The Shocking Medieval Trial of a Dead Pope

Dear reader, allow me to introduce you to perhaps the pettiest man who ever lived.

You think you’re petty? Nope, not even close compared to this guy. Pope Stephen VII certainly did not dig his predecessor, Pope Formosus. So, he ordered others to dig him up from his grave just to put his dead body on trial.

Yeah, he most certainly did not believe in letting sleeping corpses lie. In fact, lying under oath was among the charges Stephen threw at Formosus. And no this is no joke, I’m dead serious. To Pope Stephen, this was a matter of grave importance. All puns intended, no I’m not sorry!

This naturally begs the question...

What did Pope Formosus even do?

Could you believe the answer is politics?! A lot of messy politics.

Formosus was born around 816 in Rome to a noble family. This made it super easy for him to nepotism his way through the church ranks all the way to the position of a bishop. By 864 he became the Bishop of Porto, a job he would keep for 25 years. Somewhere in the middle of that, the Church sent him to Bulgaria to help convert the locals. Bulgarians quickly smashed that like button and became followers of Christianity!

But where was their bishop? Well, they didn’t really have one, unless you counted Formosus which you really shouldn’t because that would be very much against the rules. See, it was against church cannon law for a bishop to hold two dioceses at once, which is why Formosus didn’t do that. He was still officially the Bishop of Porto he just...acted like a bishop of Bulgaria too. Like he exercised the same kind of authority. But he wasn’t their bishop, okay?

Another interesting thing he liked to do was appoint bishops without pope’s approval. And what upstanding citizens those bishops were. Some were accused of simony (aka. paying and accepting bribes for ecclesiastical offices). Some had been moved from one see to another without the proper waiting period or papal dispensation and others barely set foot in their own dioceses. Instead, they spent their time chasing court gossip or pretending they were military generals. Truly, a squad that would make Jesus proud.

But to be fair, none of this was unique to Formosus or his bishop friends. This was just the kind of stuff people were doing in the 9th-century. Calling out Formosus and his pals for corruption back then was like calling out a modern day politician for the same. It’s like, it’s technically news but also… duh?!

Fast forward to 891, and Formosus is elected pope. You would think this is a good thing, but really you did not want to be the pope at this time. Popes were dying left and right and it wasn’t of old age. They were being poisoned, chased out of Rome, imprisoned, or dying “mysteriously” after a short tenure. Why?

The pope was the one who crowned emperors of the Holy Roman Empire. He was the one choosing them. And the empire was torn between different factions that all wanted their guy elected. If their candidate lost, well… suddenly the elected pope might “fall ill” or get “persuaded” to resign.

Between 872 and 965, Rome had about 25 different popes popping (or pope-ing) in and out of the papal office. The chair of Saint Peter might as well have been an electric chair. So, when Formosus took the job, it wasn’t so much “Yay, I’m pope!” as it was “Alright, let’s see how long before they kill me.” It was five years. Which was a lot for that time.

By the time he ascended to the papacy, the imperial throne was contested between the Carolingians in the north (Arnulf of Carinthia) and the Spoletan dukes in central Italy (Guy III, Lambert) and Formosus chose Arnulf. He crowned Arnulf as Holy Roman Emperor in 896, which the Spoletan family didn’t like at all. That same year, Formosus mysteriously died. Probably a stroke or some other illness, of course.

The Corpse Trial

This is where Pope Stephen VII comes in. Well, not exactly, there was another pope in between these two. He didn’t last long though so he’s not important. That’s what she said. Anyway!

Stephen was supported by the Spoletan faction, Formosus’ enemies, so when he became pope, his goal was clear: erase Formosus’ entire legacy. By putting Formosus on trial, Stephen aimed to declare all of his decisions null and void. This meant every bishop ordained by Formosus would lose their status, giving Stephen the power to replace them with his own allies. On top of that, undoing Formosus’ authority would weaken Arnulf’s influence and bolster Stephen’s political faction.

The whole spectacle was a brutal message to anyone thinking of crossing Stephen and his people: mess with us, and you’ll be humiliated, even after death. It was kind of like something mafia would do.

And so, what did the trial actually look like? Well, Pope Stephen VII ordered that Formosus’s decomposed body be propped up on a throne and dressed in papal robes. Very considerate of him! After all, the Bible does say, “Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none.” There was also this poor deacon who was supposed to crouch behind the dead pope and awkwardly answer in his name, like a medieval ventriloquist. Meanwhile, the new pope stood there shouting ridiculous accusations at a pile of fancy dressed bones.

Believe it or not, Stephen found the corpse guilty on all counts! Formosus’ papal vestments were ripped off, three fingers used for blessings were chopped off, and he was dumped in a common grave.

To be fair, Stephen did have a change of heart later on. He realized his actions were wrong and that was no way to treat a former pope. He knew he should have thrown him into the river instead, so that’s exactly what he did. Dug him up from the grave again and threw him into the Tiber.

Reactions to the Cadaver Synod

Oh, I never mentioned that this event is called the Cadaver Synod? Well, that’s embarrassing. It’s called the Cadaver Synod!

So, you know how this was supposed to show Stephen’s enemies that he’s a tough boy they shouldn’t mess with? Well, it had the absolute opposite effect. People weren’t happy about the Cadaver Synod, riots broke out, and Stephen was imprisoned and strangled to death by political opponents. Formosus’s body was fished out of the Tiber and reburied in St. Peter’s Basilica. He was declared innocent by a later pope, and corpse trials were officially forbidden by the Church.

Now I too had a reaction to this, which was “THIS BRO CRAZY”. Like, sure, I get hating your enemies, okay? If I had that kind of power, the world would be a lot emptier place. But a corpse? Really? Why you defiling a corpse, bro?! Politics and personal hatred aside, you have to be seriously unhinged to do this kind of thing.

But what do you think, dear reader? In fact, no, if you disagree that this is crazy, just leave, please.

Euralēthia

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