Pope Urban VI (1378–1389)

The first Roman pope after the Avignon exile

Urban VI matters first for historical reasons. The popes had lived at Avignon since 1309; Gregory XI had only just restored the Holy See to Rome on 17 January 1377 when he died on 27 March 1378.^[9][10] Elected immediately afterward, Bartolomeo Prignano was the first pope born in the Italian peninsula to ascend the throne after the return and the first pope of the restored Roman era. On him rested the hope that the papacy would never again leave for France. His election was meant to seal Rome's victory; instead, it opened the gravest fracture in Western Christendom.

The pope whose election began the Western Schism

The second reason is ecclesiological. Urban VI stands at the beginning of the Western Schism (1378–1417), when two and then three rival popes claimed the faithful's obedience.^[11][12] His case posed the crisis's most alarming question: how can the true pope be recognized when the cardinals who elected and crowned him later claim that the election was invalid? The Catholic answer—that Urban VI was the legitimate pope—rests on precise legal criteria, not on the man's moral qualities.

The uncompromising reformer whose character ruined his work

The third reason is spiritual and moral. Urban VI sought genuine reform: he opposed the cardinals' luxury, accumulation of benefices, pensions, and the worldliness of a Curia enriched by Avignon.^[13][14] The program was right, but he pursued it with a violence that made him detested, turning allies into enemies. His life offers a severe lesson: the holiness of a cause does not excuse a lack of charity in the means, and zeal without gentleness can destroy what it intends to save—a lesson that Saint Catherine of Siena, his most ardent supporter, addressed to him during his lifetime.

The story of Urban VI rests first on contemporary chronicles, above all the De schismate of Dietrich von Nieheim (Theodoricus de Niem), a Curial official who personally accompanied Urban VI into the Kingdom of Naples and witnessed the events at Nocera. His hostile but informed account underlies most narratives of the cardinals' torture.^[15][16] Italian chronicles, including Giovanni Sercambi and Neapolitan annalists, as well as the papal acts of the reign, also survive.^[17]

For the critical narrative—birth, career, the 1378 election, the break with the cardinals, the Neapolitan wars, and his death in 1389—the standard references broadly agree: Michael Ott's “Pope Urban VI” in the Catholic Encyclopedia, modern French and English encyclopedias, and above all Ludwig von Pastor's History of the Popes, which weighs the sources with documented severity.^{[18][19][20][21]} The Protestant historian Philip Schaff, relying on Nieheim, supplies a complementary account.^[22]

For the discernment of Urban VI's legitimacy and the theological import of the schism, readers should consult Ignispedia's general dossier. What follows is the biography of the man and his reign, carefully distinguishing facts attested by records from edifying or polemical stories transmitted by chroniclers who were themselves parties to the dispute.^[23]

An obscure Neapolitan birth

Bartolomeo Prignano was born around 1318 into a modest family in the Kingdom of Naples. Sources disagree about the exact place: the Catholic Encyclopedia gives Naples, whereas other accounts name Itri, a small town in southern Lazio then under Neapolitan rule.^[24][25][26] What is certain is that he did not belong to the high aristocracy and possessed no powerful family network. In an age dominated by great cardinalitial families, this made him appear incorruptible and independent of the Curial factions.^[27]

As a young man he went to Avignon, then the capital of Christendom, where he trained and built his reputation. Tradition describes him as a devout monk and a learned casuist, more a man of law than of government.^[28] His reputation was forged in the quiet machinery of the papal chancery rather than in episcopal government or political campaigning.

The canon lawyer of the Avignon Curia

Prignano's expertise was legal and administrative. Learned in canon law, methodical, and tireless, he became one of the key officials of the Avignon Curia.^[29][30] When Gregory XI resolved to return the Holy See to Rome in 1376–1377, the administrative apparatus had to be reorganized. Prignano, already an experienced official, was placed in charge of the papal chancery, which drafted, sealed, and dispatched papal bulls and letters.^[31]

This office is essential to understanding 1378. As head of the chancery, Prignano knew every dossier, procedure, and official and was regarded as reliable and hardworking. To divided cardinals, an austere, experienced prelate without a faction seemed the ideal administrator and compromise candidate.

Archbishop of Acerenza and then Bari

Prignano's episcopal career followed his growing reputation. On 21 March 1364, he was consecrated Archbishop of Acerenza in the Kingdom of Naples.^[32][33] Thirteen years later, on 14 April 1377, Gregory XI transferred him to Bari, the great Adriatic port. It was as Archbishop of Bari that he would be elected pope one year later.^[34][35]

This was more than a title. At his election, Prignano was a serving metropolitan archbishop, yet he was not a cardinal. Like Urban IV a century earlier and his more immediate namesake Blessed Urban V, he belonged to the rare class of popes elected from outside the College of Cardinals; in the traditional list he was the last.^[36]

Gregory XI's death and fear of a return to Avignon

When Gregory XI died in Rome on 27 March 1378, the situation was explosive.^[37][38] The papacy had been back in the city for only fourteen months, while the Curia, French in composition after seventy years at Avignon, remained dominated by Frenchmen. Of the sixteen cardinals present, eleven were French, four Italian, and one Spanish.^[39] The Roman people feared above all that a French pope would immediately return the Holy See to the Rhône, depriving Rome of the prosperity and prestige brought by the papal presence.

The issue was not merely local. Much of Italy and Christendom saw the return to Rome as the end of the “Babylonian captivity” denounced by Petrarch. The conclave therefore met in a city under arms, determined to obtain a pope who would remain.

“Romano lo volemo!”: the besieged conclave

The conclave opened in the Vatican on 7 April 1378 amid terror.^[40] A Roman crowd surrounded the palace, rang the alarm bell, and loudly demanded one of their own:

“We want a Roman, or at least an Italian!” — cry of the Roman crowd besieging the conclave, 7–8 April 1378^[41]

Unable to agree on one of their own, the cardinals chose an Italian outside the College. The Spanish cardinal Pedro de Luna—ironically, the future antipope Benedict XIII—proposed the Archbishop of Bari, describing him, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia, as “a saintly, learned man, of mature age,” known to them all.^[42] On 8 April 1378, all except Cardinal Orsini agreed on Bartolomeo Prignano.

Cardinal Tebaldeschi's stratagem

What followed would weigh heavily in the dispute over legitimacy. Fearing the crowd's fury if it learned that the new pope was not Roman, the cardinals resorted to a ruse: they clothed the elderly Roman cardinal Tebaldeschi in papal vestments and presented him to the multitude, buying time to place Prignano in safety.^[43][44] The deception provoked anger when discovered, but the election stood.

More importantly—and this is the decisive argument for legitimacy—the cardinals publicly recognized Urban VI in the following weeks. They attended his coronation on 18 April 1378, Easter Sunday, asked him for favors, addressed official letters to him, and wrote to sovereigns announcing the election.^[45][46] This sustained recognition, lasting several weeks, later made it difficult to claim that the election was null because of coercion.

Why the name Urban?

By choosing Urban, Prignano placed himself in a prestigious line: Urban V, the blessed monk and his recent namesake, and Urban IV, likewise elected from outside the College.^[47] The name evoked reform and fidelity to Rome (Urbs, the city par excellence). History's irony was that this reforming name became under him a symbol of division, while the antipope took the name Clement, as if setting Avignon's claimed mildness against Urban's harshness.

A legitimate program of reform

Immediately after his election, Urban VI began an energetic reform of Curial morals. He forbade cardinals to accept pensions and gratuities from princes, condemned their luxurious households, and attacked the plurality of benefices and simony.^[48][49] In substance, the program was irreproachable: it targeted the abuses that had made part of the College of Cardinals into a body of wealthy lords during the Avignon period. Many saints, first among them Catherine of Siena, desired such purification.

The tragedy lay not in the goal, but in the method. Where firmness and patience were needed, Urban VI employed brutality.

The humiliation of the cardinals

The new pope publicly berated the cardinals, called them perjurers and simoniacs in consistory, reportedly struck one of them, and threatened to create enough Italian cardinals to swamp the French faction.^[50][51] The Catholic Encyclopedia notes that his “conduct changed” almost immediately after the election: the retiring administrator became a suspicious and despotic master, abusing his authority until he became unbearable to the men who had elected him.^[52]

Europe read these first months in the same way: the cause was just, but the zeal was immoderate. Urban VI's violence did not merely destroy friendships; it gave his enemies the argument they needed to justify their break.

Catherine of Siena: a just cause and misguided zeal

The most poignant testimony comes from the woman who defended Urban VI until her death: Saint Catherine of Siena. Convinced of his legitimacy, she remained faithful to him, but clearly saw that his temperament was ruining everything and wrote to him without evasion:

“For the love of Christ crucified, temper somewhat those sudden impulses that nature gives you; by holy virtue, overcome nature.” — Catherine of Siena, letter to Pope Urban VI (1378)^[53]

The saint never invented another pope; she implored the true pope to become worthy of his office.^[54] This paradox—a canonized saint correcting the legitimate pope's character—captures Urban VI's singularity: law was on his side, his manner was against him, and one could be certain of his cause while distressed by his person.

Flight to Anagni and then Fondi

Frightened and offended, the French cardinals left Rome in May 1378, ostensibly to escape the summer heat, and went to Anagni, then on 27 August 1378 to Fondi in the Kingdom of Naples, under royal protection.^[55][56] From there they issued a declaration and an encyclical accusing Urban VI. His election, they argued, had been extorted through fear of the Roman populace and was therefore null in law.^[57]

The argument was convenient, but collided with an awkward fact: for weeks these same cardinals had treated Urban VI as pope, solicited his favors, and celebrated his coronation. Their belated reversal looked less like a sincere protest against coercion than a reaction against the man who had humiliated them.

The election of Antipope Clement VII

On 20 September 1378 at Fondi, the dissident cardinals took the irreparable step of electing another pope, Robert of Geneva, who took the name Clement VII and soon established himself at Avignon.^[58][59] Latin Christendom was divided into two obediences: Urban VI was followed by Italy, the Empire, England, Ireland, and much of Germany; Clement VII by France, Scotland, Castile, and part of the Iberian Peninsula.^[60][61]

To counter the adherence of almost the entire College to the antipope, Urban VI created twenty-four new cardinals at once on 18 September 1378—a twenty-fifth nomination, offered to the Bishop of London William Courtenay, having been declined—, rebuilding a completely new College in a single day.^[62][63][64] The Western Schism had begun.

Urban VI, legitimate pope: the Church's judgment

The Catholic Church has always held Urban VI to be the legitimate pope and the Roman line to be the true succession.^[65][66] The criterion is not geographical but legal: the 1378 election was conducted by the competent cardinals, followed by their prolonged public recognition, and met no immediate challenge. Real though popular coercion was, it does not prove that the cardinals voted against their consciences, since they confirmed the choice once the crowd had dispersed.^[67] The official list therefore numbers Urban VI as the 202nd Roman pontiff, whereas Clement VII is listed among the antipopes.

This judgment is all the more striking because it was reached despite Urban's character. The Church has never claimed that Urban VI was a saint; it judged that he was the pope. The distinction is crucial: a pontiff's legitimacy depends not on his virtues, but on the regularity of his election.

The Neapolitan war: Joanna I and Charles of Durazzo

The schism immediately became a war in the Kingdom of Naples, the strategic key to southern Italy. Queen Joanna I of Naples supported Antipope Clement VII; Urban VI deposed her and invested Charles of Durazzo (Charles III), whom he crowned King of Naples in 1381.^[68][69] Charles seized the throne and had Joanna I killed in 1382.

The alliance soon became confrontation. Urban VI wanted to carve out a principality for his nephew Francesco Prignano; Charles III refused.^[70] The pope then went personally into the kingdom, an imprudent step. On the night of 30 October 1383, he was held prisoner at Aversa; after his release, he took refuge in the fortress of Nocera.^[71]

The cardinals' conspiracy (1385)

At Nocera the darkest drama of the pontificate unfolded. In 1385, several cardinals whom Urban VI had himself created, appalled by his obstinacy and excesses, planned to place him under guardianship—to appoint a cardinal to govern in his stead because of his “incapacity and obstinacy,” or even to depose him.^[72][73]

Once the plot was discovered, Urban VI's response was terrible. Six cardinals were arrested, stripped of their goods, cast into an old cistern, and tortured.^[74][75] Modern reference works report that the chronicler Egidio da Viterbo is said to have later called such treatment of cardinals by a pope an unheard-of crime through the ages, without citing the exact passage of his work.^[76]

The siege of Nocera and the cardinals' ordeal

Charles III then laid siege to Nocera, where the pope had shut himself in with his prisoners. The indomitable Urban VI defended the fortress and several times a day excommunicated the besiegers from the ramparts, holding candle and bell.^[77][78] The most chilling scene is reported by the eyewitness Dietrich von Nieheim: while the cardinals were being tortured, the pope allegedly walked in the adjoining garden reciting his breviary aloud, seemingly indifferent to their cries. This detail comes from a hostile chronicler and must be treated with due reserve, yet it conveys the horror these days left in historical memory.^[79][80]

Modern reference works report that Egidio da Viterbo is said to have judged this ordeal of the cardinals an unheard-of crime through the ages, although the exact passage of his Historia viginti saeculorum could not be traced.^[81]

After several months, Urban VI managed to break the siege and escape toward Barletta, taking his imprisoned cardinals with him.^[82][83]

Flight to Genoa

From Barletta, a Genoese fleet carried the pope and his captives to Genoa. The cardinals met a grim fate: the Bishop of Aquila was killed on the way, and the others were put to death at Genoa despite the doge's intervention. Only the Englishman Adam Easton was spared, probably because of pressure from the King of England.^[84][85] Of the five cardinals who had remained faithful, many renounced his obedience, further emptying the College he had only just rebuilt.

Thus the legitimate pope, abandoned by some of his own, isolated and wandering from city to city, carried with him the memory of a crime that neither his supporters nor history could erase.

The wandering pope and the Jubilee of 1390

Urban VI's final years were those of a restless pope. From Genoa to Lucca and then Perugia, he tried in vain to restore his authority in an Italy exhausted by war.^[86][87] In August 1388, he proclaimed a Jubilee for 1390, reducing the interval between Holy Years to thirty-three years, the age of Christ, so that every generation might benefit. He would not live to celebrate it.^[88]

In October 1388, while marching with his troops near Narni, he fell from his mule and never fully recovered.^[89] Broken by injuries and reverses, the man of iron finally returned to Rome, which he had not seen for years.

Death in Rome (15 October 1389)

Urban VI died in Rome on 15 October 1389, after a pontificate of eleven years, six months, and seven days.^[90][91] Rumor immediately claimed he had been poisoned—“according to many he was poisoned by the Romans,” says the Catholic Encyclopedia—but nothing was proved, and his injuries sufficiently explain his death.^[92] He was buried in St Peter's Basilica, where his sarcophagus remains in the Vatican Grottoes. During the basilica's reconstruction, his remains nearly disappeared and were preserved only through the vigilance of the historian Giacomo Grimaldi.^[93]

His death did not end the schism. The Roman obedience immediately elected Boniface IX, while the Avignon line continued. Only the Council of Constance (1414–1418) finally restored unity around Martin V.

The judgment of history and the Church

The historians' verdict is severe, and the Church has not contradicted its substance. Philip Schaff, at the end of his account of the schism based on Nieheim, concludes bluntly:

“He had as pope shown himself in every instance utterly unfit for the responsibilities of a ruler.” — Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, vol. VI^[94]

His reform, just in principle, drowned in violence; his election, legitimate in law, became the matrix of schism; his undeniable courage hardened into cruel obstinacy.

Yet the Church upheld his legitimacy. That is the central lesson of this tragic life. The papacy is not an absolutism of personality—Urban VI was pope without being a saint—but neither is it an interchangeable symbol, for the question of who was pope truly mattered and divided Europe for forty years. The Western Schism opened by this harsh man became, paradoxically, an argument from the contrary for Christ's promise to Peter: the Church endured the worst crisis of her visible unity without perishing, and eventually recovered one recognized head.

• The Western Schism (1378–1417) — the full dossier on the crisis Urban VI opened, through the Council of Constance and the election of Martin V.
• Pope Gregory XI (1370–1378) — his predecessor, the last French pope, who returned the papacy to Rome and whose death occasioned the conclave of 1378.
• The Avignon Papacy — the seventy years of Avignon exile whose bitter aftermath was the schism.
• Blessed Urban V (1362–1370) and Urban IV (1261–1264) — the other popes named Urban, both also elected outside the College of Cardinals.
• Saint Catherine of Siena — the mystic who defended Urban VI's legitimacy while warning him to temper his zeal.
• The Council of Constance (1414–1418) — the council that ended the schism born under Urban VI.