Pope Stephen VIII
?–942 CE · Rome
Stephen VIII was another pope installed under the dominance of Alberic II, prince of Rome, and his pontificate again unfolded largely in the prince's shadow. His recorded acts are mostly routine, including support for King Louis IV of France and confirmations of ecclesiastical privileges. A later and poorly attested tradition claims he was mutilated during a revolt and died of his injuries, but this story is unreliable and rejected by many historians. His reign illustrates the continued subordination of the papacy to secular Roman power in the mid-tenth century. He died in 942, leaving little independent legacy.
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RomeרומאItaly
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Rome in this era
Between the 8th and 15th centuries Rome was the seat of the popes and capital of the Papal States, which grew from the Frankish king Pepin's grant of 756; Charlemagne was crowned emperor in St Peter's in 800. The city shrank far below its ancient size, and from 1309 to 1377 the popes resided at Avignon before returning to Rome.
About Rome
Rome, on the Tiber in central Italy, grew from an Iron Age settlement into the capital of the Roman Republic and then of an empire that by the 1st century CE ruled the whole Mediterranean. Its Jewish community, attested from the 2nd century BCE, is among the oldest in Europe. Christian tradition holds that the apostles Peter and Paul died there, and the city became the seat of the popes. After the Western Empire ended in 476 it passed to Gothic kings, to Byzantium and then to papal rule as capital of the Papal States, until it became the capital of unified Italy in 1871. Vatican City, independent since 1929, lies within it.
In Rome at the same time
Pope Sergius IV, Pope John XVIII, Pope John XVII, Pope John XV, Pope Marinus II, Pope Leo VII
In the same place & time
Sages whose lives overlapped with Pope Stephen VIII’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.
In the same tradition
Pope Sergius IV, Pope John XVIII, Pope John XVII, Pope John XV, Pope Marinus II, Pope Leo VII
The world in their lifetime
Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with Pope Stephen VIII’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.
Works
No works attributed in the corpus yet.