Was There Really a Female Pope?

according to legend there was a female Pope during the early Middle Ages called Pope Joan supposedly she had disguised herself as a man and had gone unnoticed until she suddenly gave birth during a procession now although modern scholars have generally dismissed the story of Pope Joan as fiction there was in fact a real historical woman on which the legend of a female Pope was likely based in fact this one woman likely had a greater impact on the medieval papacy than a Pope Joan could ever have had that woman was maroosya of Tusculum she was the mother of a pope the lover of a pope the great-aunt of a pope the grandmother of two popes and the ancestor of an additional five more popes today's video is part of project her story a collaboration between over a dozen youtubers on the topic of influential women throughout history and in celebration of Women's History Month 2020 to find the full playlist for Project herstory click on the link at the end of this video or in the description [Music] so you're probably aware of the fact that nowadays popes are chosen through a special process whereby a bunch of cardinals are locked in a room until they can agree on a choice via a series of votes this method has been used for almost a thousand years but prior to that popes were basically just chosen by whichever secular leader held the most power in Rome at the time in the early 10th century that person was account named Theo file act but it's likely that the real power of the day was his wife Theodora she held the rare title of Senate Rick's meaning that she served as a female senator in the city of Rome together they were the parents of Murat Zia and Theodora the second it is these three women but in particular Murat Zia who controlled the papacy for the next several decades for this reason this period in papal history is known as the poor knock receipt which means ruled by prostitutes now these women were not actually prostitutes in the modern sense of the word rather the word was chosen to represent the fact that the papacy was being controlled by a corrupt noble family who prostituted themselves in various ways in order to maintain their hold on power this period is also referred to as the sikh ulam obscura m-- which is latin for the Dark Age because many Catholic historians see this period as being the lowest point in their history now in my opinion this is somewhat unfair and sexist throughout the history of the papacy there are numerous examples of extreme corruption and power grabbing usually perpetrated by men it just so happens that the major players during this period were women and thus they get saddled with a negative label in reality it's hard to say whether these women were actually any worse when it came to their level of corruption or whether they were simply playing the game of medieval politics like everyone else that said let's dive deeper into the family tree we'll start with this guy here Pope Sergius the third just prior to becoming Pope there were two other popes fighting over which one was actually legitimate it's likely that Sergius solved the problem by having both of those popes killed so that he himself could become the Pope in order to strengthen the alliance between church and state the count and Theodora supposedly forced their daughter maroosya who was only 15 at the time to become the mistress of Sergius who was 45 yeah pretty gross a few years later she married her first of her three husbands Alba reek the first Duke of Spoleto together they had four sons the first of which was named John but it's been long rumored that John was actually the product of this illegitimate relationship here one fact that seems to back this up is that John although supposedly the firstborn became a priest meaning that his younger brother was the one who eventually inherited his father's dukedom if John really was the firstborn this likely would not have happened anyway eventually Pope Sergius the third died and we get to shore training popes directly after him but then Theodora basically chose this guy here to be Pope Pope John the tenth he was supposedly one of her many lovers you'll notice that I am saying supposedly a lot in this video that's because we're talking about the Middle Ages and it's often hard to know which sources to trust but either way Pope John the 10th definitely had a strong backing from Theodora but then around the Year 925 several important things happened first both of Maria's parents died as well as her first husband maroosya and Pope John the tenth used this opportunity to make some big power moves the Pope allied himself with a descendant of Charlemagne named Hugh who had recently been named king of Italy and was on track to become the Holy Roman Emperor although the title didn't really exist at the time maroosya in turn married Hugh's half-brother gay who was an enemy of Pope John you see Marusya and ghee didn't like the idea of John becoming the de facto ruler of Rome due to his close relationship with Hugh maroosya felt that as the daughter of these two she should have that role so together the new couple attacked Rome and had Pope John the tenth thrown in the dungeon where he was later smothered with a pillow she then personally appointed the next two popes who both had very short rains before then appointing her son John who became the youngest Pope ever at the age of twenty during this period maroosya was at her peak of power and although she didn't hold the title she was pretty much the queen of Rome never in the history of the Eternal City had a woman held so much power in Rome and correct me if I'm wrong but I believe we could say that never again did a woman rule the city until the year 2016 which is when the current mayor of Rome a woman named Virginia Raji took office but as is often the case those who rise quickly to great heights also often fall quickly D died just four years after being married to Marusya and at that point Marusya was so powerful that his half-brother Hugh the king of Italy felt that it would be wise for him to marry her himself because Hugh was on track to become the Holy Roman Emperor this would mean that Marusya was now on track to become the Holy Roman Empress but alas it would not be so the wedding between Marusya and Hugh took place in the year 932 and here's what happened supposedly Marusya asked her son Alba reek now the Duke of spello to wash Hugh's hands by pouring some water over them whether he was just drunk or whether he did it on purpose we will never know but elder eke missed Hugh's hands and poured the water all over the Kings fancy clothes instead Hugh got mad and slapped Alba reek in the face Albert in turn left the party and marriage to incite a riot in the city that grew so large that the mob was able to enter the castle and officially depose Hugh and Marusya one of the reasons why it was so easy to convince the crowd to turn against Hugh and Marusya was that their marriage went against the laws of the Catholic Church which did not allow a man to marry his brother's widow anyway Hugh managed to escape by sliding down a rope but his bride Marusya was captured by her son and thrown in the dungeon there she lived in obscurity for five years and then died but her impact on the papacy did not die because there are still eight more popes closely related to her to come so let's look at those Murat CEA's son John xi had his short papacy even though he was so young he died at age 24 but as far as I know there was no foul play involved he was followed by Pope Leo the seventh who's not on this family tree but who managed to negotiate a marriage between Murat Xia's son l barek the second now the de facto ruler of Rome and the daughter of his former enemy Hugh that daughter named Alda was from Hugh's previous marriage so the two were not actually related although technically they were step-siblings being that both of their fathers had been married to Marusya that couple ended up having a son named Gregory from whom the house of Tusculum continued however Albury ii also had an illegitimate son with a mistress who was originally named Octavius before his death Albert made the Roman Nobles promise that they would make his son the next pope the nobles made good on that promise and Octavius became Pope in 955 taking the name John the twelfth he was the second descendant of Marusya to sit on the chair of st. Peter and like his uncle John the eleventh he was a very young man when he became Pope probably in his early 20s John the twelve is also closely related to the Pope Joan a legend he is considered to be one of the most immoral Pope's of all time because it is said that he basically turned the papal residence into a brothel he had many mistresses one of whom was named Joan then there's this drawing of him from 1493 where the artist definitely tried to make him look like a woman baby and all strange times anyhow I should point out that Hugh never did become emperor the next person to gain that title was Otto the great and guess who crowned the person who is considered by many historians to be the first true Holy Roman Emperor yep Murat Sia's super corrupt grandson Pope John the 12th but John the 12th died shortly thereafter supposedly during sex and what followed was a power struggle between the Emperor Otto the Great and the Roman nobility over the next few Pope's finally everyone settled on a compromise Pope who became Pope John the 13th he was a descendant of Marat Sia's sister Theodora but also a member of the powerful Crescenta family who would go on to control the papacy for the next few decades during this time we get another one of Murat CEA's grandsons Benedict the seventh achieving the status of pope but it's with this Pope here Benedict the eighth that the house of Tusculum truly regained their hold on the papacy remember Gregory the grandson of Marusya through whom her line continued well two of his sons went on to become popes and they served consecutively the only example of brother popes in papal history they did have a third brother but obviously he couldn't become Pope because he's the one who inherited his father's titles so Pope John the 19th was followed by the next best thing to another brother a nephew and this is where we get one of the strangest Pope's of all according to some sources Benedict the ninth may have been as young as 11 when he became Pope although official sources put him in his early 20s he's also the only Pope to have served in that role on more than one occasion in fact he served three times initially he was kicked out because well he was too young and really had no business being Pope in the first place but then he managed to regain the papacy for a second time but then he kind of got tired of being Pope and decided to sell the papacy to his Godfather the only time in history when it is known that the papacy was bought for a price but guess what he changed his mind again and managed to regain the papacy for a third time at least until Emperor Henry the 3rd intervened and kicked him out for good what he did with the rest of his life is unknown so with these three consecutive popes we get the closest thing to a hereditary papacy then we get anywhere in papal history although when we get to the Renaissance we do get some other important papal dynasties as well such as the board the Medicis and Rivera's I've got a separate video on those families which I'll link to in the description so Benedict the ninth was the last close relative of Marusya to serve as Pope but there are two more descendants worth noting first there was anti Pope Benedict the tenth just a decade later the title anti Pope is used in the Catholic Church in situations where there were more than one pope at the same time basically historians choose who they think was the quote-unquote real Pope and call that person Pope and anyone else anti Pope but the designations can actually change depending on how history gets interpreted at the time though anti-popes were just Pope's with a shaky hold on power as you can see the secular branch of the family continued as well and eventually we get a guy named Peter des columnar he is the founder of the house of Colonna a branch of the house of Tusculum that would go on to become one of the most powerful noble houses in Italy famous for their rivalry with the Orsini's that house provided one Pope at the start of the Renaissance period Pope Martin the fifth but to this day the family remains influential in the Vatican the current head of the Colonna family is a direct descendant of Marusya don mark antonio who holds the official title prints assistant to the papal throne one of two hereditary positions that continue to get passed down from generation to generation so was there a pope Joan during the Middle Ages probably not but it turns out that truth is stranger than fiction because there was a Marusya and her legacy continues to this very day thanks for watching and be sure to click on the project herstory link on-screen at the end of this video or in the description for more videos about influential women in world history [Music] [Music]

Channel: UsefulCharts

Views: 132,119

Rating: 4.7772603 out of 5

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Id: f7E6NSP0rQI

Length: 17min 16sec (1036 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 20 2020