I’m not referring to the multitudes of early popes killed by the Romans, I was wanting to see the effects of a pope being murdered by other Christians. For example, during the 30 years war, the pope could go to Germany and get killed by a group of radical Protestant peasants. Or, a French king kills the Italian pope and puts his own pope in Rome, instead of the Avignon papacy.
WI: A pope killed by other Christians
- Thread starter KaiserWilhelm
- Start date
Or something regarding the Pope disagreeing with an Emperor of the Roman Empire post-Christianization or Arian Germanic tribes killing the Pope during their sacks of Rome?
In the latter case, the dead one is declared an antipope. History is written by the winners.
iMercadier
Banned
Although disputed, some say that Pope Boniface VIII was nearly beaten to death on the orders of King Philip IV, and that his death mere days later was a result of those wounds.
In OTL, Florentine elites were planning to assassinate Clement VII in 1522, so they could install Francesco Soderini as Pope in the place of the Pope.
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Pope Vigilius was imprisoned in Constantinople by Justinian. It wouldn't be hard to have him die there. Wouldn't exactly be an execution but it would essentially be killing a pope. This could actually have huge effects on the development of the church so that we get an earlier great schism, or perhaps the schism of 451 gets healed.
I think there are some examples of the Saeculum Obscurum indeed. Wasn't one of the Tusculani Popes murdered too?
Skallagrim
Banned
He died a full month later, not 'mere days'. This doesn't mean that the violence committed against him can't realistically have been the (or at least a contributing) cause, but it's less clear than it's sometimes presented to be.
It's at least pretty suspicious that both Alexander VI and Cesare suddenly fell ill at the same time.
So popes had been murdered for politically reasons OTL. Maybe ATL a Pope falls victim to an Orthodox army ? Maybe after shism in war with Eastern Roman Empire. Or a Pope angers Ivan the Terrible who sends his personal death squad to Rome.
Technically, this likely happened quite a bit during the Formosian disputes, as the pro and anti-Formosus factions both got pretty murder-happy.
Unless the new pope is, in turn, deposed and murdered, and the first one declared a holy maryr or something similar, and probably a saint soon afterwards.
1527 is the most likely time, I think—just have Clement VII fall into the Hapsburg army’s hands and be killed. What that does to the situation, I don’t know.