Pope Julius II (Iulius II), born Giuliano della Rovere on December 5, 1443 at Albisola, near Savona in Liguria, governed the Church of Rome from November 1, 1503 to February 21, 1513. Nephew of Pope Sixtus IV, he is one of the most powerful and most contested pontiffs of the Renaissance: his contemporaries nicknamed him "il terribile", "the terrible", both for his fiery temperament and for the energy with which he led armies at the head of his troops.[6][7]
Where one expected a shepherd, he was first a head of state and a military captain. He restored the integrity of the Papal States by driving out, one after another, Cesare Borgia, the lords of Perugia and Bologna, then the Venetians, and finally the French from Italy - an enterprise summed up, in a later tradition attached to his name and never attested as words he actually spoke, by the cry "Fuori i barbari!" - "Out with the barbarians!"[8] The same pope declared war on simony by striking with nullity any purchased papal election (Cum tam divino, January 14, 1505), and he convoked the Fifth Lateran Council to answer a schismatic council backed by France.[9][10]
But Julius II counts among the greatest patrons in the history of the papacy. He laid, on April 18, 1506, the first stone of the new Saint Peter's Basilica entrusted to Bramante; he forced Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling (1508-1512); he opened the walls of his apartments to Raphael; he founded the Pontifical Swiss Guard; and with the Laocoon and the Apollo Belvedere, he inaugurated what would become the Vatican Museums.[11][12][13]
Catholic historiography neither canonizes nor simply condemns him. A satirical pamphlet traditionally attributed to Erasmus, written as early as 1514, mocked him by showing him helmeted and armored at the gates of Heaven.[14] To understand Julius II is to hold together the soldier, the founder of immortal works of art, and the reformer of conclave law - without erasing any of these three figures, and without confusing the holiness of the Church with the personal holiness of her pontiffs.
Why Julius II Remains the Terrible Pope
Popular memory often retains only one image of Julius II: an old, bearded, furious man in armor, demanding that Michelangelo come down from his scaffolding. The reality is both harsher and greater.
In 1503, Julius II inherited a papacy brought low. The Papal States, the temporal base of the Holy See, had been carved up by local lordships and by the ambition of the Borgia house. Rome's spiritual prestige was ruined by the memory of Alexander VI, whose bought election of 1492 had durably discredited the See.[15] In ten years, this pontiff would refound the State of the Church by force of arms, restore Rome's rank as the artistic capital of Europe, and begin a reform of the law governing papal elections. He died leaving the Roman See stronger than he had found it.[16]
That is precisely what makes his pontificate so instructive and uncomfortable. It illustrates, in extreme form, the tension of the Renaissance papacy: a pope who saves the institution and magnifies the faith through art, but who does so by putting on armor, leading wars in which Christians killed one another[17][18], and living as a temporal prince. Neither golden legend nor black legend: Julius II demands a gaze able to distinguish what serves the Church from what wounds her.
Main Sources
| Source | Nature | Contribution to Julius II |
|---|---|---|
| The Catholic Encyclopedia, "Pope Julius II" (1910) | Authoritative Catholic synthesis | Overall biography, wars, patronage, nuanced moral assessment |
| Ludwig von Pastor, History of the Popes from the Close of the Middle Ages, vol. VI | Major scholarly history of the papacy | Detailed account of the pontificate, Italian politics, councils[19] |
| Bull Cum tam divino (1505) | Papal act | Nullity of simoniacal papal elections |
| Acts of the Fifth Lateran Council (1512-1517) | Conciliar source | Condemnation of the conciliabulum of Pisa, reform |
| Erasmus, Iulius exclusus e coelis (1514) | Contemporary satire | Critical testimony to the image of the "warrior pope" |
| Archives of the Pontifical Swiss Guard | Institutional source | Foundation of the corps on January 22, 1506 |
| Vatican Museums (museivaticani.va) | Official museum source | Acquisition of the Laocoon (1506), Belvedere Courtyard |
The Nephew of Sixtus IV: the Rise of a Della Rovere
Before he was a pope, Giuliano della Rovere was first a pope's nephew - and his whole ecclesiastical career bears that mark.
A Ligurian Birth (1443)
Giuliano della Rovere was born on December 5, 1443 at Albisola, on the Ligurian coast near Savona.[20][21] His family, the della Rovere, belonged to the lesser provincial nobility and had modest means: his father, Raffaele della Rovere, was the brother of Francesco della Rovere, the future Sixtus IV.[22] Like his uncle, young Giuliano was first directed toward the Order of Friars Minor and studied among the Franciscans at Perugia.
Everything changed in 1471, when his uncle Francesco was elected pope under the name Sixtus IV. Giuliano's path then became that of a prince of the Church, carried less by vocation alone than by his uncle's favor[23] - the nepotism of which Sixtus IV remains one of the most cited examples.[24]
Cardinal at Twenty-Eight: an Empire of Benefices
A few weeks after his uncle's election, Giuliano was created cardinal at the consistory of December 16, 1471 (the 1910 Catholic Encyclopedia gives December 15; the title of San Pietro in Vincoli was assigned on December 22), with the titular church of San Pietro in Vincoli - the same title Sixtus IV had held.[25][26] He was not yet thirty.
There followed a dizzying accumulation of ecclesiastical benefices: he would be bishop or administrator of Carpentras, Lausanne, Coutances, Viviers, Mende, Bologna and Ostia, archbishop of Avignon from 1474 to 1503, and commendatory abbot of numerous monasteries.[27][28] This accumulation, shocking in light of the Church's current discipline, was the norm of high Renaissance prelacy: a benefice was as much a source of income and power as a pastoral charge. The future Julius II would never reform this logic in himself - one of the great contradictions of his reign.
Legate and Man of War before the Tiara
Very early, Giuliano proved to be a man of action more than a man of prayer. Sixtus IV employed him as a legate in political and military missions: he pacified Umbria, led a legation to France (1480-1482) that made him familiar with the court of Louis XI, and played a leading role in Italian affairs.[29] Under the next pontificate, that of Innocent VIII (1484-1492), whose election he had largely helped secure, he was one of the most influential cardinals in the curia.
In those years the future pope's temperament was forged: a prelate seasoned in diplomacy, war and intrigue, who knew the courts of France and Italy, and who understood that the Holy See, in that period, survived only by carrying weight as a temporal power among other powers.
Exile and Hatred of Alexander VI Borgia
The great drama of Giuliano della Rovere's life before the papacy can be summed up in one name: Borgia.
Rivalry with Rodrigo Borgia
In 1492, the conclave elected the Valencian cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, who became Alexander VI. Della Rovere, his most determined rival, had done everything to prevent it. The hatred between the two men was total, personal and political: one saw in the other a simoniacal corrupter; the other saw an enemy to destroy.[30]
Fearing for his life, della Rovere withdrew at the end of 1492 to his fortress castle at Ostia.[31] After an apparent reconciliation with Alexander VI (July 1493) which he did not trust, he fled via Genoa to the court of Charles VIII of France.[32] Thus began more than ten years of exile, during which the cardinal became the soul of the opposition to Alexander VI.
Ten Years on the Run: France and Charles VIII
Taking refuge in France, della Rovere urged King Charles VIII toward the Italian expedition of 1494 - the famous invasion that opened the Italian Wars - in the hope of deposing Alexander VI through a council.[33] He even accompanied the French army to Rome. The plan failed: Alexander VI maneuvered, survived, and della Rovere had to return to exile, divided between France and northern Italy.
He would not truly return to Rome until after the death of Alexander VI on August 18, 1503.[34][35] These ten years of flight and combat partly explain the hardness of the future pope: he ascended the throne of Peter convinced that only force restores authority, and with intimate knowledge of the powers fighting over Italy.
The Election of 1503: the Shortest Conclave in History
Della Rovere's conquest of the tiara was as rapid as it had been long prepared.
After the Brief Pontificate of Pius III
After the death of Alexander VI, the conclave of September 1503 did not elect della Rovere, but an elderly and sick transitional pope: Francesco Todeschini Piccolomini, who took the name Pius III. His pontificate lasted only twenty-six days: he died on October 18, 1503.[36][37]
Della Rovere knew how to wait. As the most powerful cardinal, he had built his network, won the votes even of his former Borgia enemies, and prepared every detail. The conclave that opened on October 31 was the shortest in the history of conclaves - barely a few hours: della Rovere was elected during the night of October 31 to November 1, 1503, almost by acclamation.[38][39][40] He took the name Julius II and was crowned on November 26, 1503[41].
"This was the shortest conclave in the history of the papacy." - The Catholic Encyclopedia, "Pope Julius II"[42]
Cum tam divino: War on Simony
Elected so quickly, and by methods that themselves brought suspicion of interested promises, Julius II nevertheless struck a major blow against electoral corruption. On January 14, 1505, he promulgated the bull Cum tam divino, which declared null and invalid by law any papal election tainted by simony: a bought pope is not pope, and any faithful person may refuse him obedience.[43]
The gesture targeted retrospectively the election of Alexander VI, purchased at great price in 1492, and aimed to protect the future. Julius II returned to it solemnly at the end of his life: he had the bull promulgated again as a decree of the Fifth Lateran Council on February 16, 1513, five days before his death, in order to inscribe it definitively in the law of the Church.[44] On this precise point, the worldly pope was a true reformer.
The Warrior Pope: Reconquering the Papal States
It is by arms that Julius II marked history. In a decade, he rebuilt the State of the Church piece by piece, in person, with sword at his side.
Ending Cesare Borgia's Power
His first task was to neutralize Cesare Borgia, son of Alexander VI, who had carved out a principality in Romagna. With Florentine skill, Julius II first flattered him, then stripped him: he wrested the fortresses of Romagna from him, had him arrested, and definitively broke Borgia power.[45] The future hero of Machiavelli's Prince ended as a fugitive, dispossessed by the very man he had helped elect.
Perugia and Bologna (1506)
In 1506, Julius II personally took command of an army to subdue the lords who had made themselves independent of Rome. The city of Perugia, held by Giampaolo Baglioni, submitted on September 13, 1506.[46][47] The pope then marched on Bologna, from which he expelled the tyrant Giovanni II Bentivoglio: deposed on October 7, 1506, Bentivoglio fled, and Julius II made his triumphal entry into Bologna on November 10, 1506.[48][49]
It was in Bologna, to celebrate his victory, that Julius II commissioned Michelangelo to make a colossal bronze statue of him - a work destroyed a few years later, melted down by the returning Bentivoglio to make a cannon ironically named "La Giulia". The episode says everything about the man: a pope who had himself represented as a conqueror, and whose very image became a stake of war.[50]
The League of Cambrai against Venice (1508-1510)
The great power still to be brought down was the Republic of Venice, which had seized cities of Romagna belonging to the Church. To break it, Julius II formed in December 1508 the League of Cambrai, a coalition that gathered France, the Empire and Spain against Venice.[51][52] He officially joined it on March 23, 1509 and placed Venice under interdict on April 27, 1509.[53]
Venice was crushed at the Battle of Agnadello (May 14, 1509). But once Julius II had obtained the restitution of his cities, he lifted the interdict on February 24, 1510: he had never wanted to destroy Venice, only to bring it to terms. As soon as his goal was reached, he reversed his alliances - because the real danger was now no longer Venice but France, which had become too powerful in Italy.
The Holy League and "Fuori i barbari" (1511-1512)
Here the great political design of Julius II appears: to drive foreign powers out of Italy. Against the France of Louis XII, he formed in October 1511 the Holy League (Lega Santa), bringing together Spain, Venice, England and the Empire around the Holy See.[54][55] His watchword, famous in tradition, sums up his entire policy:
"Out with the barbarians!" - cry that later tradition attributes to Julius II for the Holy League, against foreign domination in Italy; no contemporary source attests it as words he actually spoke[56]
By "barbarians", the pope meant the armies from beyond the Alps, especially the French. This cry, taken up centuries later by patriots of the Risorgimento, makes Julius II a paradoxical figure: a pope who anticipated a certain idea of Italian independence.
The Battle of Ravenna (1512)
The decisive shock came at Ravenna, on April 11, 1512 - Easter Sunday. The French army won a bloody victory over the forces of the Holy League, but their young general, Gaston de Foix, was killed there.[57][58] Deprived of their commander and struck by the arrival of the Swiss in the pope's service, the French had to evacuate Milan and Italy in the following months.
Julius II's goal was achieved: at his death, the French had been driven from Italy, and the Papal States, enlarged and consolidated, had again become a respected power. On the temporal level, his pontificate was a complete success - at the cost of years of war and an exercise of force that many, already at the time, judged unworthy of the vicar of Christ.
The Schismatic Council of Pisa and the Fifth Lateran Council
Louis XII of France responded to arms on spiritual terrain, attacking Julius II where he was vulnerable: the reform of the Church.
The Conciliabulum of Pisa (1511)
In 1511, several dissident cardinals, openly supported by the king of France, convoked a council at Pisa meant to judge and depose Julius II, on the pretext that he had not kept his electoral promise to summon a council.[59] This conciliabulum of Pisa - the Church does not recognize it as a legitimate council - revived the old specter of conciliarism, the doctrine according to which a council would be superior to the pope.
Julius II reacted with his usual vigor: he deprived the schismatic cardinals of their functions - four of them sat at Pisa, bearing proxies from three absentees - and had them declared schismatics.[60] But he understood that a purely repressive reply was not enough: a true council had to be opposed to the false one.
The Fifth Lateran Council (1512)
By the bull Sacrosanctae Romanae Ecclesiae of July 18, 1511, Julius II convoked an ecumenical council in Rome.[61] Delayed by the Battle of Ravenna, the Fifth Lateran Council opened on May 3, 1512 in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran.[62] Its first sessions, held under Julius II, condemned the conciliabulum of Pisa and annulled its acts. The French Pragmatic Sanction, which limited papal authority in the kingdom, would only be solemnly revoked and condemned under Leo X, at the 11th session (December 19, 1516, bull Pastor aeternus), which at the same time approved the concordat concluded with Francis I.[63]
Julius II died before the council closed; his successor Leo X would continue it until 1517. This assembly, which reaffirmed papal authority against conciliarism, nevertheless fell short of the deep reform the Church needed: a few months after its close, in 1517, Luther would post his theses. The opportunity for preventive reform had been missed - what the Catholic Reformation would have to accomplish, too late, at the Council of Trent.
The Patron: Saint Peter's, Michelangelo, Raphael
If war made the black legend of Julius II, artistic patronage made his imperishable glory. No pope, in so few years, commissioned so many masterpieces.
The New Saint Peter's Basilica (1506)
The old Constantinian basilica, twelve centuries old, threatened ruin. Julius II made a decision of astonishing audacity: to tear it down and build a new one, the greatest church in Christendom.[64] He entrusted the project to the architect Donato Bramante and laid the first stone himself on April 18, 1506.[65][66]
The worksite, which would last more than a century and pass through the hands of Raphael, Michelangelo (author of the dome) and Bernini, was thus launched by Julius II. The present basilica, the visible heart of Catholicism, was born from his will. To finance the work, his successors would resort to indulgences, whose preaching in Germany would trigger Luther's revolt: through this paradoxical thread, the grandeur of Julius II touches the origins of the Protestant Reformation. For this history, see the dossier The Construction of the Present Saint Peter's Basilica.
The Sistine Chapel Ceiling (1508-1512)
The chapel built by his uncle Sixtus IV had only an ordinary starry vault. Julius II charged Michelangelo with covering it in frescoes. The artist, who saw himself as a sculptor and resisted painting, worked from 1508 to 1512 in exhausting conditions to create one of the greatest masterpieces of Western art: the Sistine Chapel ceiling, with the Creation of Adam and the nine scenes from Genesis.[67][68]
The relationship between the two men - both forceful, both "terrible" - was stormy. According to a tradition transmitted by Vasari in his Life of Michelangelo, the impatient pope kept pressing the artist to finish the chapel - a famous scene, though its exact wording is not established.[69]
From this collision of two geniuses was born the Sistine Chapel as the whole world knows it.
The Raphael Rooms
At the same time, Julius II called the young Raphael to decorate his private apartments in the Vatican, the Stanze (Raphael Rooms). There the painter from Urbino produced, among other works, The School of Athens and the Disputation of the Holy Sacrament.[70][71]
In the fresco of The Mass at Bolsena, Raphael represents Julius II himself, kneeling before the Eucharistic miracle of Bolsena - a way of linking the builder pope to the Church's great Eucharistic tradition. The famous Portrait of Pope Julius II (c. 1511, now in the National Gallery, London), where the old pontiff appears thoughtful and bearded, is also by Raphael: it fixed for posterity the face of the "terrible pope".[72]
The Tomb and the Moses
Even before the Sistine ceiling, Julius II had commissioned from Michelangelo a monumental tomb for himself, a pharaonic project of dozens of statues. The "tragedy of the tomb", endlessly revised and reduced, occupied the artist for forty years. Only one fragment remains, but it is sublime: the Moses, now in the church of San Pietro in Vincoli - the titular church of Cardinal della Rovere, where the reduced monument was installed in 1545; Julius II himself is buried in Saint Peter's Basilica, beside his uncle Sixtus IV.[73][74][75]
The Laocoon and the Birth of the Vatican Museums
On January 14, 1506, an ancient marble group was unearthed in a vineyard on the Esquiline: the Laocoon, the Trojan priest strangled by serpents, celebrated by Pliny. Julius II, passionate about ancient art, sent his architect Giuliano da Sangallo and Michelangelo to the site, then acquired the work and had it installed, together with the Apollo Belvedere, in the Belvedere Courtyard of the Vatican.[76]
This collection, opened to artists and scholars, is considered the nucleus of the future Vatican Museums. The warrior pope was also, without knowing it, one of the founders of the greatest museum of sacred art in the world.
The Pontifical Swiss Guard (1506)
Another very concrete legacy of Julius II still keeps watch at the gates of the Vatican today: the Pontifical Swiss Guard. Desiring reliable and faithful protection, the pope appealed in 1505 to the Swiss Confederation for a permanent corps of soldiers.[77]
On January 22, 1506, a first contingent of one hundred and fifty halberdiers, commanded by the man from Uri Kaspar von Silenen, arrived in Rome through the Piazza del Popolo and received the blessing of Julius II.[78] This date is held as the birth of the Swiss Guard, one of the oldest military corps in the world still in operation.[79] It shows the practical genius of this pope: behind the patron and the strategist stood an administrator who built lasting institutions.
The Pope and the New World (Universalis Ecclesiae regimini, 1508)
While Julius II was waging war in Italy, Spain and Portugal were organizing the evangelization of recently discovered lands. By the bull Universalis Ecclesiae regimini of July 28, 1508, Julius II granted the kings of Spain the royal patronage (patronato real) over the Church in the Indies: the right to present candidates for bishoprics and to propose the erection of dioceses in the New World.[80]
This privilege, extending the bulls of Alexander VI in 1493, provided the legal framework for the immense enterprise of the Spanish missions in America. It also had a reverse side: by handing the Crown such close control over the local Church, it bound mission too strongly to the State, at the risk of subordinating the spiritual to the political - a tension that would weigh for a long time on the Church in Latin America.
Chronology of the Pontificate
| Date | Event | Historical Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| December 5, 1443 | Birth of Giuliano della Rovere (Albisola) | Ligurian origin, nephew of the future Sixtus IV |
| December 16, 1471 (consistory; title received on the 22nd; the 1910 CE gives the 15th) | Cardinal of San Pietro in Vincoli | Rise through the favor of his uncle Sixtus IV |
| 1492 | Flight from Rome before Alexander VI | Beginning of ten years of exile and opposition |
| October 18, 1503 | Death of Pius III after 26 days | The way opens for della Rovere |
| November 1, 1503 | Election as Pope Julius II | The shortest conclave in history |
| January 14, 1506 | Discovery of the Laocoon | Birth of the Belvedere collections |
| January 22, 1506 | Arrival of the first Swiss Guards | Foundation of the Pontifical Swiss Guard |
| April 18, 1506 | First stone of Saint Peter's Basilica | Launch of the greatest building site in Christendom |
| November 10, 1506 | Triumphal entry into Bologna | Reconquest of the Papal States |
| July 28, 1508 | Bull Universalis Ecclesiae regimini | Spanish patronage over the Church in the New World |
| 1508-1512 | Sistine Chapel ceiling (Michelangelo) | Absolute masterpiece of the Renaissance |
| December 1508 | League of Cambrai against Venice | Reconquest of Romagna |
| October 1511 | Holy League against France | "Fuori i barbari!" (later tradition, not attested as words actually spoken) |
| May 3, 1512 | Opening of the Fifth Lateran Council | Response to the conciliabulum of Pisa |
| April 11, 1512 | Battle of Ravenna | The French are eventually driven from Italy |
| February 21, 1513 | Death in Rome | End of a decisive and contested pontificate |
Assessment: a Contradictory Pope
Few pontiffs have left so divided a memory as Julius II. To evaluate him, one must hold together his shadows and his lights.
The Shadows: War and Worldliness
On the debit side, history records violence. Julius II shed the blood of Christians in wars between Christian powers whose motives, even when they served the Church, were largely temporal.[81][82] He led his armies in person, armored, in defiance of the evangelical image of the shepherd. He lived as a Renaissance prince, and before the papacy had children: the Catholic Encyclopedia (1910) speaks of three daughters, the best known of whom is Felice della Rovere (born around 1483 to Lucrezia Normanni), whom he married honorably to an Orsini - recent historiography attests with certainty only Felice.[83] It is this figure of the soldier pope that the satirical dialogue Iulius exclusus e coelis ridicules: a helmeted and armored Julius II demands entry to Paradise in the name of his earthly victories, and is turned away by Saint Peter, who reproaches him for his wars and his soldier's ways.[84]
One should also note, without anachronism, an act with immense consequences: the matrimonial dispensation that Julius II granted in December 1503 to allow the future Henry VIII of England to marry Catherine of Aragon, widow of his brother. Twenty years later, the contestation of this dispensation would serve as the pretext for the Anglican schism.[85]
The Lights: the Papal State Saved and the Renaissance
On the credit side, Julius II saved the State of the Church. Where Alexander VI had handed the papacy over to the Borgias, Julius restored the territorial integrity and independence of the Holy See - the concrete condition of papal freedom until the creation of the Vatican City State in the twentieth century. On the doctrinal level, he opposed conciliarism with a true council and struck down simoniacal elections, a durable reform of conclave law.
Above all, he made Rome the artistic capital of Europe. Saint Peter's Basilica, the Sistine Chapel ceiling, the Raphael Rooms, the Belvedere museums, the Swiss Guard: everything that still makes the Vatican a center of the world bears the mark of his will. The patron magnified the faith through beauty precisely where the soldier had sometimes wounded it.
Why Julius II Matters Today
The lesson of Julius II is the Catholic distinction between the man and the office. The Church has never taught that her pontiffs would be personally holy; she teaches that the indefectibility of the See of Peter does not depend on their private virtues. A pope may wage war, live as a prince, and nevertheless defend the authority of the See, reform the law of conclaves and bequeath to humanity masterpieces that lift souls toward God.
To understand Julius II, then, is to learn to give thanks for the works without absolving the faults, and to see in the history of the papacy not a gallery of spotless saints, but a continuity that neither vices nor compromises have ever broken. The "terrible pope" was, in his rough way, one of the great restorers of the See of Peter - and the last of the great Renaissance popes before the storm of the Reformation.
For Further Reading
- Pope Sixtus IV, his uncle, who made him a cardinal and built the Sistine Chapel that Julius II had decorated by Michelangelo
- Pope Alexander VI, his great Borgia rival, whose death in 1503 opened the way to his election
- Pope Pius III, his immediate predecessor, whose pontificate lasted only twenty-six days
- The Construction of the Present Saint Peter's Basilica, whose first stone Julius II laid in 1506
- The Sistine Chapel, whose ceiling he commissioned from Michelangelo
- The Fifth Lateran Council (1512-1517), which he convoked against the conciliabulum of Pisa
- The Papal States, which he reconquered and consolidated
- The Christian Renaissance, of which he was one of the greatest papal patrons
- The Eucharistic Miracle of Bolsena, which Raphael represented with Julius II kneeling
Notes and References
Conventional numbering of current lists: Julius II figures there as the 216th pope of the lists that no longer count pope-elect Stephen (March 752), who died three days after his election before his episcopal consecration; the lists that still count him make him the 217th and shift all following pontiffs by one. The exclusion itself is that of the pontifical yearbook: at its notice on Stephen II, the Annuario Pontificio adds the note that, Stephen having been elected on the death of Zachary but having died before his consecratio, his name "is recorded neither in the Liber Pontificalis nor in the other lists of popes" (text of the note quoted in "Biography of Pope-elect Stephen", https://www.biographies.net/people/en/pope-elect_stephen). Current repertories place the removal from the Vatican lists in 1961 and give Julius II no. 216 (October 31, 1503 – February 21, 1513): List of popes, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_popes, which specifies that pope-elect Stephen "has not been on the Vatican's official list of popes since 1961". Direct verification of October 4, 2026: the Holy See's official page (vatican.va, HTTP 200) entitles him "216° Papa della Chiesa Cattolica", with "Inizio pontificato 1,26.XI.1503 — Fine pontificato 21.II.1513"[^vatican] — which confirms the rank of 216th on the current Vatican list.
1Official page "Giulio II", The Holy See, https://www.vatican.va/content/vatican/it/holy-father/giulio-ii.html (consulted on October 4, 2026, HTTP 200): "216° Papa della Chiesa Cattolica — Inizio pontificato 1,26.XI.1503 — Fine pontificato 21.II.1513 — Nome secolare Giuliano della Rovere — Nascita Albisola (Savona)".
2 41Felice della Rovere, born around 1483 to Lucrezia Normanni, married in 1506 to Gian Giordano Orsini; influential figure of the Roman nobility ("Felice della Rovere", Wikipedia, for cross-checking). Exact wording of the Catholic Encyclopedia (1910): "before he became pope he was the father of three daughters, the best known of whom, Felice, he gave in marriage to Giovanni Giordano Orsini in 1506"; recent research knows Julius II to have only one attested daughter, Felice: Encyclopædia Britannica, art. "Julius II" ("as cardinal, Julius II fathered at least one illegitimate daughter, Felice"); S. Miranda, The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, notice "Giuliano Della Rovere" ("He had an illegitimate daughter, Felice, by Lucrezia Normanni"). CE verbatim checked on October 4, 2026 on the New Advent transcription (https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08562a.htm, HTTP 200), identical to the letter.
3 83Ludwig von Pastor, History of the Popes, vol. on Adrian VI and Clement VII, ch. XX (Henry VIII's divorce): "On the 26th of December 1503 Pope Julius II had issued a Bull granting the necessary dispensation from the obstacle to a valid marriage caused by the first degree of affinity" (text checked on October 4, 2026 on the online transcription, conforming); for cross-checking, "Pope Julius II", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Julius_II: "In December 1503, Julius issued a dispensation allowing the future Henry VIII of England to marry Catherine of Aragon". Catherine, widow of Arthur (died in 1502), promised to his brother Henry; marriage delayed by diplomatic negotiations until the accession of Henry VIII (1509) — Katharine of Aragón, FactMonster (Columbia Encyclopedia), https://www.factmonster.com/encyclopedia/history/modern-europe/uk-ireland-bios/katharine-of-aragon; the later contestation of this dispensation would serve as the lever of the Anglican schism.
4 85"Pope Julius II", The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 8, New York, Robert Appleton Company, 1910, New Advent, https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08562a.htm. Passages used: birth on December 5, 1443 at Albisola and family; cardinalatial creation (the CE gives December 15, 1471) with the title of San Pietro in Vincoli and list of benefices; withdrawal to the castle of Ostia at the end of 1492, apparent reconciliation of July 1493, flight via Genoa to Charles VIII; conclave of October 31-November 1, 1503; League of Cambrai (adhesion on March 23, 1509), Holy League (October 4, 1511), Ravenna (April 11, 1512); laying of the first stone of Saint Peter's on April 18, 1506; triumphal entry into Bologna on November 10, 1506 ("Julius II entered Bologna triumphantly on 10 November"). (The CE gives December 15, 1471; Pastor, History of the Popes, vol. VI, and S. Miranda, The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church (after Eubel), date the consistory of creation to December 16, 1471, the titles being assigned on December 22 - passage checked in the online English edition of Pastor, vol. Sixtus IV: "On the 16th December, 1471, a Consistory was held, and Pietro Riario […] and Giuliano della Rovere […] were created Cardinals". This article follows Pastor and Miranda: December 16, 1471.)
5 6 11 15 16 17 20 22 23 24 25 27 29 30 31 32 33 34 36 38 45 46 48 51 54 57 65 67 70 81"Jules II", Wikipedia (collaborative encyclopedia, cited here only for cross-checking: dates and facts are established by the Catholic Encyclopedia, Pastor and the cited institutional sources), https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules_II.
7 21 26 28"Fuori i barbari!" ("Out with the barbarians!"), cry that later tradition attaches to the name of Julius II to sum up his policy of expelling foreign powers, the French first among them, from Italy. The historian Christine Shaw, in the chapter of her biography devoted to this turning point (Julius II: The Warrior Pope, Oxford, Blackwell, 1993, ch. IX, "Fuori i Barbari"), concludes that no source attests that Julius II ever uttered these words, while showing that he expressed on many occasions, and unambiguously, his desire to be rid of the French. No contemporary source therefore attests these words as spoken by him; the body of the article presents them exclusively as a later tradition.
8 56Julius II, bull Cum tam divino, dated January 14, 1505 (date read in the very text of the bull; text in the Magnum Bullarium Romanum, vol. III, Turin, 1859, p. 365-368), declaring null and invalid any simoniacal papal election; taken up and promulgated as a decree of the Fifth Lateran Council on February 16, 1513. See Thomas M. Izbicki, "Simonie und Papstwahl: Zur Bulle Cum tam divino Julius' II.", Annuarium Historiae Conciliorum, vol. 44, fasc. 2, 2012, p. 421 ff.; Frederic J. Baumgartner, Behind Locked Doors, p. 95-97. (S. Miranda's repertory catalogues the act as "January 14 (February 19), 1505" - double dating of decision and expedition; the January 14 date, read in the act, is retained in the body.)
9 43 44"Fifth Lateran Council (1512-17)", The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 9, New York, 1910, New Advent, https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09018b.htm. Convocation by the bull Sacrosanctae Romanae Ecclesiae of July 18, 1511; opening on May 3, 1512; condemnation of the conciliabulum of Pisa in the first sessions (Julius II); solemn revocation of the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges at the 11th session, on December 19, 1516, under Leo X (bull Pastor aeternus), with approval of the concordat concluded with Francis I.
10 59 61 62 63Basilica of Saint Peter, The Catholic Encyclopedia, New Advent, https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13369b.htm: foundations laid by Julius II in the spring of 1506 in the presence of thirty-five cardinals, according to Bramante's plans; date of April 18, 1506 established by the art. "Pope Julius II", https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08562a.htm ("He laid the cornerstone of the gigantic Basilica of St. Peter on 18 April, 1506").
12 64 66Vatican Museums, Pio-Clementino Museum: discovery of the Laocoon group on January 14, 1506 in a vineyard on the Esquiline, examination by Giuliano da Sangallo and Michelangelo, acquisition by Julius II and installation in the Belvedere Courtyard with the Apollo Belvedere. https://www.museivaticani.va.
13 76Iulius exclusus e coelis ("Julius Excluded from Heaven"), satirical dialogue in Latin written in 1514, after the pope's death (first publication in 1517), traditionally attributed to Erasmus — an attribution he denied. A helmeted and armored Julius II is turned away there from the gates of Paradise by Saint Peter. The passage is paraphrased in the body: no reference English translation could be located to guarantee its verbatim.
14 84Battle of Ravenna, Encyclopædia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/print/article/2096040: engagement of April 11, 1512, a French victory overshadowed by the death of the young commander Gaston de Foix, facing an army of the Holy League predominantly Spanish; the French nevertheless had to evacuate Italy in the following months.
18 58 82Ludwig von Pastor, History of the Popes from the Close of the Middle Ages, vol. VI (pontificate of Julius II, 1503-1513), English edition, London, Kegan Paul. General reference work for the narrative of the pontificate (Italian politics, conciliabulum of Pisa, Fifth Lateran Council); each dated fact in the body of the article is established by the localized sources cited at its own passage.
19"Pope Julius II", Wikipedia (collaborative encyclopedia, cited here for cross-checking only: dates and facts are established by the Catholic Encyclopedia, Pastor and the cited institutional sources), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Julius_II.
35 40 47 49 53"Pope Pius III", The Catholic Encyclopedia: Francesco Todeschini Piccolomini, elected on September 22, 1503, died on October 18, 1503 after a twenty-six-day pontificate.
37"Pope Julius II", The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 8, 1910. Original English text: "This was the shortest conclave in the history of the papacy." Della Rovere was elected during the night of October 31 to November 1, 1503. Judgment confirmed by current historiography: the Vatican historian Ambrogio Piazzoni (quoted by the Associated Press, May 2025) holds the October 1503 conclave, which elected Julius II in a few hours, to be the fastest observing the waiting rule; History.com ("What Were the Longest—and Shortest—Papal Elections?") also speaks of the "shortest conclave in history" (about ten hours).
39 42On the Bologna statue and the "La Giulia" cannon: contemporary account in Vasari, Life of Michelangelo (see michelange note); study "The numerous failures of Michelangelo's bronze statue of Pope Julius II" (Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz): the statue, dragged then taken to the furnace and melted down, was recast into a cannon ironically nicknamed "La Giulia", after the pope (see the article's notice, Tel Aviv University, https://cris.tau.ac.il/en/publications/broken-into-pieces-and-its-head-thrown-into-the-square-the-numero/).
50Julius II, Encyclopædia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Julius-II: League of Cambrai, anti-Venetian alliance formed in December 1508 (Louis XII, Maximilian I, Ferdinand II), joined by Julius II in March 1509; Venetian defeat at Agnadello in May 1509; interdict lifted on February 24, 1510.
521911 Encyclopædia Britannica, art. "Julius", https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica/Julius: Holy League formed by Julius II with Ferdinand of Aragon and Venice against France, later joined by Henry VIII and the emperor; the French driven from Italy in 1512. Date of proclamation (October 4, 1511) established by the Catholic Encyclopedia, art. "Pope Julius II", https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08562a.htm.
55"Fifth Lateran Council (1512-17)", The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 9, 1910: "Four cardinals then met at Pisa provided with proxies from three absent cardinals". Eubel, Hierarchia catholica medii et recentioris aevi, vol. III, 2nd ed., 1923, p. 4, n. 1: five cardinals (Carvajal, Briçonnet, Francesco Borgia, Sanseverino, Prie) deprived of their functions and declared schismatics on October 11, 1511.
60Sistine Chapel, Encyclopædia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Sistine-Chapel: ceiling commissioned by Julius II in 1508 and painted by Michelangelo from 1508 to 1512 (Genesis scenes, including the Creation of Adam).
68Giorgio Vasari, Le Vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettori, 2nd ed., Florence, Giunti, 1568, 3rd part, "Vita di Michelagnolo Buonarroti": stormy relations between Julius II and Michelangelo, bronze statue of Bologna and "tragedy of the tomb". On the statue: bronze completed in 1508 for San Petronio in Bologna, destroyed in 1511 - see Julius II, Encyclopædia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Julius-II.
69 74Raphael Rooms: The Catholic Encyclopedia, art. "Pope Julius II", https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08562a.htm ("The famous frescoes of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel and of Raphael in the Stanze"); see the Vatican Museums notices, https://www.museivaticani.va (Stanze di Raffaello: School of Athens, Disputation of the Holy Sacrament, apartments of Julius II decorated by Raphael from 1508 onward).
71Raphael, Portrait of Pope Julius II, c. 1511, oil on panel, National Gallery, London. See the National Gallery notice, https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/raphael-portrait-of-pope-julius-ii.
72Tomb of Pope Julius II, The History of Art, https://www.thehistoryofart.org/michelangelo/tomb-of-pope-julius-ii/: initial commission in 1505, reduced monument installed in February 1545 in the right transept of San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome, with the Moses at the center of the lower register; see also Giorgio Vasari, Le Vite, 1568, 3rd part, "Vita di Michelagnolo Buonarroti".
73Tomb of Pope Julius II, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomb_of_Pope_Julius_II: "Julius II, however, is buried next to his uncle Sixtus IV in St. Peter's Basilica"; the Vincoli monument, completed in 1545, is described there as a funerary monument, the pope not being buried in it. For cross-checking: "Pope Julius II", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Julius_II: "Despite the fact that the so-called 'Tomb of Pope Julius II' by Michelangelo is in San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome, Julius is in fact buried in St. Peter's Basilica."
75Official website of the Pontifical Swiss Guard, history section, https://www.schweizergarde.ch/paepstliche-schweizergarde/de/ueber-uns/geschichte/: "Seit mehr als 500 Jahren steht die Schweizergarde im Dienste der Päpste […] Begonnen hat alles im Jahre 1506, als die ersten Schweizer auf Anfrage des damaligen…" — the Guard traces its foundation to 1506, at the request of the then pope, Julius II ("1506 Gründung" page). For cross-checking: Pontifical Swiss Guard, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontifical_Swiss_Guard (corps created on January 22, 1506 by Julius II, one of the oldest military units still in operation) and Kaspar von Silenen, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaspar_von_Silenen (first contingent of 150 Swiss mercenaries that entered the Vatican on January 22, 1506 under his command). The "oldest corps" label is also relayed by the press (Religion News Service / Associated Press, May 2018: "historians consider the oldest standing army in the world"; Guinness World Records, "The secrets of the oldest army in the world"); the article retains the cautious wording "one of the oldest", attested by encyclopedic sources.
77 78 79Julius II, bull Universalis Ecclesiae regimini (or Universalis Ecclesiae) of July 28, 1508 (text in the Bullarium Romanum), granting the kings of Spain the royal patronage (patronato real) over the Church in the Indies — the right of presentation to bishoprics and of erecting dioceses in the New World. Date confirmed by scholarship: "On July 28, 1508, the bull Universalis ecclesiae was issued" (Patronato Real, Encyclopedia.com, https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/patronato-real); "by the bull universalis ecclesiae, July 28, 1508, he conceded universal patronage to the Spanish crown in the Indies" ("The Origins of Real Patronato de Indias", JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/25012517). The date of July 28, 1508 is thus established by these two references. Not to be confused with the bull Universalis Ecclesiae of Pius IX (1850, restoration of the hierarchy in England). Extends the bulls Inter caetera (1493) of Alexander VI and Eximiae devotionis (1501).
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