The Vacant See and Regime Change in Papal Rome, 1503–1559

Abstract

The Italian polities, both great and small, faced new realities from Charles during the Italian Wars. Invading forces toppled petty regimes, replaced ruling dynasties with their own representatives, and forced surviving potentates to realign themselves to a new diplomatic system that would shape the peninsula’s political destiny for several hundred years. This chapter examines the case of papal Rome through the lenses of the vacant see, the time between the death of popes and the election of their successor. In contrast to many of the Italian polities, the papacy did not suffer from a sudden collapse of its political system during the turmoil of the time, rather it underwent a regular, internal regime change centered on a cycle of the death and election of popes. This cycle signaled the end of one family’s grasp on power, patronage, and policy and the rise of new papal regime with an entirely new set of relatives, officials, and agendas, all of which could drastically alter the tone of the papacy. This chapter argues that both the strengths and weaknesses of the papacy as a polity were rooted in this cycle.