Due to a unique set of circumstances at the beginning of the 16th century, a teenage monarch inherited much of Europe, ...

Downloads of the 2024 film have surged since the death of Pope Francis—but in the 16th and 17th century, it was etchings that ...

Conclave,” the movie, may have introduced movie-goers to the spectacular ritual and drama of a modern conclave, but the ...

The papal election started out with a once-a-day meeting at the Episcopal Palace in Viterbo, as tradition dictated that the ...

It was the mounting rage of citizens in Viterbo, a small town north of Rome, that ended the longest papal election in the ...

The longest ever took place in the 13th century, and lasted for 1,006 days as Cardinals struggled to pick the successor of Pope Clement IV ... who supported the Holy Roman Empire against each ...

Its power was such that during the controversy over lay investiture (the king appointing bishops) in the early 11th century, Pope Gregory VII excommunicated Henry IV and stripped him of his royal ...

Shortly afterwards in December 1154, Pope Anastasius IV died. At that time ... He restored Papal authority over the city of Rome, and clashed with the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa over ...

Prior to that, the pope, officially known as the Bishop of Rome, was most likely elected by local clergy and churchgoers, and often under the influence of the Roman emperors and then Holy Roman ...