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On the day Celestine III was buried, Lotario
was elected pope and took the name of Innocent III. He was just thirty-seven years of age, a deacon, not yet a priest. Throughout
his career as Pope, Innocent sought to reassert and extend the plenitudo potestatis (secular power). The throne of the Holy
Roman Empire had become vacant by the death of Henry VI in 1197, and no successor had yet been elected. Innocent took advantage
of the confusion to lessen imperial (German) influence in Italy. His first act was the restoration of the papal power in Rome.
The Prefect of Rome, who reigned over the city as the emperor's representative, swore allegiance to Innocent. Innocent demanded
the restoration to the Church of the Romagna and the March of Ancona using papal troops to bring this about.
(1161-1216)
Innocent III, born Lotario de' Conti di Segni (Gavignano, near Anagni, ca. 1161 – Perugia,
June 16, 1216), was Pope from January 8, 1198 until his death. As Pope, Innocent III represents the height of the medieval
papacy. His papacy asserted an absolute right above the reign of kings.
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| Arms of Pope Innocent III and the House of Conti. |
The pope also made use of
the weakness of King Frederick of Sicily (who was only four years old) to reassert papal power in Sicily. He acknowledged
Frederick as king, only after the surrender of the privileges of the Four Chapters, which William I of Sicily had previously
extorted from Pope Adrian IV. The pope then invested the young Frederick as King of Sicily in November 1198.
Innocent decreed the Fourth Crusade in 1198,
which was intended to recapture the Holy Land. The pope directed his call towards the knights and nobles of Europe rather
than to the kings. He did not want Richard I of England nor Philip II of France, who were still engaged in war with his German
enemies, to participate in the crusade. Innocent's call was generally ignored until 1200, when a crusade was finally organized
in Champagne. The Venetians, however, re-directed the crusade into the sacking of Zara in 1202 and of Constantinople in 1204.
Innocent was not happy with this action, but nonetheless, he accepted the Sack of Constantinople because it brought about
the temporary reunification of the Catholic and Orthodox churches, after the Great Schism of 1054. He did excommunicate the
Venetians he held to responsible.
Innocent also summoned the
Fourth Lateran Council (12th ecumenical council) in November 1215. It decided on another crusade to the Holy Land (the Fifth
Crusade) and issued some seventy reformatory decrees. Among other things, it encouraged creating schools and holding clergy
to a higher standard than the laity.
Innocent III died at Perugia and was buried
in a local cathedral, where his body remained until Pope Leo XIII had it transferred to the Lateran in December 1891. Although
the papal power, over the kings that Innocent III established would be short-lived, he sincerely attempted to turn theological
principles into actual powers. Two of his Latin works are still widely read: De Miseria Humanae Conditionis, a tract on asceticism
that Innocent wrote before becoming Pope, and De Sacro Altaris Mysterio, which is a description and exegesis of the liturgy.
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| Cathars being expelled from Carcassone in 1209. |
Albigensian Crusade
Cathars and Catharism in the Languedoc The Cathars were a religious group who appeared in Europe in the
eleventh century, their origins remain something of a mystery. Records from the Roman Church mention them under various
names and in various places. The Roman Church debated whether they were Christian heretics or Christians at all. In
the Languedoc, famous at the time for its culture, tolerance and liberalism, Catharism took root and gained more adherents
during the twelfth century. By the early thirteenth century it was probably the major religion of the area, supported
by both nobility and commoners. This was too much for the Roman Church, some of whose own priests had become Cathars.
Pope Innocent III called a formal crusade, appointing a series of leaders to head his holy army. This led to forty years
of war against the indigenous population. During this period Languedoc men women and children were massacred; the Counts
of Toulouse and their vassals were dispossessed and their lands annexed to France. The Dominican Order was founded and
the Inquisition established to wipe out the last vestiges of resistance.
Catholic Response
Innocent III made clear to
the German princes by the Decree "Venerabilem" which he addressed to the Duke of Zähringen, in May 1202, in what relationship
he considered the empire to stand with the papacy. This decretal was afterwards embodied in the "Corpus Juris Canonici". It
is found in Baluze, "Registrum Innocentii III super negotio Romani Imperii", no. lxii. The following are the chief points
of the decretal:
- The German princes have the right to elect the
king, who is afterwards to become emperor.
- This right was given them by the Apostolic See
when it transferred the imperial dignity from the Greeks to the Germans in the person of Charlemagne.
- The right to investigate and decide whether
a king thus elected is worthy of the imperial dignity belongs to the pope, whose office it is to anoint, consecrate, and crown
him; otherwise it might happen that the pope would be obliged to anoint, consecrate, and Crown a king who was, excommunicated
a heretic, or a pagan.
- If the pope finds that the king who has been
elected by the princes is unworthy of the imperial dignity, the princes must elect a new king or, if they refuse, the pope
will confer the imperial dignity upon another king; for the Church stands in need of a patron and defender.
- In case of a double election the pope must exhort
the princes to come to an agreement. If after a due interval they have not reached an agreement they must ask the pope to
arbitrate, failing which, he must of his own accord and by virtue of his office decide in favor of one of the claimants. The
pope's decision need not be based on the greater or less legality of either election, but on the qualifications of the claimants.
Many princes accepted Innocent’s exposition
of his theory concerning the relation between the papacy and the empire.
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| The Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople, by Eugène Delacroix, 1840 |
Like many preceding popes,
Innocent had at heart the recovery of the Holy Land, and for this end undertook the Fourth Crusade.
The Venetians had pledged themselves to transport the entire Christian
army and to furnish the fleet with provisions for nine months, for 85,000 marks. When the crusaders were unable to pay the
sum, the Venetians proposed to bear the financial expenses themselves on condition that the crusaders would first assist them
in the conquest of the city of Zara. The crusaders yielded to their demands and the fleet started down the Adriatic in the
October of 1202. Zara had scarcely been reduced when Alexius Comnenus arrived at the camp of the crusaders and pleaded for
their help to replace his father, Isaac Angelus, on the throne of Constantinople from which his cruel brother Alexius had
deposed him. In return he promised to reunite the Greek with the Latin Church, and to add 10,000 soldiers to the ranks of
the crusaders he also promised to contribute money and provisions to the crusade. The Venetians, who saw their own commercial
advantage in the taking of
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| Pedro Berruguete. Saint Dominic de Guzman presiding over an Auto-da-fe against Albigensians (1475). |
Constantinople induced the crusaders to
yield to the prayers of Alexius. They took Constantinople in 1204. Isaac Angelus was restored to his throne but soon replaced
by a usurper. The crusaders took Constantinople a second time on April 12, 1204. After a horrible pillage, Baldwin, was proclaimed
the emperor and the Greek Church was united with the Latin faction. The reunion, as well as the Latin empire in the East,
did not last longer than two generations. When Pope Innocent learned that the Venetians had diverted the crusaders from their
purpose of conquering the Holy Land he expressed his great dissatisfaction. First at their conquest of Zara, and when they
proceeded towards Constantinople he solemnly protested and finally excommunicated the Venetians, who had caused the diversion
of the crusaders from their original purpose. Since, he could not undo what had already been accomplished he did his utmost
to destroy the Greek schism and Latinize the Eastern Empire
Innocent was also a zealous protector of the true Faith and a strenuous opponent of heresy. His chief activity
was turned against the Albigenses who had become so numerous and aggressive that they were no longer satisfied with being
adherents of heretical doctrines, but even endeavored to spread their heresy by force. They were especially numerous in a
few cities of Northern and Southern France. Under the leadership of Simon of Montfort a cruel campaign ensued against the
Albigenses. Despite the protest of Innocent, it soon turned into a war of conquest. The culminating point in the glorious
reign of Innocent was his convocation of the Fourth Lateran Council, which he solemnly opened on November 15, 1215.
It was by far the most important council of the middle ages. Besides deciding on a general crusade to the Holy Land, it issued
seventy reformatory decrees, the first of which was a creed (Firmiter credimus), against the Albigenses and Waldenses, in
which the term "transubstantiation" received its first ecclesiastical sanction.
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