Conclave 1667
The conclave of 1667 was convened after the death of Pope Alexander VII and ended with the election of Giulio Rospigliosi as Pope Clement IX. The conclave was dominated by factions loyal to the cardinal nephews of Alexander VII and Urban VIII . It saw the continued existence of the Volante Squadrone , which had arisen in the 1665 conclave . The conclave also saw that Spain and France, the two main Catholic powers at the time, supported Rospigliosi's election as pope. Ultimately, Rospigliosi's election was achieved when the French ambassador bribed Flavio Chigi , Alexander's nephew, to aid Rospigliosi. After the conclave, all parties believed that they had chosen the Pope they wanted.
background
After his election, Alexander VII initially opposed nepotism and refused to appoint a cardinal nepot. Members of the college of cardinals urged him to reconsider the appointment of members of his family to positions of power, and he eventually relented, summoning members of his Chigi family to the papal government and appointing a nephew. Relations between the Papal States and France deteriorated under Alexander's reign . France invaded Avignon in 1664 after a confrontation between France's ambassador to the Holy See and papal troops . The French troops left Avignon only after an apology from Alexander. Cardinal Jules Mazarin , the leader of the French government, continued to urge Alexander to appoint more French cardinals, but he didn't. During his pontificate, Alexander appointed 40 new cardinals, 33 of whom were Italian.
Within the college of cardinals, a faction that was not loyal to any of the Catholic monarchies was called Squadrone Volante . It was written during the conclave of 1665. The name, which translates as "flying squadron", was given to them because of the support of candidates they believed had the interests of the papacy in mind, rather than candidates who were already supported by secular monarchs. Christina of Sweden , who renounced the throne and moved to Rome before converting to Catholicism, served as the group's secular supporter and was particularly close to Cardinal Decio Azzolino .
conclave
When the conclave opened, there were 64 eligible voters in attendance. At the moment of Alexander's death, the quorum was at its maximum of 70 members. By the time the conclave opened on June 2, 1667 , two cardinals had died and four had not yet arrived in Rome. Since the 1605 conclave, the quorum had consistently had 60 or more members in the conclave, and space had become a problem. The cardinals debated whether it was appropriate to hold the conclave in the Vatican as there were concerns in previous conclaves about the crush and death of cardinals, but senior cardinals insisted on staying.
Alexander VII himself appointed 34 of the cardinals who were now present. Ten of them did not accept Flavio Chigi, Alexander's cardinal nepot, as their leader, as his lifestyle seemed inappropriate to them. Sixteen cardinals in attendance owed their appointment to Urban VIII and they all agreed to follow the lead of Antonio Barberini , one of Urban's nephews. The conclave was dominated by parties loyal to the cardinal nephews , and voters who surrendered to different monarchs or who were members of the Volante Squadrone split evenly between the two parties under the leadership of the nephew. Eight voters were loyal to France, six to Spain, and the Squadrone Volante consisted of eleven cardinals.
Giulio Rospigliosi was considered the most promising candidate from the beginning of the conclave. It was not opposed by any of the major factions in the Conclave. At first the French tried to hide their support for Rospigliosi and promoted Scipione Pannocchieschi d'Elci as the new Pope so that the Spaniards could support Rospigliosi, who was on good terms with the Spanish government. However, the Spaniards initially preferred Francesco Barberini , another nephew of Urban VIII.
A second serious candidate at the beginning of the conclave was Girolamo Farnese . Farnese, however , was not acceptable to the Squadrone Volante , who saw Rospigliosi and d'Elci as the only possible options. Flavio Chigi promoted d'Elci as a candidate, but he was viewed as too zealous by some voters.
Election of Clemens' XI.
In the ballot on the morning of June 20, 1667 , Rospigliosi received five votes. He had received a maximum of 10 votes in the previous weeks' votes. Between the morning and evening votes, Charles d'Albert d'Ailly , the French ambassador in Rome, promised Flavio Chigi an income from France, whereupon Chigi agreed to persuade his loyal voters to vote for Rospigliosi. That evening Rospigliosi received 61 votes and became Pope Clement IX. elected. He was the last Pope from Tuscany . At the end of the conclave, both France and Spain believed they had succeeded in getting the Pope they wanted through.
Eligible voters
64 cardinals attended the conclave:
- Giulio Rospigliosi , Cardinal Secretary of State
- Francesco Barberini , Bishop of Ostia and Velletri , Dean of the Holy College
- Marzio Ginetti , Bishop of Porto e Santa Rufina , Subdean of the Holy College
- Antonio Barberini , Bishop of Palestrina
- Giovanni Battista Maria Pallotta , Bishop of Frascati
- Francesco Maria Brancaccio , Bishop of Sabina
- Ulderico Carpegna , Bishop of Albano
- Ernst Adalbert von Harrach , Archbishop of Prague
- Stefano Durazzo
- Giulio Gabrielli
- Virginio Orsini
- Cesare Facchinetti , Bishop of Spoleto
- Girolamo Grimaldi-Cavalleroni , Archbishop of Aix
- Carlo Rosetti , Bishop of Faenza
- Giovanni Stefano Donghi , Bishop of Ferrara
- Niccolò Albergati-Ludovisi
- Federico Sforza
- Benedetto Odescalchi , later Pope Innocent XI.
- Alderano Cibo , Bishop of Jesi
- Lorenzo Raggi
- Jean-François Paul de Gondi
- Luigi Omodei
- Pietro Ottoboni , later Pope Alexander VIII.
- Marcello Santacroce Bishop of Tivoli
- Lorenzo Imperiali
- Giberto Borromeo
- Giovanni Battista Spada
- Francesco Albizzi
- Ottavio Acquaviva d'Aragona the Younger
- Flavio Chigi
- Girolamo Buonvisi , Bishop of Lucca and legate in Ferrara
- Scipione Pannocchieschi d'Elci
- Girolamo Farnese
- Antonio Bichi , administrator of Osimo
- Pietro Vidoni , Bishop of Lodi
- Gregorio Barbarigo , Bishop of Pavia
- Girolamo Boncompagni , Archbishop of Bologna
- Celio Piccolomini
- Carlo Bonelli
- Carlo Caraffa della Spina , legate in Bologna
- Alfonso Litta , Archbishop of Milan
- Neri Corsini
- Paluzzo Paluzzi Altieri degli Albertoni , Prefect of Propaganda Fide
- Cesare Maria Antonio Rasponi , legate in Urbino
- Giannicolò Conti , Bishop of Ancona
- Giacomo Filippo Nini
- Carlo Roberti de 'Vittori
- Giulio Spinola
- Innico Caracciolo , Archbishop of Naples
- Giovanni Delfino , Patriarch of Aquileia
- Rinaldo d'Este
- Paolo Emilio Rondinini , Bishop of Assisi
- Francesco Maidalchini
- Friedrich of Hessen-Darmstadt
- Carlo Barberini
- Carlo Pio di Savoia
- Carlo Gualterio , Bishop of Fermo
- Decio Azzolini
- Odoardo Vecchiarelli , Bishop of Rieti
- Giacomo Franzoni
- Francesco Maria Mancini
- Angelo Celsi
- Paolo Savelli
- Louis de Vendôme
When Pope Alexander VII died on May 22, 1667, the College of Cardinals comprised a total of 70 cardinals. With the beginning of the conclave on June 2, 61 cardinals entered the conclave to elect a new head of the church in the Vatican.
The cardinals appeared late for the conclave:
- Niccolò Albergati-Ludovisi on June 6, 1667
- Giovanni Stefano Donghi on June 10, 1667
- Marcello Santacroce on June 10, 1667
The following four cardinals did not participate in the papal election:
- Pascual de Aragón-Córdoba-Cardona y Fernández de Córdoba
- Vitaliano Visconti
- Guidobald von Thun , Archbishop of Salzburg
- Luigi Guglielmo de Moncada Aragón Luna de Peralta y de la Cerda
Cardinals Pietro Sforza Pallavicino SJ and Volumnio Bandinelli died on June 5th and had not entered the conclave.
The 64 electors present came from the following pontificate:
- 16 cardinals from the pontificate of Pope Urban VIII.
- 20 cardinals from the pontificate of Pope Innocent X and
- 28 cardinals from the pontificate of Pope Alexander VII.
literature
- Frederic J. Baumgartner: Behind Locked Doors. Palgrave Macmillan, 2003, ISBN 0-312-29463-8 .
- FL Carsten: The New Cambridge Modern History. Volume 5: The Ascendancy of France, 1648-88. CUP Archives, 1961, ISBN 978-0-521-04544-5 .
- Ludwig von Pastor , Ernst Graf (Ed.): The History of the Popes. Volume 31, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd. (1940) [1891].