Innocent IV (in Latin Innocentius IV), born Sinibaldo Fieschi (Sinibaldo de' Fieschi) in Genoa or Lavagna no later than 1190, governed the Church of Rome from June 25, 1243 - the day of his election at Anagni - to December 7, 1254.[1][2] He succeeds Celestine IV, whose sixteen-day pontificate was followed by a vacancy of more than nineteen months (November 10, 1241 – June 25, 1243), and precedes Alexander IV.
Coming from the powerful house of the Counts of Lavagna, one of the great lineages of the Ligurian coast, Sinibaldo Fieschi was first of all one of the greatest jurists of his time: professor of canon law in Bologna, author of the Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium, long considered the best commentary on the Decretals.[3][4] Yet his name remains attached above all to an unprecedented political act: the deposition of Emperor Frederick II pronounced at the First Council of Lyon, July 17, 1245.[5][6]
Jurist pope and combat pope, Innocent IV embodies the summit - and the tension - of the theocratic papacy of the central Middle Ages. His doctrine of the fullness of power (plenitudo potestatis) intends to submit the Empire itself to the judgment of Peter's successor; his genius as a canonist lays the foundations of the law of legal entities and the first Western reflection on the rights of non-Christian peoples.[7][8] But his reign was also that of permanent war against the house of Hohenstaufen, of favors granted to his Genoese family, and of the grave bull Ad extirpanda, which authorized under strict conditions a limited use of torture in the inquisitorial procedure (May 15, 1252, without mutilation or danger of death, only once), confirmed in 1259 and 1265.[9][10]
"He neglected the internal affairs of the Church and allowed many abuses, provided they served to strengthen his position against the Hohenstaufen." - Catholic Encyclopedia, article "Pope Innocent IV"[11]
Why does Innocent IV matter?
The jurist pope who deposed an emperor
No pope before him had deposed an emperor in an ecumenical council — Gregory VII had indeed deposed Henry IV in 1076, but in a Roman synod, not in an ecumenical council.[12] The quarrel that had been brewing since Gregory VII between priesthood and empire reached its most spectacular breaking point under Innocent IV. At the Council of Lyon, in 1245, the pope declared Frederick II Hohenstaufen deposed from the Empire and all his kingdoms, and released his subjects from their oath of loyalty.[13][14]
This gesture, whose audacity astonished Christendom, was not an impulsive act: it rested on an entire theology of power developed by the canonist Sinibaldo Fieschi. For him, the pope, vicar of Christ, holds a jurisdiction that extends into temporal affairs when salvation or justice requires it. The deposition of 1245 is the most extreme application of this doctrine - and one of the strongest expressions of medieval theocratic thought.[15][16]
One of the greatest canonists to ascend the throne of Peter
Before being pope, Sinibaldo Fieschi was a master of law. His Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium - commentary on the Decretals promulgated by Gregory IX in 1234 - was, for centuries, the reference work for Church jurists.[17][18] Legal historians credit him with decisive advances: the first mature theory of the juridical person (persona ficta), which allows a corporation, a chapter or a city to be treated as a subject of law distinct from its members; and the first major canonical reflection on the legitimacy of non-Christian political authority.[19]
This last question, dealt with in his commentary on the decretal Quod super his, will make him an authority cited even in the debates of the 16th century on the rights of the peoples of the New World.[20] There are few popes whose intellectual work has held weight as long as their political work.
The Pope who opened the West to Mongol Asia
At the same time as he was fighting the Empire, Innocent IV faced a new threat: the irruption of the Mongols in Eastern Europe, after the ravages of 1241-1242. Rather than just a defensive crusade, the pope chose a new path - the embassy. In 1245, he sent the Franciscan John of Plano Carpini — along with the Dominican Ascelin of Lombardy, entrusted with a second embassy to the Mongols of Persia[21] — to carry his letters to the heart of Asia, to the encampment of the Great Khan.[22][23]
This mission, one of the first diplomatic contacts between Latin Christendom and the Mongol Empire, brought back the first great Western account of the Mongols and a scathing response from the khan Güyük, who demanded the submission of the pope and the kings of Europe.[24] Innocent IV was thus, despite the apparent failure, the initiator of the missionary and diplomatic opening of the Church towards the Far East.
Main sources
Witness table
| Source | Date | What it brings | Caution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Catholic Encyclopedia (New Advent) | 1910 | Complete biography: family, law, election, Lyon I, war, death | Old but Catholic and detailed source |
| Enciclopedia dei Papi (Treccani) | 2000 | Italian scholarly synthesis: Fieschi, canonist, doctrine of power | Leading academic reference |
| Encyclopaedia Britannica | modern notice | English-speaking summary of the pontificate and assessment | Short notice |
| Canons of the First Council of Lyon | 1245 | Sentence of deposition of Frederick II and constitutions | Conciliar primary source |
| Bull Ad extirpanda | May 15, 1252 | Inquisitorial procedure, authorization of torture | Grave pontifical primary source |
| Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium | before 1245 | Canonical doctrine of Sinibaldo Fieschi | Legal primary source |
| Account by John of Plano Carpini | 1247 | First Latin embassy among the Mongols | First-hand testimony |
Catholic Encyclopedia, Treccani and modern notices
The reference biographical file remains the article "Pope Innocent IV" of the Catholic Encyclopedia (1910), which traces the career of Sinibaldo Fieschi from the law school of Bologna until his death in Naples.[25] The Enciclopedia dei Papi of the Treccani gives a scholarly reading, attentive to the legal training of the pope, to his doctrine of plenitudo potestatis and to the family network of the Fieschi.[26] The Britannica provides an English-speaking summary centered on the imperial duel.[27] These notices do not replace the primary sources: for the deposition, it is the text of the canons of Lyon which is authentic; for the Inquisition, the bull Ad extirpanda; for the thought of the pope, his Apparatus.[28][29][30]
Primary sources: Lyon I, Ad extirpanda, the Apparatus, Carpini
Four documents structure the pontificate. First, the canons of the First Council of Lyon (1245), including the sentence Ad apostolicae dignitatis apicem which deposed Frederick II.[31] Then the bull Ad extirpanda of May 15, 1252, which regulated the fight against heresy and introduced judicial torture.[32] Then the Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium, the canonical summa in which Sinibaldo Fieschi sets out his doctrine of power, the juridical person and the rights of non-Christians.[33] Finally the Ystoria Mongalorum of John of Plano Carpini, report of the embassy of 1245-1247 and the first detailed Western description of the Mongols.[34]
Before the pontificate: Sinibaldo Fieschi, Genoese prince and canonist
A birth in the Ligurian high aristocracy
Sinibaldo Fieschi was born no later than 1190, in Genoa or in the family fiefdom of Lavagna, on the eastern coast of Liguria.[35][36] He belongs to the house of the Counts of Lavagna, one of the most powerful lineages in the region, which controlled the Apennine passages between the sea and the Po Valley.[37] His father is Ugo (Ugone) Fieschi; his youth was spent partly in Parma, with his uncle Opizone Fieschi, bishop of the city.[38][39]
This origin is not a simple ornament: the Fieschi family will weigh heavily throughout the pontificate. For half a century, it remained present without interruption at the Curia; it would even give a second pope, Adrian V, nephew of Innocent IV.[40]
The Bologna jurist and the Apparatus
The young Sinibaldo studied law in Bologna, European capital of legal science, undoubtedly between 1213 and 1223.[41] There he acquired the title of magister and, according to a well-established tradition, himself taught canon law there before entering the pontifical administration.[42][43]
His masterpiece is the Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium, a systematic commentary on the Decretals of Gregory IX (the Liber Extra, promulgated in 1234). The Catholic Encyclopedia says it bluntly: it is "the best commentary on the Decretals of Gregory IX", printed for the first time in Strasbourg in 1477 and republished until modern times.[44] A collection of his own decretals, the Novellae, is also attributed to him.[45] The future pope was therefore, in the literal sense, a scholar: not a speculative theologian, but a master of Church law, trained to reason about jurisdiction, proof, procedure and the legitimacy of power.
Cardinal, vice-chancellor, bishop
Sinibaldo Fieschi's curial career was rapid. Canon of Parma around 1226, auditor in the Roman Curia, he was created cardinal-priest of San Lorenzo in Lucina in 1227 by Gregory IX.[46][47] (The exact date varies according to sources between September 18 and 23 1227.)[48][49] He became vice-chancellor of the Roman Church, a key office in the pontifical chancery, then bishop of Albenga in 1235 and legate in Northern Italy.[50]
Around 1234-1235, Gregory IX entrusted him with the government of the March of Ancona, a strategic province of the Papal States, which he administered until around 1240.[51][52] When he ascended the throne of Peter, Sinibaldo Fieschi therefore knew the Church in all its workings: the science of law, the chancellery, the episcopate, the temporal government. No apprenticeship could better prepare the pope-jurist that he was to be.
The election of 1243: a pope after a long interregnum
The death of Celestine IV and the vacancy
At the death of Gregory IX in 1241, the Church went through a crisis of government. His successor Celestine IV died after only sixteen days of pontificate.[53][54] Then began a vacancy of the Holy See lasting one year, seven months and fifteen days - more than nineteen months, from the death of Celestine IV (November 10, 1241) to the election of June 25, 1243.[55]
The cause is Emperor Frederick II. Excommunicated, in open war against the papacy, he held several cardinals captured in 1241 prisoner and put pressure on the Sacred College. As long as the threat lasts, the election is impossible: the cardinals can neither meet freely nor elect in peace.[56][57]
The election to Anagni and the choice of name
To escape this pressure, the cardinals took refuge in Anagni, in Lazio. It was there that, on June 25, 1243, they elected Cardinal Sinibaldo Fieschi.[58][59] The choice could surprise observers: Sinibaldo was reputed to be a personal friend of Frederick II, who is said to have welcomed the news with satisfaction.[60] The rest of the pontificate would radically disappoint those hopes.
The newly elected pope takes the name Innocent IV, in the wake of the great Innocent III (1198-1216), theoretician of papal supremacy. The choice of the name announces the program: a pope determined to ensure that, until the end, the authority of the Apostolic See prevails over the princes of this world. He entered Rome on October 20, 1243.[61]
The duel with Frederick II
The failed peace of 1244
First, Innocent IV negotiates. Frederick II wishes his excommunication to be lifted; the pope wants the restitution of Church lands and guarantees. An agreement was concluded on March 31, 1244.[62][63] But the pope distrusted the imperial word: any agreement, he judged, would remain illusory as long as the emperor retained the power to break it at will. Frederick's commitments appeared to him to be insincere, and the emperor had, according to him, no intention of keeping them.[64][65]
Convinced that he will neither be able to live nor govern freely as long as Frederick holds Italy, Innocent IV makes a spectacular decision: leave Italy to reach a place beyond the reach of the Empire, and from there strike the emperor with all the weight of a council.[66][67]
The flight to Lyon
The escape is worthy of a novel. In June 1244, the pope escaped from Rome in disguise, reached the coast, and embarked at Civitavecchia on a Genoese fleet that came to pick him up in the night.[68][69] Ill, he stopped at Genoa, his homeland, during the summer and autumn of 1244, then crossed the Alps.[70]
He reached Lyon at the end of November or the beginning of December 1244.[71][72] The city, then on the borders of the kingdom of France and the Empire but outside the effective reach of Frederick, would be the capital of the Church for almost seven years. From this refuge, the pope will convene the council which will change the face of the conflict.
A merciless war
The break is complete. The pope mobilizes against Frederick all the weapons of the papacy: excommunication, preaching, diplomacy, support for rebellious cities and rival candidates for the Empire. From April 13, 1245, from Lyon, he solemnly renewed the excommunication of the emperor and his son Enzo.[73] The war would henceforth only cease with the death of one of the two adversaries.
Innocent IV supports the election of anti-kings in Germany - Henry Raspe (1246), then William of Holland (1247) - to deprive Frederick of his imperial base.[74][75] In Italy, he encourages the revolt of the Guelph cities; the defection of Parma in 1247, then the destruction of the camp city of Vittoria that Frederick had built to besiege it (1248), mark a decisive turning point against the emperor.[76]
The first council of Lyon (1245)
An ecumenical council in exile
To give his struggle the solemnity of a decision of the universal Church, Innocent IV convened, on December 27, 1244, a general council in Lyon for Saint John's Day the following year.[77][78] This is the thirteenth ecumenical council and the first of the two councils of Lyon. The assembly met in three public sessions, on June 28, July 5 and July 17, 1245, in the presence of approximately one hundred and fifty prelates, mainly French and Spanish - many bishops of the Empire, retained or prevented by Frederick, being absent.[79][80]
The council set three major objectives: the relief of the Holy Land, the defense against the Mongols (the "Tartars"), and above all the affair of the emperor.[81][82] It is this last point that made history.
The deposition of Frederick II
On July 17, 1245, Innocent IV pronounced the sentence Ad apostolicae dignitatis apicem against Frederick II: the emperor was declared deposed from the Empire and all its kingdoms, and his subjects were released from their oath of loyalty.[83][84] This was the first time that an emperor was deposed by an ecumenical council (Gregory VII had deposed Henry IV in 1076 in a Roman synod[85]).
"We deprive him of them by our sentence. We absolve from their oath for ever all those who are bound to him by an oath of loyalty, firmly forbidding by our apostolic authority anyone in the future to obey or heed him as emperor or king." - sentence of deposition Ad apostolicae dignitatis apicem, First Council of Lyon, July 17, 1245[86]
The sentence lists four counts: perjury (repeated violation of oaths sworn to the Church), breach of the peace, sacrilege (the capture and death of prelates who were on their way to the council of 1241), and suspicion of heresy (disregard for censures, ties judged too close with Muslims, scandalous conduct).[87][88] Frederick, in Turin, received the news with fury, but refused to submit: the war continued.
The red hat and other decisions
The council was not limited to imperial affairs. It promulgated twenty-two constitutions (the authentic collection, entirely legal in nature, sent to the universities on August 25, 1245; the figure of thirty-eight put forward by older historiography counts the total of the chapters transmitted under the council's name)[89] reforming judicial procedure, the management of church debts and the discipline of the clergy; it organized relief for Latin Constantinople, ordered the preaching of the crusade and the taxation of the clergy, and called for fortifying Christian defenses against the Mongol invasion.[90][91]
It was also in Lyon, in 1245, that Innocent IV would have granted the cardinals the red hat (galero), a badge intended to remind that they must be ready to shed their blood for the faith.[92] The pope still founded a studium (higher school) in Lyon, a sign that his exile was not a simple parenthesis but a real transfer of the government of the Church.[93]
The opening towards the Mongols
Carpini and the letters to the Great Khan
The irruption of the Mongols in Poland and Hungary (1241-1242) had terrified the West. Rather than just a military response, Innocent IV attempted an unprecedented approach: sending ambassadors carrying letters to the Mongol sovereign. On Easter Day, April 16, 1245, the Franciscan John of Plano Carpini left Lyon, accompanied by Benedict the Pole.[94][95]
He carried two pontifical letters: Dei patris immensi, which sets out the Christian faith and invites conversion, and Cum non solum, which protests against the massacres of Christians and asks the khan to state his intentions.[96] After an exhausting journey through Russia and Central Asia, Carpini reached the Mongol imperial camp and attended, on August 24, 1246, the enthronement of the Great Khan Güyük.[97]
Güyük's response
The khan's response, preserved in the Vatican Archives, leaves no room for illusion: far from converting, Güyük summons the pope and the kings of the West to come and pay homage to him.[98] The khan presents himself as the instrument of divine judgment: if the Mongols have won, it is because Heaven willed it; therefore the pope must submit.
Back in 1247, Carpini wrote the Ystoria Mongalorum, the first great Western description of the Mongol empire - its geography, customs, religion and especially its art of war.[99] The embassy failed diplomatically, but it inaugurated relations between the papacy and Asia, and nourished the Franciscan and Dominican missions of the following decades.
The pope canonist: power, legal person and rights of infidels
The fullness of power (plenitudo potestatis)
The entire policy of Innocent IV is based on a doctrine: the plenitudo potestatis, the fullness of the power attributed to the pope as vicar of Christ. The text known as Eger cui lenia (1245-1246, preserved in the collection of pontifical letters compiled at Lyon and long attributed to Innocent IV) affirms that this authority “embraces the entire universe”, so that “nothing escapes it”.[100] Imperial power itself, according to this vision, is subordinate to the spiritual judgment of the Apostolic See, which can sanction its abuse.
This conception, inherited from Innocent III and taken to its conclusion, legally founded the deposition of 1245.[101][102] It marks one of the highest points of the doctrine of papal supremacy: rarely has the pope's right to judge princes been formulated with so much force. The following centuries - and the development of the modern State - will push it back; but in the 13th century, it was the intellectual weapon of a pope determined not to give in to any emperor.
The Apparatus and the legal person (persona ficta)
The legal genius of Sinibaldo Fieschi cannot be reduced to politics. In his Apparatus, he developed, according to historians of canon law, the first coherent theory of the juridical person: a corporation - chapter, university, city, religious order - can be considered a persona ficta, a "fictitious person", subject of rights and obligations distinct from the individuals who compose it.[103] This notion, inherited from Roman law but systematized by Innocent IV, is regarded by these historians as the ancestor of the legal personality of modern societies and institutions.
He draws precise consequences: a corporation can own, contract, be represented in court; but, having neither soul nor body of its own, it cannot be excommunicated as such nor commit sin in the strict sense. These distinctions, which appear abstract, have irrigated all Western law on legal entities.
Can infidels rule legitimately?
The most fruitful question that Innocent IV addressed concerns the power of non-Christians. In his commentary on the decretal Quod super his of Innocent III (Liber Extra, X 3.34.8, under the title De voto et voti redemptione), he frankly poses the problem: is it lawful to invade land owned by infidels?[104]
His response is nuanced and, for the time, moderate:
According to James Muldoon's analysis, Innocent IV maintains therein that God gave to all men — believers and infidels alike — the legitimate capacity to own lands and goods and to choose leaders for themselves: this is a paraphrase of his doctrine, not a literal quotation, the exact source of the French formula having proved impossible to establish.[105]
Innocent IV therefore recognizes that non-Christian peoples possess true sovereignty and property rights: simple unbelief does not deprive anyone of natural rights. But he maintains a hierocratic reservation: the pope, responsible for the salvation of all, has the duty to send missionaries; if they are prevented from preaching, armed intervention can, according to him, be justified to open the way to the Gospel.[106] According to James Muldoon, this dossier became one of the foundations of later canonical reflection on the rights of peoples, taken up even in the debates of the School of Salamanca on the New World.
Ad extirpanda (1252): torture in the inquisitorial procedure
What the bull says
We must clearly name the heaviest act of the pontificate. On May 15, 1252, by the bull Ad extirpanda, Innocent IV organized the repression of heresy in the cities of Italy and authorized the use of torture to obtain the confession of suspected heretics and the denunciation of their accomplices.[107][108] Torture had to be exercised “without endangering life or mutilating” - a restriction which in no way diminishes the seriousness of the principle.[109] It was to be applied only once, and only in the face of already grave evidence; the bull was confirmed by Alexander IV (November 30, 1259) and then Clement IV (November 3, 1265).[110]
The bull belongs to the establishment of the pontifical Inquisition, entrusted mainly to the Dominicans, and to the context of the fight against Catharism and the assassination of the Dominican Peter of Verona (Peter Martyr), killed by heretics in 1252 and canonized by Innocent IV the following year.[111]
How a Catholic should read it today
Historical honesty requires two things. First, hide nothing: Ad extirpanda is a pontifical text which legitimized a practice that the Church itself now condemns without reservation. We do not defend it; we look it in the face.
Then locate it. Judicial torture was not an invention of the Church: it belonged to Roman law and the civil law of all 13th-century Europe; secular courts commonly resorted to it.[112] Innocent IV, a jurist of his time, aligned ecclesiastical procedure with secular law, not the other way around. This explains the fact without excusing it.
Above all, the development of doctrine led the Church to explicitly repudiate what this bull had tolerated. The Catechism of the Catholic Church recognizes that, "in times past, cruel practices were commonly used by legitimate powers to maintain order", and today declares these practices "contrary to the respect due to the person and his dignity" (CCC §2297-2298).[113] The condemnation of torture by the contemporary magisterium - Vatican II, the Catechism, and the magisterium of recent popes - is not a denial of the faith, but the outcome of a clearer moral conscience, in continuity with a Gospel whose final consequences medieval Christendom had not yet fully drawn out.
Final years and legacy
A frieze of the pontificate
- before 1190Birth in LavagnaCounts of Lavagna, Liguria
Sinibaldo Fieschi was born into the high Genoese aristocracy; he grew up partly in Parma with his uncle, bishop.
- 1213-1227The Jurist of BolognaApparatus on the Decretals
Studies and teaching of canon law in Bologna; writing of the Apparatus, future reference commentary on the Decretals of Gregory IX.
- 1227-1240Cardinal and governorSan Lorenzo in Lucina, Ancona
Created cardinal in 1227, vice-chancellor, bishop of Albenga (1235); he governs the March of Ancona for Gregory IX.
- June 25, 1243Election at AnagniEnd of a nineteen-month-long interregnum
After a vacancy of more than nineteen months caused by Frederick II, the cardinals who had taken refuge in Anagni elected Sinibaldo Fieschi, who took the name of Innocent IV.
- June-December 1244The flight to LyonRome, Civitavecchia, Genoa, the Alps
Convinced of the insincerity of the agreement of March 1244, the pope escaped in disguise, boarded a Genoese fleet and reached Lyon, out of reach of the Empire.
- June 28-July 17, 1245First Council of LyonDeposition of Frederick II
Thirteenth Ecumenical Council: on July 17, the sentence Ad apostolicae dignitatis apicem declares Frederick II deposed from the Empire and releases his subjects from their oath.
- 1245-1247The Mongol EmbassyJohn of Plano Carpini
The pope sends Carpini to take his letters to the Great Khan; the Franciscan attends Güyük's enthronement and reports the first major Western description of the Mongols.
- December 13, 1250Death of Frederick IIThe turning point of the war
The death of the emperor frees the pope from his great adversary; he can think of returning to Italy.
- May 15, 1252Bull Ad extirpandaTorture in the inquisitorial procedure
Innocent IV organized the repression of heresy and authorized the use of torture, aligning ecclesiastical procedure with the secular law of the time.
- October 1253-December 7, 1254Return to Rome and death in Naples
Returning to Rome after seven years of exile, the pope continued the war against the heirs of Frederick; he died in Naples on December 7, 1254, shortly after the papal defeat at Foggia.
Death in Naples (1254)
The death of Frederick II, on December 13, 1250, did not end the war.[114] Innocent IV left Lyon in the spring of 1251, was welcomed triumphantly in Genoa in May 1251, and finally returned to Rome in October 1253, after more than seven years of absence.[115][116] But he firmly pursued the struggle against the heirs of Hohenstaufen - Conrad IV, then the bastard Manfred - to prevent the union of the kingdom of Sicily with the Empire.[117]
The pope sought a new king for Sicily: after Richard of Cornwall, who declined, he sounded out Charles of Anjou and then Edmund, son of King Henry III of England; but, after negotiations, they too withdrew in the face of the difficulty of dislodging Conrad IV and then Manfred.[118] But Manfred resisted. On December 2, 1254, his troops crushed the papal army at Foggia.[119][120] Five days later, on December 7, 1254, Innocent IV died in Naples - the news of the disaster is said to have hastened his end.[121][122] He was buried in Naples Cathedral, where his tomb is preserved.[123]
The nepotism of the Fieschis
The reign of Innocent IV durably established a practice that history judges severely: pontifical nepotism. The pope granted honors and benefices to his Genoese family. He created his nephew Ottobuono Fieschi (1251) cardinal, who himself became pope under the name of Adrian V in 1276; he made his nephew Opizzo Fieschi the Latin Patriarch of Antioch.[124][125] For half a century, the Fieschis had uninterrupted influence on the Curia.
This trait did not escape contemporaries. The English bishop Robert Grosseteste, although faithful to the papacy, denounced the abuse of provisions and benefices by which Innocent IV rewarded his relatives.[126] This criticism, coming from a bishop so loyal to the papacy, testifies to the disarray these practices were already causing within the most faithful Church.
What to remember from Innocent IV?
Innocent IV is one of the most powerful and contested popes of the Middle Ages. A brilliant jurist, he endowed the Church with a science of law which has marked centuries; a daring diplomat, he opened the first door to Asia; A fighting pope, he took the assertion of papal supremacy to its peak by deposing an emperor.
But this greatness has its downside. The war against the Hohenstaufen absorbed his forces, to the point that his critics reproach him with having neglected the internal reform of the Church; the favors granted to the Fieschi and the provisions of benefices drew criticism even within the most faithful Church; and his bull Ad extirpanda remains a grave act, which the contemporary magisterium has disavowed. Innocent IV thus illustrates, better than any other, the tension specific to the medieval papacy: the gap between the legitimate defense of the freedom of the Church and the pursuit of temporal domination.
The spiritual lesson: the sword of Peter and the sword of Caesar
The most just spiritual point of this life lies in a word that the Gospel has decided in advance. In the Garden of Olives, when Peter drew his sword to defend his Master, Christ stopped him short:
"Put your sword back into its sheath, for all who take the sword will die by the sword." - Gospel according to Saint Matthew, 26:52[127]
The Church has a sword - that of truth, of holiness, of the word - which is not that of empires.
Innocent IV was a great servant of the freedom of the Church, and this freedom was worth defending: a pope cannot accept being the hostage of a prince. But his pontificate also shows the danger of winning the battle for power by losing a little of the soul: by dint of fighting the emperor with his own weapons - force, alliance, money, family network - the pope-jurist risked forgetting that Peter's authority is first and foremost that of the servant and the pastor, not that of the temporal sovereign. The history of the Church will remember two lessons from him: the need to defend the freedom of the Apostolic See, and the vanity of any power which is not placed in the service of charity.
To go further
- Pope Celestine IV - predecessor of Innocent IV, whose sixteen-day pontificate opened a vacancy of more than nineteen months.
- Pope Alexander IV - successor of Innocent IV, who inherited the war against the Hohenstaufen.
- Pope Innocent III - the great theorist of papal supremacy whose name and doctrine Innocent IV took up.
- Pope Gregory IX - predecessor in the conflict with Frederick II and promulgator of the Decretals commented by Sinibaldo Fieschi.
- Council of Lyon I (1245) - the thirteenth ecumenical council, which deposed Frederick II.
- Pope Adrian V - nephew of Innocent IV (Ottobuono Fieschi), brief pope from 1276.
- The Crusades - the defense of the Holy Land, one of the three objectives proclaimed at the Council of Lyon.
- The Inquisition and the Black Legend - for the context of the bull Ad extirpanda and the repression of heresy in the 13th century.
Notes and sources
Notes and References
Catholic Encyclopedia, "Pope Innocent IV", vol. 8, New York, Robert Appleton Company, 1910; New Advent transcription: Sinibaldo de' Fieschi, count of Lavagna, born in Genoa, educated in Parma and Bologna, professor of canon law in Bologna, canon of Parma, auditor of the Curia (1226), cardinal-priest of San Lorenzo in Lucina (September 23, 1227), vice-chancellor (July 28, 1228), bishop of Albenga and legate (1235); election on June 25, 1243 in Anagni after an interregnum of one year, seven months and fifteen days; earlier friendship with Frederick II, congratulations and peace offers from the emperor immediately after the election; agreement with Frederick II on March 31, 1244; flight (night of June 27-28, 1244, from Sutri to Civitavecchia, then Genoa by sea; arrival in Lyon in December 1244); first council of Lyon (1245) and deposition of Frederick II on July 17; anti-kings Henry Raspe and William of Holland; death of Frederick II (1250); return to Rome; crown of Sicily first offered to Richard of Cornwall, then proposed to Charles of Anjou and to Edmund son of Henry III of England, refused after negotiations in the face of the difficulty of dislodging Conrad IV and Manfred; war against Conrad IV and Manfred; defeat of Foggia (December 2, 1254); died in Naples on December 7, 1254; Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium (“best commentary on the Decretals of Gregory IX”, printed in Strasbourg in 1477); judgment on the neglect of the internal affairs of the Church. Original English text of the quote: “he neglected the internal affairs of the Church and allowed many abuses, provided they served to strengthen his position against the Hohenstaufen.” URL: https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08017a.htm.
1 3 6 11 17 25 42 44 47 48 50 53 55 57 58 60 62 65 66 68 71 74 84 88 114 116 117 118 119 121"Innocenzo IV" (Agostino Paravicini Bagliani), Enciclopedia dei Papi, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome, 2000: Sinibaldo Fieschi, conti di Lavagna, born in Lavagna no later than 1190; father Ugo (married, according to tradition, to a daughter of Amico Grillo); youth in Parma with his uncle Opizone, bishop of that city from 1195 to 1224 (to be distinguished from his nephew Opizzo, Latin Patriarch of Antioch, cf. D. Calcagno cited in the bibliography of the article); studied law in Bologna; vice-chancellor and cardinal of San Lorenzo in Lucina (1227); rector of the March of Ancona (appointed in October 1234, attested until 1240); election on June 25, 1243, entry into Rome on October 20, 1243; flight of 1244 (meeting at Narni planned for June 7 not held, sick stay in Genoa from July to October, crossing of the Alps in autumn, convocation of the council on December 27, 1244, three weeks after arrival in Lyon); convocation of the council on December 27, 1244; renewal of the excommunication of Frederick II and Enzo on April 13, 1245; deposition of Frederick; red hat of the cardinals (1245); studium of Lyon; embassy of John of Plano Carpini; triumphant return to Genoa (1251); doctrine of plenitudo potestatis (section on the Eger cui lenia — or Eger cui levia according to some manuscripts —, curial pamphlet of 1245-1246 preserved in the collection of pontifical letters compiled at Lyon by Alberto Behaim, chaplain of Cardinal Raniero Capocci, following two letters of protest from Frederick II against the condemnation of Lyon; long attributed to Innocent IV on the testimony of Ptolemy of Lucca, its attribution is debated — lead of Cardinal Capocci's entourage —; the pope, vicar of Christ, possesses therein a “general delegation” from the King of kings and “the fullness of power [...] so that nothing escapes a power which embraces the entire universe” (French translation of the article's Italian); critical editions: P. Herde, “Ein Pamphlet der päpstlichen Kurie gegen Kaiser Friedrich II. von 1245/46”, Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters, 23, 1967, pp. 468-538; C. Dolcini, “'Eger cui lenia' (1245-1246)”, Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia, 29, 1975, pp. 127-148); constitution Ad extirpandam (1252 — Treccani gives only the year; the date of May 15 is carried by the supplementary notice, cf. ad-extirpanda note); nepotism of the Fieschi (two nephews created cardinals, including Ottobuono, future Adrian V — the detail “cardinal-deacon of Sant'Adriano, December 1251” comes from the supplementary notice, not from Treccani); died in Naples on December 7, 1254, buried in the cathedral. URL: https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/innocenzo-iv_(Enciclopedia-dei-Papi)/.
2 4 8 10 15 18 23 26 35 37 38 40 41 43 45 46 49 51 54 56 59 61 67 70 73 75 76 77 92 93 95 100 101 108 111 115 122 123 125 126First Council of Lyon (Lyon I), 1245: thirteenth ecumenical council, convened by Innocent IV; three public sessions (June 28, July 5, July 17, 1245); sentence of deposition Ad apostolicae dignitatis apicem against Frederick II (July 17, 1245), declaring him deposed from the Empire and its kingdoms and releasing his subjects from their oath of loyalty, on four counts - perjury, breach of the peace, sacrilege (capture and death of prelates on the way to the council of 1241), suspicion of heresy; the text is decisive: "he has committed four of the greatest gravity"; twenty-two disciplinary and procedural constitutions (the authentic collection of the constitutions, "22 constitutions, all of which are of a legal nature", sent to the universities by Innocent IV on August 25, 1245); the competing figure of thirty-eight comes from older historiography (G. Goyau, "Councils of Lyons", CE, 1910: "thirty-eight constitutions which were later inserted by Boniface VIII in his Decretals") and counts the total of the chapters transmitted under the council's name; the critical edition is decisive (N. P. Tanner, introduction: Coll. I = these 22 legal texts, August 25, 1245; second collection of 12 decrees, April 21, 1246; final collection, September 9, 1253, taken up — except one constitution — in the Liber Sextus of 1298; neither the sentence of deposition nor the five constitutions on the Tartars, the Latin East and the crusade appear in Coll. I); relief in Latin Constantinople; call for crusade and defense against the Mongols. English text of the sentence: “we deprive him of them by our sentence. We absolve from their oath for ever all those who are bound to him by an oath of loyalty, firmly forbidding by our apostolic authority anyone in the future to obey or heed him as emperor or king.” (translation by N. P. Tanner, Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. I; the body's French quotation is its translation). Text of the canons: "First Council of Lyon (1245)", Papal Encyclicals Online (https://www.papalencyclicals.net/councils/ecum13.htm). See the Ignispedia article Council of Lyon I (1245).
5 13 28 31 78 80 82 83 86 87 89 90James Muldoon, Popes, Lawyers, and Infidels: The Church and the Non-Christian World, 1250-1550, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1979: analysis of Innocent IV's commentary on the decretal Quod super his (of Innocent III) — primary locus: gloss on Liber Extra, X 3.34.8 (De voto et voti redemptione), in the Apparatus in quinque libros decretalium written before 1245; doctrine according to which all men, believers and infidels, can legitimately own land and property and choose leaders (paraphrase of Muldoon's analysis, not a literal quotation); right and duty of the pope to send missionaries, with the possibility of armed intervention if preaching is prevented; theory of the persona ficta (legal person) in the Apparatus; lasting influence on canonical reflection up to the debates on the New World (the work covers 1250-1550 up to the School of Salamanca). See also James Muldoon, “The Nature of the Infidel: The Anthropology of the Canon Lawyers.”
7 16 19 20 30 33 102 103 104 105 106Bull Ad extirpanda, Innocent IV, May 15, 1252: organizes the repression of heresy in the communes of Italy; establishes magistrates and rules of prosecution; authorizes civil authorities to apply torture to suspected heretics to obtain confessions and denunciations, “without endangering life or mutilating limbs.” The text aligns ecclesiastical procedure with judicial torture already practiced by civil and Roman law of the time. Sources: “Ad extirpanda”, Wikipedia; Enciclopedia dei Papi, "Innocenzo IV". URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_extirpanda. Authorization of May 15, 1252, confirmations by Alexander IV (November 30, 1259) and Clement IV (November 3, 1265), limit citra membri diminutionem et mortis periculum and single application in case of grave evidence: Henry Charles Lea, A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, vol. I, New York, Harper & Brothers, 1887, book II, chap. 1 (text on Wikisource: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:A_History_of_the_Inquisition_of_the_Middle_Ages-Volume_I_.pdf/359).
9 29 32 107 109 110 112Catholic Encyclopedia, "Conflict of Investitures", New York, Robert Appleton Company, 1910: “At the next Lenten Synod in Rome (1076) Gregory sat in judgment upon the king, and in a prayer to Peter, Prince of the Apostles, declared: "I depose him from the government of the whole Kingdom of Germany and Italy, release all Christians from their oath of allegiance, forbid him to be obeyed as king..."” (French translation in the body). URL: https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08084c.htm.
12 85Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Innocent IV", biographical note: elected June 25, 1243 after eighteen months of vacancy; agreement of March 31, 1244 with Frederick II and mistrust of the pope; convocation of the council in Lyon; first council of Lyon (summer 1245) on three themes - the emperor, the Holy Land, defense against the Mongols; condemnation and deposition of Frederick II (the "Innocent IV" biographical page could not be reopened that day — anti-bot protection, 403 error — so no "three counts" summary is asserted anymore; the indexed excerpts of the Britannica article on the councils of Lyon retain four counts for the sentence: perjury, breach of the peace, sacrilege and suspicion of heresy, cf. lyon-i-1245 note); death of Frederick (December 13, 1250); return to Rome (1253); mission to the Great Khan (1245-1247); commentary Apparatus in quinque libros Decretalium; died December 7, 1254 in Naples. URL: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Innocent-IV.
14 27 63 64 81 91Ascelin of Lombardy, Dominican: second embassy sent by Innocent IV in 1245 to the Mongols of Armenia and Persia; he met the Mongol general Baïdju in 1247 and returned to the West in 1248. Account by his companion Simon of Saint-Quentin (Historia Tartarorum, preserved in Vincent of Beauvais's Speculum historiale). Sources: Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), "Ascelin" (chosen in 1245 with three other Dominicans, meeting of May 24, 1247); Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911), "Simon of St Quentin" (Dominican embassy “which Pope Innocent IV sent [...] to the Mongols of Armenia and Persia”).
21John of Plano Carpini (Giovanni da Pian del Carpine), Ystoria Mongalorum, 1247: Franciscan sent by Innocent IV, left Lyon on April 16, 1245 (Easter Day) with Benedict the Pole, bearer of the pontifical letters Dei patris immensi (statement of the faith, call to conversion) and Cum non solum (protest against the massacres) — Latin texts edited in A. van den Wyngaert (ed.), Sinica Franciscana, vol. I (Quaracchi-Florence, 1929); arrival at the Mongol court and presence at the enthronement of the Great Khan Güyük on August 24, 1246; response letter from Güyük (November 1246, Persian original and Latin copies preserved in the Vatican Apostolic Archives, shelfmark A.A., Arm. I-XVIII; English trans. I. de Rachewiltz, Papal Envoys to the Great Khans, Stanford, 1971, pp. 213-214) demanding submission and homage from the Pope and the kings of the West; return in 1247; first major Western description of the Mongol Empire.
22 24 34 94 96 97 98 99"Pope Innocent IV", Wikipedia (English) — supplementary notice, each precise detail below having been checked against CE, Treccani or the primary source: Sinibaldo Fieschi, born in Genoa or Lavagna (Treccani retains Lavagna; the "Manarola" variant is unconfirmed and abandoned); son of Ugo Fieschi, count of Lavagna (Treccani indicates, according to tradition, a marriage of Ugo to a daughter of Amico Grillo, first name unattested: the first name "Beatrice" is abandoned); studies in Parma and Bologna; cardinal-priest of San Lorenzo in Lucina (September 18, 1227 according to this notice, September 23 according to the CE); rector of the March of Ancona (appointed in October 1234, attested until 1240 according to Treccani); election June 25, 1243; flight of June 1244 (the meeting at Narni planned for June 7, 1244 did not take place according to Treccani; the CE places the departure on the night of June 27-28: the exact day "June 7" is abandoned), arrival in Lyon in late November-early December 1244 (the exact day "November 29" is attested only by this notice and is abandoned); first council of Lyon (June 28, July 5, July 17, 1245), deposition of Frederick II, around 150 bishops; anti-kings Henry Raspe (1246) and William of Holland (1247); Mongol missions of John of Plano Carpini (letters Cum non solum and Dei patris immensi) and Ascelin; response from Güyük (1246); bull Ad extirpanda (May 15, 1252); defeat of Foggia against Manfred (December 2, 1254); died in Naples on December 7, 1254; nephews Opizzo (Latin Patriarch of Antioch, confirmed by Treccani) and Ottobuono (cardinal-deacon of Sant'Adriano in December 1251, future Adrian V). URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Innocent_IV.
36 39 52 69 72 120 124"First Council of Lyon (1245)", EWTN Catholic Library, historical notice of the council: at the opening, on June 26, 1245, "three patriarchs and about 150 bishops besides other religious and secular persons", including the Latin Emperor of Constantinople; many bishops prevented by the Tartar invasions in the east, the Saracen attacks in the Holy Land or Frederick II's intimidation (Sicilians and Germans above all); the four main groups present were the French, and probably the Spanish, the English and the Italians. URL: https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/history-and-text-1467.
79Catechism of the Catholic Church, §2297-2298: condemnation of kidnappings, hostage-taking, terrorism and torture; recognition that legitimate powers have, in the past, resorted to cruel practices to maintain order, and affirmation that they are “contrary to the respect due to the person and their dignity”; call to work for their abolition. Official text on vatican.va.
113Gospel according to Saint Matthew, 26, 52: words of Christ to Peter in the garden of Gethsemane, during the arrest, after the apostle had struck the servant of the high priest with the sword - "Omnes enim qui acceperint gladium, gladio peribunt". French translation from the Jerusalem Bible; Latin text of the Vulgate.
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