AHC: Largest possible Papal States

With a POD in 1177 with the Treaty of Venice, what is the largest the Papal States can possibly expand to?
 
Southern Tuscany could be integrated with a stronger Papacy or if Lucius III accepts a compromise about sharing the Margraviate of Tuscany after Matilda's death.

A stronger Papacy, and/or a weaker kingdom of Sicly and HRE, could allow the popes to take control of the whole duchy of Spoleto in the early XIIIth century.

You may have other possibilities, but these seems to me being the most possible ones in the forseeable list of events after the PoD.
The big problem being not the capacity to takeover these territories, but about the papal capacity to hold on it, but it could be admittedly turns as Romagna did IOTL : technical suzerainty from Rome, independent in facts, and papal campaign at some point to enforce its claims.
 
I believe the ownership of Sardinia(or Corsica, I forget really) was contested between the Papal States and Pisa at some point, perhaps a Pope could assert that claim.
 
Southern Tuscany could be integrated with a stronger Papacy or if Lucius III accepts a compromise about sharing the Margraviate of Tuscany after Matilda's death.

A stronger Papacy, and/or a weaker kingdom of Sicly and HRE, could allow the popes to take control of the whole duchy of Spoleto in the early XIIIth century.

You may have other possibilities, but these seems to me being the most possible ones in the forseeable list of events after the PoD.
The big problem being not the capacity to takeover these territories, but about the papal capacity to hold on it, but it could be admittedly turns as Romagna did IOTL : technical suzerainty from Rome, independent in facts, and papal campaign at some point to enforce its claims.

I find quite hard to believe that Frederick Barbarossa would accept the loss of such a significant piece of real estate as the southern part of the Margraviate of Tuscany. IIRC the compromise offered by the emperor was a share of the revenues, without any suzerainty involved (and even that compromise was subordinate to an agreement for some bishoprics in Germany). The same thing can be said for the duchy of Spoleto too, which was also part of the Mathildan inheritance (in practice more than in theory, because in point of law Mathilda would not have been entitled to inherit either the Margraviate of Tuscany or the duchy of Spoleto or any of the comital titles her father held in Emila and Lombardy). The Norman kingdom was quite a viable concern and the treaty of Venice marked its ascendancy, therefore gaining Spoleto is really quite difficult for the pope. Later popes were able to gain the city of Spoleto, but the papal hold over the city was never secure enough until the end of the 15th century (and in any case the southern part of the duchy was never included among the papal lands).
 
I believe the ownership of Sardinia(or Corsica, I forget really) was contested between the Papal States and Pisa at some point, perhaps a Pope could assert that claim.

Pope Benedict VIII granted to Pisa the rights over Sardinia and Corsica early in the 11th century in a kind of proto-crusade to defend the island from Arab attacks from Balearic islands. Later on Boniface VIII granted the kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica (newly created out of full cloth) to the crown of Aragon in an attempt to mediate between Aragon and Anjou.
Nothing new here: on the strength of the fictional Donation of Constantine (purportedly granted by the Roman emperor in the 4th century but actually counterfeited in the late 9th-early 10th century) the papacy claimed suzerainty over the western portion of the Roman empire. Other notable examples of the application of this theory are the creation of the kingdom of Sicily (for William the Guiscard) and the papal blessing to William the Bastard to invade England.
 
I suppose a more ambitious Pope who succeeded after Leo III (The Pope who crowned Charlemagne) could try and get Charlemagne's successors to conquer more of Italy and donate them to 'Saint Peter' like Charlemagne in return for more power as an Emperor
 
If you had the right Pope, you could see Italy being unified in the 19th century in a federation under the Pope.

Yes, I think that's the largest likely version.

Gioberti's neo-Guelphism was a well-meaning pipe dream, with no chance to be implemented in real world.
No chance to have the "right pope" on St. Peter's chair: Austrian influence (and the Austrian emperor right to blackball any papal candidate who was considered unreliable or against Austrian interests) as well as French involvement would always guarantee that the pope would look to the "greater" Catholic interests rather than to the Italian ones, and in any case the majority Curia was conservative and reactionary.
Even the quite low-key attempt to create a custom union among the major Italian states (Sardinia, Naples, Tuscany and the Papal States) met with scarce interest (also because of the strong Austrian opposition) and ended up in failure.
The revolution of 1848 almost immediately scared Pius IX, who by April 1848 was already regretting his first decision to authorize Papal troops to move north in support of the insurgents. For the next 30 years the purported paladin of a liberal church became more and more the vessillifer of reaction. Can anyone see such a man presiding over an Italian Federation?
 
I find quite hard to believe that Frederick Barbarossa would accept the loss of such a significant piece of real estate as the southern part of the Margraviate of Tuscany.
Hence why I said "weakened HRE" and "a" compromise instead of the IOTL situation.
 
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