Pope Julius II

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Pope Julius II : biography

5 December 1443 – 21 February 1513

Pope Julius II ( ; 5 December 1443 – 21 February 1513), nicknamed "The Fearsome Pope" (Il Papa Terribile) and "The Warrior Pope" (Il Papa Guerriero),Luminarium: Pope Julius II born Giuliano della Rovere, was the head of the Catholic Church from 1 November 1503 to his death in 1513. His papacy was marked by an active foreign policy, ambitious building projects, and patronage for the arts—he commissioned the destruction and rebuilding of St. Peter’s Basilica, plus Michelangelo’s decoration of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

Papacy

Giuliano Della Rovere thenceforth took the name of his fourth century predecessor, Julius I. He was pope for ten years, from 1503 to 1513. From the beginning, Julius II set himself with a courage and determination rarely equaled, to rid himself of the various powers under which his temporal authority was almost overwhelmed. By a series of complicated stratagems he first succeeded in rendering it impossible for the Borgias to retain their power over the Papal States. Indeed, on the day of his election, he declared: "I will not live in the same rooms as the Borgias lived. He [Alexander VI] desecrated the Holy Church as none before. He usurped the papal power by the devil’s aid, and I forbid under the pain of excommunication anyone to speak or think of Borgia again. His name and memory must be forgotten. It must be crossed out of every document ad memorial. His reign must be obliterated. All paintings made of the Borgias or for them must be covered over with black crepe. All the tombs of the Borgias must be opened and their bodies sent back to where they belong – to Spain." The Borgias’ apartments remained sealed until the 19th Century.

Julius II then used his influence to reconcile the two powerful Roman families of Orsini and Colonna, and, by decrees made in their interest, he also attached to himself the remainder of the Roman nobility.

Being thus secure in Rome and the surrounding country, he next set himself to oust the Republic of Venice from Faenza, Rimini, and the other towns and fortresses of Italy which it occupied after the death of Pope Alexander. In 1504, finding it impossible to succeed with the Doge of Venice by remonstrance, he brought about a union of the conflicting interests of France and the Holy Roman Empire, and sacrificed temporarily to some extent the independence of Italy to conclude with them an offensive and defensive alliance against Venice. The combination was, however, at first little more than nominal, and was not immediately effective in compelling the Venetians to deliver up more than a few unimportant places in the Romagna. But, by a brilliant campaign in 1506, Julius succeeded in freeing Perugia and Bologna from their despots (Giampolo Baglioni and Giovanni II Bentivoglio, respectively), and raised himself to such a height of influence as to render his friendship of prime importance both to Louis XII of France and the Holy Roman Emperor.

In December 1503, Julius issued a dispensation allowing Henry VIII to marry Catherine of Aragon who had previously been briefly married to Henry’s brother Prince Arthur Tudor who had died some years before. Katharine maintained she had remained a virgin for the six months of her first marriage, allowing Julius to issue the dispensation, as church law would have forbidden the union if Katherine had admitted to sleeping with Arthur. Years later, when Henry was in love with Anne Boleyn and seeking to replace Katharine as his Queen, Henry would cite that the union had been consummated, and that the dispensation should never have been issued. The issue of whether Katharine and Arthur’s marriage had been consummated is a question still puzzled over by historians to this day.

In 1506 he officially founded the Swiss Guard to provide a constant corps of soldiers to protect the Pope.

As part of the Renaissance programme of reestablishing the glory of antiquity for the Christian capital, Rome, Julius II took considerable effort to present himself as a sort of emperor-pope, capable of leading a Latin-Christian empire. On Palm Sunday, 1507, "Julius II entered Rome . . . both as a second Julius Caesar, heir to the majesty of Rome’s imperial glory, and in the likeness of Christ, whose vicar the pope was, and who in that capacity governed the universal Roman Church."Stinger, Charles M. The Renaissance in Rome (Indiana University Press, 1985). Julius, who modelled himself after his namesake Caesar, would personally lead his army across the Italian peninsula under the imperial war-cry, "Drive out the barbarians."Adams, Robert M., "Introduction," The Prince Niccolo Machiavelli (Norton, 1992), 72, n3. Despite the imperial rhetoric, Julius’ campaigns were highly local.