#pope formosus

[wtf-fun-factss]

In 897, a pope put the corpse of one of his predecessors on trial. Click to read the full fact.

[bluebellebarrett]

Fun Fact 5

Hey, remember that time that a pope put another pope on trial for heresy? Me neither, because it was the so-called Dark Ages and none of us were alive back then, probably. 

But it did happen. And wait, you may be asking, two popes? How do you have two popes?? Well, when you are the pope and exhume the body of your predecessor in order to put his rotting corpse on trial in a rather underhanded attempt to get a teenaged king put back on the Roman throne, of course.

Probably one of the weirdest things the Catholic Church has ever done, and that’s saying something.

[de-es-ce-ha]

People: screaming at pope Formosus during the synod

Pope Formosus:

[buff-borf-bork]

"they cant arrest you if youre dead"

*Pope Formosus stares at his three missing fingers in ghost jail*

[bforbetterthanyou]

Dead Pope Trial Anon here. I went and found the book I read about it in. It was Pope Formosus.They legit dressed him in the papal vestments and all that jazz. He was found guilty of the charges of “despoiling the cloisters in Rome, and conspiring to destroy the papal see.” They punished him by making all the acts and ordinations he had done null and void and by burying him again in ordinary layman’s clothes.

So like, I guess theoretically, could do the same to anyone really.

This is a level of extra I couldn’t even dream of achieving.

[useleshistory]

Useless Fact #85

In 897, Pope Stephen VI dug up Pope Formosus’ skeleton, put it on trial, found it guilty, had it reburied, dug it up again, and chucked it into the river. The trial is known as Cadaver Synod.

[julieschulerart]

In 897 Pope Stephen VI dug up the body of his predecessor and put it on trial for violating church law. Pope Formosus was found guilty and buried again. Rome turned against Stephen who was later strangled in prison. The trial is known as the Cadaver Synod, Synodus Horrenda, in Latin.

(painting Jean-Paul Laurens, Le Pape Formose et Étienne VII ("Pope Formosus and Stephen VII"), 1870)

[historybizarre]

The Cadaver Synod: Putting a Dead Pope on Trial | JSTOR Daily

Why did Pope Stephen VI go to such great lengths to destroy an enemy who was already dead?

In 897, the Vatican saw one of the most bizarre episodes in history: The corpse of a pope was put on trial by his living successor. Pope Formosus, dead for a few months, was hardly qualified to defend himself in a court of law. Nonetheless, Pope Stephen VI had the body disinterred, dressed in its ecclesiastical robes, and propped up on the papal throne to stand trial. He even appointed a deacon to speak on the corpse’s behalf.