AHQ: The Papal States keeps its exclaves in France, what happens in 1870?

[TheWitheredStriker]

Temporarily putting potential butterflies aside (though I doubt this PoD is going to change too much before 1870), I’ve recently been wondering what would happen if the Papal States still controlled Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin when the Italians capture Rome.

Let’s suppose that, at the Congress of Vienna, the Europeans powers for whatever reason decide to give the Pope his French territories back. Then in 1870, the Italians capture Rome. Now what?

I’ve seen it suggested in other threads on this forum that a new Avignon Papacy would begin; since the Pope wants temporal power, he would book it to the Comtat. It was argued that the Pope decided to play prisoner in the Vatican mainly because he had nowhere else to go. Here, the Pope has a fair amount of land in France, so he would go there and run it as a rump Papal State, right?

… Well, to play devil’s advocate: the Pope might still lock himself in the Vatican. After all, Italy declined to occupy the Leonine City (OTL Vatican City + the Roman district of Borgho) and offered to let the Pope keep all of it as a remnant Papal State (which, ironically, would’ve given the Pope twice the territory he has now). However, the Pope STILL refused, because he didn’t want to look like he was bending the knee to Italy, nor accepting their takeover of the rest of Rome. The Pope is the Bishop of ROME, after all.

Soooo … what would happen? Does the Pope move to the Comtat and continue the Papal States there? Or does he still stay put in the Vatican and throw a hissy fit? If the latter, what happens to the Comtat and Avignon?

 

[Evil Crusader]

France wants the territory since a couple centuries, which makes this reliant on mass butterfly slaughter.
Anyways, The Pope is a reactionary hothead. I feel he would stay in Italy just out of spite, and feared harassment on the way out (which could well possibly end with in the worst way, either as an incident or an arranged hit).
Any successor would have the option of residing in Avignon though, while claiming they are not welcome in Rome, who they claim to be theirs, anymore; an option rife with schisms and unlikely to be welcome by most, but still an option. The major butterflies come if European politics remain similar to OTL, with invaders maybe deciding to dissolve the Comtat for their ends or the Pope lobbying for Rome as a sovereign entity and possibly being coopted in exchange for some kind of restoration.
EDIT: I forgot, but if a Pope gets there for any amount of time, expect French politics to get extra spicy to a level that would make the Dreyfus Affair a relaxed chat between friends.

 

[Nuraghe]

Temporarily putting potential butterflies aside (though I doubt this PoD is going to change too much before 1870), I’ve recently been wondering what would happen if the Papal States still controlled Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin when the Italians capture Rome.

Let’s suppose that, at the Congress of Vienna, the Europeans powers for whatever reason decide to give the Pope his French territories back. Then in 1870, the Italians capture Rome. Now what?

I’ve seen it suggested in other threads on this forum that a new Avignon Papacy would begin; since the Pope wants temporal power, he would book it to the Comtat. It was argued that the Pope decided to play prisoner in the Vatican mainly because he had nowhere else to go. Here, the Pope has a fair amount of land in France, so he would go there and run it as a rump Papal State, right?

… Well, to play devil’s advocate: the Pope might still lock himself in the Vatican. After all, Italy declined to occupy the Leonine City (OTL Vatican City + the Roman district of Borgho) and offered to let the Pope keep all of it as a remnant Papal State (which, ironically, would’ve given the Pope twice the territory he has now). However, the Pope STILL refused, because he didn’t want to look like he was bending the knee to Italy, nor accepting their takeover of the rest of Rome. The Pope is the Bishop of ROME, after all.

Soooo … what would happen? Does the Pope move to the Comtat and continue the Papal States there? Or does he still stay put in the Vatican and throw a hissy fit? If the latter, what happens to the Comtat and Avignon?

this is a very complicated question, because it addresses two problems, the first is obviously the continued existence of the papal dominions in France even after the revolution which was notoriously highly anti-clerical, and Avignon was one of the first places to suffer forced secularization in the kingdom , in 1791, would therefore require a totally different revolution, which in turn also changes the Congress of Vienna, given that if the papacy succeeds in retaking Avignon then the main German ecclesiastical princes ( Mainz, Cologne and Trier ) will also try to be recognized as well them as legitimate states therefore entitled to their previous lands, if instead at the congress it is decided to give these territories to the pope ( it is not a far-fetched hypothesis, already under Charles V and up to Joseph II it was thought of rewarding the papacy with some territory in Germany, in exchange for his authorization to make a secularization of the minor bishoprics in the HRE, furthermore Bismarck offered Mainz as an alternative seat to Pius IX Otl, but he refused due to how this would heavily influence the Kulturkampf in favor of Prussia ), for the rest I am of the opinion that to be considered such the papacy must reside in Rome, given that historically the difference between an anti-pope and an official one was his ability to control the curia and the eternal city itself, above all because every pontiff has in mind what it means to end up under the control ( apparent or real ) of a foreign power, and it would therefore be their task to avoid the repetition of a similar situation, furthermore, post-1849 Pius had become a strong reactionary and therefore leaving Rome would be the equivalent of decreeing that the church must bend to the temporal, secular and modernist will, which in this era is usually highly anti-clerical, the son of the revolution, in practice it would be seen as the end of the Pope's freedoms in religious matters, as he could be heavily influenced by whoever controlled Rome or Avignon, which is why Otl the Popes considered themselves prisoners in the Vatican ( There are obviously other reasons too, but unfortunately I'm not at home to be able to describe this better )

 

[TheWitheredStriker]

Thanks for the responses so far!

this is a very complicated question, because it addresses two problems, the first is obviously the continued existence of the papal dominions in France even after the revolution which was notoriously highly anti-clerical, and Avignon was one of the first places to suffer forced secularization in the kingdom , in 1791, would therefore require a totally different revolution, which in turn also changes the Congress of Vienna, given that if the papacy succeeds in retaking Avignon then the main German ecclesiastical princes ( Mainz, Cologne and Trier ) will also try to be recognized as well them as legitimate states therefore entitled to their previous lands, if instead at the congress it is decided to give these territories to the pope ( it is not a far-fetched hypothesis, already under Charles V and up to Joseph II it was thought of rewarding the papacy with some territory in Germany, in exchange for his authorization to make a secularization of the minor bishoprics in the HRE, furthermore Bismarck offered Mainz as an alternative seat to Pius IX Otl, but he refused due to how this would heavily influence the Kulturkampf in favor of Prussia ), for the rest I am of the opinion that to be considered such the papacy must reside in Rome, given that historically the difference between an anti-pope and an official one was his ability to control the curia and the eternal city itself, above all because every pontiff has in mind what it means to end up under the control ( apparent or real ) of a foreign power, and it would therefore be their task to avoid the repetition of a similar situation, furthermore, post-1849 Pius had become a strong reactionary and therefore leaving Rome would be the equivalent of decreeing that the church must bend to the temporal, secular and modernist will, which in this era is usually highly anti-clerical, the son of the revolution, in practice it would be seen as the end of the Pope's freedoms in religious matters, as he could be heavily influenced by whoever controlled Rome or Avignon, which is why Otl the Popes considered themselves prisoners in the Vatican ( There are obviously other reasons too, but unfortunately I'm not at home to be able to describe this better )

I was not aware that there were plans to give the Pope land in Germany. Quite interesting! A Papal exclave in Mainz sounds cool, but of course Pius IX would not agree to it.

No worries about not being home. There is no rush! Take your time.

France wants the territory since a couple centuries, which makes this reliant on mass butterfly slaughter.
Anyways, The Pope is a reactionary hothead. I feel he would stay in Italy just out of spite, and feared harassment on the way out (which could well possibly end with in the worst way, either as an incident or an arranged hit).
Any successor would have the option of residing in Avignon though, while claiming they are not welcome in Rome, who they claim to be theirs, anymore; an option rife with schisms and unlikely to be welcome by most, but still an option. The major butterflies come if European politics remain similar to OTL, with invaders maybe deciding to dissolve the Comtat for their ends or the Pope lobbying for Rome as a sovereign entity and possibly being coopted in exchange for some kind of restoration.
EDIT: I forgot, but if a Pope gets there for any amount of time, expect French politics to get extra spicy to a level that would make the Dreyfus Affair a relaxed chat between friends.

The scenario of Pius getting assassinated and a successor Pope deciding to move to Avignon is also quite an interesting setup. What kind of restoration are you thinking of?

 

[Evil Crusader]

The scenario of Pius getting assassinated and a successor Pope deciding to move to Avignon is also quite an interesting setup. What kind of restoration are you thinking of?

As stated, even if the Pope moves to Avignon, there will still be enormous political pressure for His reinstatement at Rome both in France and Italy.
The assassination I see more as a fluke, it would topple the Government under which purview it happens and make the Pope into a martyr, enormously changing the debate. Who and where is the next Pope would be incredibly important.
Anyways, enemies of Italy would be more than happy to give back a fraction of Rome to the Pope in exchange for some revolt against the evil secular government in the context of a major European War, and depending on how isolated Italy ends up, something like the OTL Concordate could eventually be enforced or negotiated to resolve the long-standing issue.

 

[Nuraghe]

Thanks for the responses so far!


I was not aware that there were plans to give the Pope land in Germany. Quite interesting! A Papal exclave in Mainz sounds cool, but of course Pius IX would not agree to it.

No worries about not being home. There is no rush! Take your time.

The scenario of Pius getting assassinated and a successor Pope deciding to move to Avignon is also quite an interesting setup. What kind of restoration are you thinking of?

Don't worry, I can still try to give some answers which, even if they are not as in-depth as I would like, are still good, so let's start from Mainz, surely Pio would give us some serious thought about it, if he had the possibility of having it as his own territory, but we have to understand whether it is independent and its protection is protected by the great powers or is ceded to it by Prussia ( the latter case would be a very poisonous gift, which Pius would immediately refuse ), as regards the possibility of the Pope having territories in Germany ( more precisely in the HRE, most of the time we were talking about in Swabia ), is an ancient idea, which the Habsburgs repeatedly brought out to "bribe" the pontiff in charge to assist them in their projects, in practice it was based on three principles: the first was to strengthen the bond between papacy and the emperor in an anti-Protestant function ( since the Habsburgs usually wanted to give the pope a minor episcopal territory close to the religious front, so as to force Rome to take a greater interest in how to deal with the reform effectively, naturally said territory was also quite close to the archducal territories so that they could easily intervene in his defense... ) the second point instead concerns a greater possibility of influencing papal politics like France / Spain, especially after the loss of the latter by the imperial family, and finally served as an olive branch to calm the Catholics of the empire, during the years of the attempted imperial reform ( i.e. the years from Francis I to Francis II ) where it was expected to expand the imperial power and its influence, using a mediatisation of the minor territories of the HRE ( including ecclesiastical territories ), which in principle saw the major clerical entities annexing the minor ones close to them, or merging them together, while the rest would be divided between the Emperor and the major princes ( Catholics and non-Catholics )

 

[Nuraghe]

this is a very complicated question, because it addresses two problems, the first is obviously the continued existence of the papal dominions in France even after the revolution which was notoriously highly anti-clerical, and Avignon was one of the first places to suffer forced secularization in the kingdom , in 1791, would therefore require a totally different revolution, which in turn also changes the Congress of Vienna, given that if the papacy succeeds in retaking Avignon then the main German ecclesiastical princes ( Mainz, Cologne and Trier ) will also try to be recognized as well them as legitimate states therefore entitled to their previous lands, if instead at the congress it is decided to give these territories to the pope ( it is not a far-fetched hypothesis, already under Charles V and up to Joseph II it was thought of rewarding the papacy with some territory in Germany, in exchange for his authorization to make a secularization of the minor bishoprics in the HRE, furthermore Bismarck offered Mainz as an alternative seat to Pius IX Otl, but he refused due to how this would heavily influence the Kulturkampf in favor of Prussia ), for the rest I am of the opinion that to be considered such the papacy must reside in Rome, given that historically the difference between an anti-pope and an official one was his ability to control the curia and the eternal city itself, above all because every pontiff has in mind what it means to end up under the control ( apparent or real ) of a foreign power, and it would therefore be their task to avoid the repetition of a similar situation, furthermore, post-1849 Pius had become a strong reactionary and therefore leaving Rome would be the equivalent of decreeing that the church must bend to the temporal, secular and modernist will, which in this era is usually highly anti-clerical, the son of the revolution, in practice it would be seen as the end of the Pope's freedoms in religious matters, as he could be heavily influenced by whoever controlled Rome or Avignon, which is why Otl the Popes considered themselves prisoners in the Vatican ( There are obviously other reasons too, but unfortunately I'm not at home to be able to describe this better )

without forgetting that with the papacy in possession of extra territories than Otl, the possibility that the ultramontanism movement both locally and internationally will be slightly stronger, it's a lot, is in some places perhaps more rooted, given the actual presence of a piece of papal territory nearby, this in turn will increase opposition to it, especially in France and the territories of the German Confederation, particularly in the liberal movement / party of the time, which was strongly anti-Catholic and supported by the "Protestant" courts, in particularly in Berlin , the major exponent of this he was the Prince Frederick III, who frowned upon the Catholic church Otl because in the Kulturkampf it was openly aligned in favor of the Polish minority, which was the main target of the maneuver desired by Bismarck, whose ultimate objective was their assimilation, paradoxically the existence of these papal exclaves can help the resistance of the German medium powers who do not want to end up under total Prussian control and will therefore play an alliance of convenience with Rome to keep the Status Quo in the confederation or to modify it slightly in their favor, also finding in this a point in common with Vienna, how this could affect the German unification movement, it's all a very complicated can of worms, but we are certainly unlikely to see a revival of OTL, it is more likely that we will see the various factions looking for a compromise that satisfies everyone but at the same time does not fully satisfy anyone