NOW CHILDREN WE’RE GOING TO RECALL THE BRUTAL, CRAZED STORY of what happened to the good ol' Roman Pope Formosus in the year of our Lord 897.
These were years in which Popes mortality was really high —there were eleven pontiffs in ten years, mostly murdered—, and Formosus turned out to be an uncompromising man that challenged the emperor Guido de Spoleto, by declaring Arnulfo de Carintia Holy Roman Emperor instead of Spoleto’s son.
After the violent and never clarified death of Pope Formosus in April 896, Boniface VI was elevated to the pontificate: a priest with a dark past who lasted only 15 days. Boniface VI was followed by Pope Stephen VI, an ally of the Spoletos and the man in charge of executing his maniacal revenge: Stephen VI declared that Formosus had been a heretic and a sinner and ordered his exhumation and trial.
So, after nine months in his grave, the corpse was taken out, dressed in papal ornaments and seated before the ecclesiastical tribunal, being tied to a chair to prevent it from slipping.
“There was a terrible stench emanating from the remains of the corpse. In spite of all this, Formosus was brought before the Court, stripped of its sacral vestments, with the papal miter over his almost skeletonized head where the worms swarmed in the empty basins", according to an eyewitness account.
Eventually, the corpse —always silent— was found guilty and his pontificate, illegitimate; and a group of soldiers dragged him through Rome casting the body into the Tiber River.
“This macabre spectacle turned public opinion in Rome against Stephen VI. Rumors circulated that Formosus' body, after washing up on the banks of the Tiber, had begun to perform miracles. A public uprising led to Stephen VI being deposed and imprisoned. While in prison, in July or August 897, he was strangled.”
These events would become known as The Cadaver Synod; in Latin: Synodus Horrenda.
*Image: Concile cadavérique de 897. Jean Paul Laurens ~ 1870 Musée des Beaux Arts. Nantes • via Bibliothèque Infernale on FB
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