From Incest to Blasphemy, Meet the Least Saintly Pope in History

Forget about the Borgias, this pope used the papal armies to massacre his family’s enemies, engage in incestuous threesomes, and question Mary’s virginity.

Remember when Pope Benedict XVI abdicated and the media went into a meltdown? You probably heard around then that this wasn’t the first abdication, and that Celestine V had abdicated about 800 years earlier. And then we promptly forgot about all of that whenPope Francis was elected. Because, Francis.

Things could have gone very differently.

When Celestine V abdicated in 1294 he was succeeded by Pope Boniface VIII. Celestine was an 85-year old hermit from Naples. He was originally selected because of his great piety but he was, as Eamon Duffy has written, “saintly but hopeless.” Some thought that electing an “angelic Pope” like Celestine would help free the papacy of corruption. But it was not to be: Celestine was badgered into resigning by his successor. A more savvy diplomat, Boniface’s first move as Pope was to secure his position by having Celestine imprisoned in the Castle of Fumone. Celestine endured 10 miserable months of mistreatment there beforThus began the reign of Boniface VIII, one of history’s least saintly Popes. Born a minor noble in Anagni, Italy, Benedetto Caetani (as he was then known) had a strong dictatorial streak. He was a talented canon lawyer and member of the Curia before being ordained a cardinal in 1291.

Boniface was a fierce believer in Papal supremacy (just not that of his predecessor). He involved himself in continental affairs, getting into diplomatic spats with foreign monarchs like Philip IV of France, when he dared to tax the French clergy. Boniface issued a swift succession of Papal bulls including the notorious Unam Sanctam, in which he effectively claimed all civil and spiritual authority for himself: “We declare, state and define that it is absolutely necessary to salvation for every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff.” This particular teaching was not repudiated until Vatican II.

Francis he was not. And it wasn’t just his lack of humility that earned him his reputation. Boniface famously clashed with other Italian figureheads and engaged in a relentless war against his family’s traditional rivals. In particular, he feuded with the powerful Colonna family. In one instance, Boniface used the Papal armies to raze several Colonna towns to the ground. Among them was Palestrina, a town of 6,000 people, every one of whom was massacred at Boniface’s command. This was reportedly after the town had surrendered having received assurances from Boniface that they would be spared.

In his personal life, though, Boniface was chaste and contrite. Just kidding. Not content with committing one mortal sin at a time, he was known for engaging in threesomes with a married woman and her daughter. If you’re keeping track, that’s three divine laws broken in a single night (adultery, incest, and breaking the vows of celibacy). Which is reprehensible or efficient, depending on your perspective.

D88GCD Bonifacius Viii Prisoner — Pope Bonifacius VIII was arrested on the orders of Philippe IV of France, for somewhat specious reasons. He was released and died a few weeks later.

In the end, though, Boniface got his comeuppance: He died a month after a kidnapping and brutal beating at the hands of his enemies. Some stories of his demise reported that he died in a frenzy, feverishly gnawing off his own hands and beating his brains out. This is the stuff of myth. An accidental exhumation of his tomb in the 17th century, however, revealed that he was both tall and in possession of shapely hands.

It was only after his death that the worst rumors about Boniface began to surface. His old adversary Philip IV of France demanded that he be exhumed and burned as a heretic. Boniface’s successor, Clement V, balked at the idea but nevertheless a council met in 1312 at Vienne. Boniface was acquitted, but the witnesses who met there claimed that Boniface was not just immoral, but also a non-believer. According to some reports he had said that the Eucharist was “just flour and water” and, most shockingly, that Mary was no more a virgin than his own mother and that there was “no more harm in adultery that in rubbing your hands together.” Most of these accusations are likely to have been amassed by Boniface’s French accusers so it’s difficult to know how much credibility to give them. Nevertheless, early editions of the Cambridge Medieval History summarized the situation by saying that he was doctrinally a skeptic and that the moral code held little meaning for him.

In the end, Boniface’s quest for absolute power has earned him the disapproval of his fellow Catholics. In the Inferno, Dante Aligheri places Boniface in the eighth circle of hell, in the pit of the simonists (those who bought and sold church offices). Boniface was not even dead at the time of the Inferno’s composition but in Dante’s imagination the damned welcomed the power-hungry corrupt cleric ahead of his time.