishop he had been, Benedict XIII sought to purify the morals of the clergy. He combated the luxury and worldly pomp of cardinals, legislated on clerical dress, condemned the wearing of wigs by clerics, and abolished lotteries in Rome and the Papal States.^[52][53] These measures, sometimes considered overly meticulous, stemmed from a deep conviction: the reform of the Church begins with the visible holiness of its ministers.

Why a Provincial Council During the Jubilee

The most original act of the pontificate was the Roman provincial council of 1725, held at the Lateran from April 15 to May 29, 1725, during the jubilee year and despite opposition from much of the Curia.^[54] Benedict XIII’s intention was educational: to set an example for the bishops by personally convening, as Bishop of Rome, the synod that each of them was expected to hold in their own diocese.

What the Council Decreed

The council addressed the entire Tridentine discipline: residence of bishops, diocesan visitations, pastoral conferences, sincerity in administration, ecclesiastical immunities, clergy formation, supervision of public morality.^[55][56] It was the Roman application, on the scale of the universal Church, of the method Benedict XIII had implemented forty years earlier in Benevento.

Unigenitus Imposed: The Jansenist Issue

The 1725 council was also the stage for Benedict XIII’s commitment against Jansenism. He demanded there an unreserved acceptance of the bull Unigenitus of Clement XI (1713), which had condemned one hundred and one propositions of Quesnel.^[57] Through his pressure, he obtained in 1728 that Cardinal de Noailles, Archbishop of Paris and long reluctant, finally submitted to the bull.^[58][59]

Benedict XIII’s stance, however, was nuanced, and it was this that earned him the most criticism from later Catholic historiography. A Dominican devoted to the Thomistic doctrine of efficacious grace and predestination without foreknowledge of merits, he insisted in a brief to the Preachers that this doctrine was not condemned by Unigenitus.^[60] His constant concern was to avoid worsening the division within the Catholic world through excessive severity—even if it meant allowing an ambiguity for which his opponents reproached him.^[61]

Saints of the Counter-Reformation

It is probably through his canonizations that Benedict XIII most enduringly influenced Catholic devotion. In just a few years, this liturgical pope inscribed on the calendar some of the greatest figures of the Counter-Reformation and evangelization:

Sources: Catholic Encyclopedia and biographical notices.^[62][63]

On August 13, 1729, Benedict XIII further beatified Vincent de Paul, apostle of charity: it was only eight years later, on June 16, 1737, that Clement XII canonized him.^[64]

He also proclaimed Peter Chrysologus Doctor of the Church on February 19, 1729.^[65] Altogether, this paints the portrait of a pope for whom canonized holiness was the foremost service rendered to the Church: more than political decrees, he wished to offer the faithful models to imitate.

Gregory VII and the Office Controversy

One of these canonizations, however, turned into a diplomatic incident. By canonizing Gregory VII on May 24, 1728, Benedict XIII had inserted into the breviary for May 25 an Office whose lessons exalted the great reforming pope—including his power to depose Emperor Henry IV and to release his subjects from their oath of loyalty.^[66]

This assertion, taken from the Dictatus papae, struck a direct blow to the 18th-century Catholic sovereigns, jealous of their authority. Several Catholic courts took offense at it and forbade its reading in their territories.^[67] The episode illustrates a persistent tension of the reign: a pope wholly focused on the sacred unwittingly revived the old conflicts between the priesthood and the empire.

A Favorite of Benevento

While Benedict XIII prayed and celebrated, the real government slipped from his hands. He entrusted it to a man from Benevento: Niccolò Coscia, his former secretary, whom he showered with honors — archbishop in partibus (holder of a defunct see), coadjutor of Benevento, secretary of the Memorials, then cardinal in 1725.^[68] Around Coscia formed a faction of Beneventans (Santamaria, Lercari, Fini) who isolated the pope from critical information and seized the levers of power.^[69]

The Ruin of the Papal Finances

The outcome was disastrous. Coscia “committed a long series of financial abuses for his own profit, causing the ruin of the papal treasury.”^[70] Benedict XIII had inherited sound finances; at his death, he left a deficit of some 120,000 écus, where at the beginning of his government there had been an active margin of more than 270,000 écus — figures given by Gaspare De Caro in Treccani.^[71][72] The reforming pope, who had so effectively administered Benevento, saw his own economic reforms subverted by the corruption of his close associates.

“All the Money of Rome Goes to Benevento”

The scandal was public. Montesquieu, passing through Italy, noted that all the money from Rome was sent to Benevento because the Beneventans controlled the pope’s weakness.^[73] The contrast between Orsini’s personal holiness and the greed of his entourage became the subject of all Europe—and the main reason for the harsh judgment history would pass on his pontificate.

The Congregation of Agriculture

Benedict XIII nevertheless tried to apply to the Papal States the methods proven in Benevento. In October 1725, he created a congregation on Agriculture, endowed with jurisdiction over the entire papal territory, to revise the Annona budget, organize agricultural credit, and lighten taxation. In six years, he promulgated thirty-eight constitutions to this effect.^[74] The intention was sound; the execution was sabotaged by the corruption of the ruling group, which diverted funds to parasitic clienteles.^[75]

The Monarchia Sicula and Peace with Naples

A man of peace, Benedict XIII sought to extinguish conflicts inherited from his predecessors. He settled the old dispute of the Monarchia Sicula—the ecclesiastical privileges claimed by the kings of Naples and Sicily—by revoking the rigorist constitution of Clement XI (1715) and granting the king the right to appoint a spiritual judge for ecclesiastical matters.^[76] The conciliatory solution, verging on weakness, appeased the princes but weakened Roman positions: it was typical of his entire policy, where the concern for concord always prevailed over the assertion of rights.

Death on February 21, 1730

Benedict XIII died in Rome on February 21, 1730, in his eighty-second year, after contracting a catarrh while celebrating the funeral of a cardinal.^[77][78] True to his Dominican fidelity, he was buried not in the Vatican basilica but in the church of his order, Santa Maria sopra Minerva, where Pietro Bracci sculpted his tomb.^[79] To the end, the friar preacher prevailed over the prince.

The Trial of Coscia

Barely was Benedict XIII buried when long-contained anger erupted. His successor Clement XII had Coscia excommunicated and tried; the favorite, convicted of embezzlement, was sentenced to ten years in prison.^[80][81] The contrast is cruel: the reign of a saint ended with the sensational trial of his trusted man.

A Cause for Beatification

The memory of Benedict XIII still carries the fragrance of his personal holiness. A cause for beatification was opened as early as 1755 in Tortona, then closed, reopened in Tortona on February 21, 1931, then closed in 1940 due to doubts linked to the Coscia affair; it was reopened on January 17, 2004, with the diocesan process conducted in Rome opening in 2012 and concluding on February 24, 2017 at the Lateran. Orsini today holds the title of Servant of God, with no further progress known to date.^[82]

The Judgment of History

How to judge such a pontificate? Contemporaries were harsh. The Neapolitan jurist and historian Pietro Giannone (1676–1748) — author of the Istoria civile del Regno di Napoli (1723), placed on the Index, which earned him excommunication for his anti-papal bias: a brilliant but hostile witness — mocked a pope who, indifferent to great affairs, thought only of ceremonies:

“Caring nothing for the great affairs of state nor the pontifical monarchy, he was entirely devoted to ceremonies and ecclesiastical functions, baptisms, consecrating temples and altars, blessing bells.” — Pietro Giannone, cited by the Enciclopedia dei Papi^[83]

The verdict is as unfair as it is revealing. Unfair, because it reduces to “ceremonies” what was, for Benedict XIII, the very heart of the Church’s mission: sanctifying souls. Revealing, because it points to his true weakness—the abandonment of temporal government to unworthy hands. Balanced historiography recognizes that Orsini lacked neither administrative ability nor zeal, as Benevento had shown; but that he was betrayed by his choice of corrupt collaborators and by his inability to dominate the Curia and the powers.^[84][85][86] Without making him a corrupt man — Treccani stresses his personal honesty — his share of responsibility must be named: entrusting government to unworthy men, then dismissing as slander the accusations brought against them, is the culpa in eligendo (the fault in choosing collaborators) which, despite himself, revived around him the evils of nepotism he wished to flee.^[87]

What remains is the image, passed down by his successor Benedict XIV himself, of a pontiff of disarming humility, more ready to yield the way than to dispute it.^[88] Of a personal holiness held to be recognized, but weak in his government: Benedict XIII remains the clearest example of what a monk on the throne of Peter can be when holiness is not accompanied by political genius.

Related Articles

• Pope Innocent XIII
• Pope Clement XII
• Pope Benedict XIV
• Saint John of the Cross
• Saint Louis de Gonzaga
• Pope Saint Gregory VII
• Jansenism and the Unigenitus Bull
• The Western Great Schism
• The Council of Constance
• The Papal States

Main Sources

• Holy See, official file Benedetto XIII, list of sovereign pontiffs: 245th pope, May 29 / June 4, 1724 – February 21, 1730, born in Gravina.
• Gaspare De Caro, article Benedetto XIII, Enciclopedia dei Papi, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani, 2000.
• Michael Ott, article Pope Benedict XIII, The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 2, Robert Appleton Company, 1907; transcription New Advent.
• Benedict XIII, Pope, New Catholic Encyclopedia, online version Encyclopedia.com.
• Ludwig von Pastor, History of the Popes since the End of the Middle Ages, vol. XXXIV (pontificate of Benedict XIII), for a detailed account of the reign and the Coscia affair.