PAPAL MYTHS OF THE MIDDLE AGES.*

To the relationship between Dr. Dollinger and the Vatican Council, whose decrees be has repudiated with such startling effect, we need not here allude more than to remark that the motive of his seces- sion and the key-note of the book before us were identical. His purpose in each case was to prove the fallacy of the arguments on which Papal Infallibility is based, and to lay bare the doctrine which, while acknowledging the fiction of the past, still claims the privileges that have grown out of it.

The main object of Mr. Plummer's translation is "to make one more of Dr. Dollinger's works accessible to that large number of the English public who are debarred from reading them in the original." He has done well in selecting this work, for it is not weighted with too much religious controversy or doctrinal disputation, and contains matter of general interest in this country. It is to the fable of Pope Joan that we think English readers will turn most readily, and yet who of those who sit round the card-table on winter evenings playing the game which immortalises the memory of the Papess have ever considered the problem of her existence? The question concerning her is altogether unlike any of the other historical problems we are wont to hear discussed, because in her case we have no real data from which to start. The mystery which shrouds the famous Masque de Fer is only that of identity, for no one has doubted the fact of his existence ; and so, too, the importance of the Casket Letters hinges merely on their genuineness, for true or spurious, there they are. But in Pope Joan we find nothing

* Fades respecting the Popes of the Middle Agee. By John J. Ign. Von Diglinger. Translated (with Introduction and Appendices) by Alfred Plummer. London: RivIngtons. 1871.

but a myth of monstrous growth, a deliberate invention of the Dominicans and Minorites of the fourteenth century. Her allotted place among the Popes is generally between Leo IV. and Benedict III., in the middle of the ninth century.

Originally she was nameless. Her own name was not discovered until the end of the fourteenth century ; she was then called Agnes, or Gilberta, besides having four or five other names, according to the writer's taste ; but as Pope, she was com- monly called John. Details of her life varied, as might be ex- pected, like her names. She was born at Mayence, and sent by her parents to male teachers to receive instruction in the sciences. With one of her teachers she fell in love ; she left her home with him in male attire, and some say went to Athens, where she made great progress in profane law ; she afterwards journeyed to Rome, surpassed every one in knowledge, and was made Cardinal by Leo IV. On his death, she was elected Pope, on account of her wonderful learning, and after enjoying a quiet reign of rather more than two years and a half gave birth to a child during a solemn procession between the Lateran and the Vatican ; she either died on the spot, or was deposed, or was stoned to death, according to report :—

" Of course, people in general regarded the circumstance as disgrace- ful to the Roman See, and, indeed, to the whole Church. The woman- pope had reigned for two years and a half, had performed a vast number of functions, all of which were now null and void ; and, added to all this, there was the scandal of giving birth to a child in the open street. It was scarcely possible to conceive anything more to the dishonour of the Chair of the Apostle, or, indeed, of the whole of Christendom. What mockery must not this story excite among the Mohammedans ! "

Dr. Dollinger first of all states most positively that nowhere in the Western or Byzantine literature of the four centuries between 850 and 1250 is there the faintest reference to a female pope. Although mention is often found of her in the writings of Marianne Scotus, the most learned man of the age, in the Chronicle of Sigebert of Gemblours, and in the historical works of Otto of Freysingen,

the allusions in each case are clearly interpolated at later periods. Stephen de Bourbon is the first chronicler who, quoting from the con- temporary writings of Jean de Mailly, has really taken up the myth ; this was about 1240-1250, but although it then found its way

into history, it was not for forty or fifty years later that it came into extensive circulation, and then it was chiefly through the Chroni- cle of Martinus Polonus. It has been stated without exaggera- tion that the latter became almost the exclusive historical instructor of the Catholic world, whilst his chronicle was equally prized by all countries ; was translated into all languages, and largely em-

ployed by later writers. From his position at Rome as chaplain and penitentiary to the Popes, and consequent residence at the

Papal Court, and since he followed the Curia wherever it went, his history of the Popes gained an amount of popularity and autho- rity such as no similar writing obtained. Hence the people

accepted the story of Pope Joan, which they found in his history, readily and unsuspectingly, and early in the fifteenth century even her bust was placed in the cathedral at Sienna, along with the busts of the other Popes :—

" Nevertheless Martin himself, as can be proved, knew nothing about Pope Joan, or, at any rate, said nothing about her. Not until several years after his death did attempts begin to be made to insert the myth into his book Each pope and each emperor on the opposite page had as many lines assigned to him as he reigned years, and each page contained fifty lines, that is, embraced half a century. Hence, in the copies which kept to the original arrangement of the author, addi- tions or insertions could only be made in those places where the account of a pops or emperor did not fill all the lines assigned to him, owing to the short period of his reign. But the insertion of a pope had been rendered impossible by Martin himself and all the copyists who kept to the plan of the book, by means of the detailed chronology, according to which every lino had a date, and in the case of each pope and emperor the length of his reign was exactly stated. But for the same reason, Pope Joan also, if she had originally had a place in his book, could not have been effaced, nor have been omitted from the copies which held fast to the arrangement of the original. Popo Joan, therefore, does not occur in the oldest manuscripts of Martinus. She is wanting especially in those which have kept to the exact chronological method of the author.

There are, however, plenty of manuscripts in which her history is written in the margin at the bottom of the sheet, or aa a gloss at the side. It was thence gradually, and one may add very violently, thrust into the text. This was done in various ways."

But for the gradual development of the myth, its general accep- tance, and its final discomfiture by Dr. Dellinger, we must refer our readers to his book. Clement Cyriacus and Marcellinus are also imaginary Popes who were inserted in the Papal roll about the same time as Pope Joan, and they are all shown to have been without existence, yet their abdications of the Papacy were actually quoted as precedents by the adherents of Boniface VIII. and others. In the same way, we see gradually demolished all the circumstantial evidence of the baptism at Rome of the Emperor Constantine by Pope Silvester, and of his cure at the same time from leprosy. There follows an elaborate description of the fabri- cation of the donation of Constantine. The well-known story of Archbishop Hatto, who was devoured by mice (or by rats, as

Southey gives the story in verse) in the tower to which he had fled for refuge, is given as one example of how easily a popular

myth may be created by a circumstance that arrests public attention, and is also unintelligible. Hatto died at the close of the tenth century, but the event of his being devoured is not mentioned until the beginning of the fourteenth, and in all that is historically known of him there is nothing with which

the legend can be connected. A similar tragical event is said to have occurred in the mountains of Bavaria, and another among the myths of early Polish history. In fact, wherever a tower on an island was to be seen the purpose of which could no longer C°. explained, there sprang up a story of blood-thirsty mice.

Probably many of our readers will now learn for the first time

that stories of Papal mythology are so numerous, and even those who are acquainted with the popular incidents clinging to

some amongst them will be unaware of their direct connection with the Roman See and of their wholly fictitious nature ; but everyone will marvel at the cool audacity with which the fabri- cations were devised, at the credulity with which they were accepted, and at the prolonged existence posterity allowed them. It is not possible in a review to point out in a way intelligible to our readers the real merit of Dr. Dellinger's work. The drift of each fable can only be caught by attentive perusal from end to end, for a paragraph skipped will break the chain of evidence, and the reader will be at fault ; every sentence has its part to play in working out the problem of each successive myth, and every page carries conviction with it. We accept the assur- ances the Doctor gives us, satisfied that they are the honest result of long and conscientious research, and that he has left no stones unturned to set at rest the lingering doubts of those who would know the truth.

We owe Mr. Plummer no small thanks for placing this book within our reach. It possesses the unusual merit of reading not like a translation, but of having all the ring of an original work, and the writing is so thoroughly English that one is apt to ignore the authorship of Dr. Dellinger. The introduction, besides con- taining an interesting biographical sketch of the latter, shows a deep insight into and an intimate acquaintance with all the knotty

points of these Papstfabeln. From knowing the German doctor personally, and from having attended in Munich his lectures on

ecclesiastical history, Mr. Plummer was, perhaps, specially fitted to take in hand and introduce to English readers a work like this. We think he will have secured Dr. Dollinger's thanks, in addition to our own, for the accurate, skilful, and intelligent way he has treated his work.

We cannot better conclude our notice than by quoting Mr. Plummer's own remarks on the main features of the book :— "One examines and studies the details of the stories for various reasons, but scarcely in order to test their truth. That question has long since closed. But what it is of importance still to consider is this : —That though these legends have been abandoned, the claims which have been made on the strength of the legends have not been aban- doned. The self-condemnation and self-deposition of Marcellinus are consigned to the regions of fable, but the principle Prima sedes non judicabitur a guoguam is maintained. The grant made to Silvester is allowed to be apocryphal, but the authority and territory which the Popes acquired or retained on the strength of that supposed grant are still either possessed or claimed. It would not be too much to say that the bulk of what is now claimed or reclaimed by the Roman See, in the way of supremacy, infallibility, and temporal dominion, is demanded, either directly or indirectly, in virtue of documents which have been either forged or falsified. The invalidity of the title-deeds has been exposed again and again, but possession (or vehement claim to posses- sion), through a most unhappy prescription, still continues."