Julius II

Italian pope (r. 1503-1513)

• Born: December 5, 1443
• Birthplace: Albisola, Republic of Genoa (now in Italy)
• Died: February 21, 1513
• Place of death: Rome, Papal States (now in Italy)

Julius II, called Warrior Pope, was the first and only pontiff to command and lead a papal army into battle. His military exploits regained large amounts of territory lost to the Papal States in wars with France and small Italian republics. In addition to his attempts to strengthen church administration and reduce nepotism, he also was a patron to Michelangelo, Raphael, and Donato Bramante.

Early Life

Julius II was born Giuliano della Rovere in the small town of Albisola. When his father’s brother, Francesco della Rovere, became head of the Franciscan order, Giuliano was educated under the direction of the Franciscans; soon after his studies were completed, he was ordained a priest. When his uncle became pope and took the name Sixtus IV in 1471, Giuliano was made a cardinal in the same year. Over the next few years, Cardinal della Rovere held eight bishoprics, controlled many more abbeys and benefices, and assumed the title of archbishop of Avignon.

From 1480 to 1482, della Rovere served as legate to France. In this capacity, he showed great diplomatic skill in reconciling the differences between Louis XI of France and Maximilian I of Austria. He returned to Rome when Sixtus IV died in 1484, and he bribed many cardinals into electing Batista Cibo as Pope Innocent VIII . Innocent was controlled rather easily; indeed, his policies were to a large extent determined and implemented by della Rovere.

Because of his strong influence over Innocent, della Rovere was opposed by Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia; in a short time, the two men became bitter rivals. Their disagreements escalated to such an extent that, when Innocent died in 1492 and Cardinal Borgia was elected Pope Alexander VI , della Rovere was forced to flee to France in order to save his life.

Della Rovere tried to convince King Charles VIII of France that church reforms in Italy could be achieved only with his personal support. In fact, della Rovere was seeking help in removing Alexander from the Papacy. When Charles VIII decided to invade Italy, della Rovere accompanied him and attempted to win his backing for the convocation of a council to depose the pope on the grounds of his having won the election of 1492 through bribery. Unfortunately for della Rovere, Charles negotiated and signed a conciliatory treaty with Alexander in 1495 all della Rovere’s efforts to get rid of his enemy were frustrated.

In 1498, della Rovere was reconciled with Alexander when his diplomatic skills helped to arrange the marriage of Charlotte d’Albret, sister of the king of Navarre, to Cesare Borgia, a relative of the pope. When Borgia attacked the dukedom of Urbino, however, where della Rovere’s nephew stood next in line to succeed the duke, the peace was over. Once again, della Rovere had to flee far from Rome. Only the death of Alexander in August of 1503 made it possible for the cardinal to return to Rome.

Believing that the way was now clear for him to become pope, della Rovere did everything in his power to assure the outcome of the election. Yet the Italian cardinals were divided as to which candidate to support and della Rovere, although he received a majority of the votes, fell two short of the required two-thirds. Realizing that he was not going to be elected to the Papacy, he threw his support to the cardinal of Siena, Francesco Piccolomini, who took the name Pius III. Yet della Rovere knew that the new pope’s age and ill health meant a short tenure in office. When Pius died after only twenty-six days, della Rovere prepared for one last chance to wear the tiara.

Life’s Work

By extensive promises to his opponents, and by resorting to bribery when necessary, della Rovere was unanimously elected pope on November 1, 1503, in the shortest conclave ever recorded, less than twenty-four hours. A proud and egotistical man, he changed two syllables of his given name, Giuliano, to come up with his papal name, Julius II. Extremely confident, impetuous, hot-tempered, and impatient, Julius soon gained the reputation of an activist pope, unable to listen to advice. He insisted on doing everything himself and was almost impossible to consult; when faced with a contrary opinion, he would stop the speaker with a little bell kept near him at all times. Although he was sixty years old at the time of his election to the Papacy and suffering from gout and kidney ailments, his spirit was indefatigable. He was large and had a tight mouth and dark eyes; the word most often used by Italians in describing him was terribilitá, or awesomeness.

Julius immediately began to repair the damage wrought on the Church by Alexander VI. He reorganized papal administration, planned to achieve financial solvency for the Church, promised to eliminate simony, and began to reduce nepotism. He established order in Rome by implementing harsh measures against bandits and hired assassins who had run rampant under Alexander; to serve as a bulwark against any foreign or domestic threat to himself, he hired mercenary Swiss guards as protectors of the Vatican.

Believing that the authority of the Papacy could be enhanced by the exercise of temporal power, Julius implemented a strategy of territorial conquest, expedient diplomacy, and the show of external pomp and glory. Accordingly, his first major decision as supreme pontiff was to recover the territories lost to the Papal States under the administration of and following the death of Alexander.

In the first year of his pontificate, Julius set out to regain the cities that Venice had seized from the Holy See and later occupied. Initially, he used diplomatic measures to isolate and pressure the Venetian republic to release its holdings. Venice did give back some of the land but continued to hold the cities of Rimini and Faenza. Frustrated by Venice’s intransigence, the pope turned his attention to the recovery of Bologna and Perugia, two of the most important cities within the Papal States whose leaders ignored the authority of Rome. Impatient and reckless in his desire to recapture the land, Julius ignored the objections of many cardinals and shocked all Europe when he personally rode at the head of his army to conquer the cities in 1506. Shortly afterward, when the papal fief Ferrara turned against him, the white-bearded pope donned helmet, mail, and sword, and led his troops in an attack through a breach in the fortress wall. During these years of violent disputes, Julius was continually on horseback, encouraging his soldiers, directing their deployment, and making certain that they used the armaments of modern warfare correctly.

Still unable to subdue Venice, Julius sought the help of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I and Louis XII of France. Julius convinced the two men to declare war on the republic and, with the added participation of Spain and Swiss mercenaries, formed the League of Cambrai to execute his plan. Julius also issued a bull of excommunication and interdict for the entire population of the city. When the Venetians were finally defeated at the Battle of Agnadello in May of 1509, one of the bloodiest conflicts in the history of warfare, the pope’s troops reclaimed Rimini, Faenza, and other territories previously held by the republic.

Only one year later, Julius received a formal confirmation of ecclesiastical rights and authority in the Venetian territory; with this reconciliation, he lifted the ban of excommunication. Yet neither Louis XII nor Maximilian I was ready to make peace and leave Italy; the expansion of their empires now dominated their strategy. Julius quickly recognized that there could be no consolidation of the Papal States as long as the French and the emperor remained in Italy. Convinced of the growing danger that foreign troops in Italy now posed, Julius made a complete about-face and formed an alliance in 1511 with Venice and Spain, along with Swiss mercenaries, against France. This new combination was called the Holy League, and Julius’s new battle cry was, “Out with the barbarians!”

King Louis XII’s resentment and animosity ran so deep as to label the war against himself illegal and to convene, with the support of Emperor Maximilian and prominent French cardinals, a synod at Tours intended to depose Julius from the Papacy; also in 1511, at the instigation of the French king, the rebel cardinals established their own antipapal council at Pisa. At the time, Julius was again waging war in person, on this occasion against the duke of Ferrara, who supported the French. When he received news of the attempts to remove him from office, however, the pope reacted swiftly: He excommunicated Louis and the rebellious cardinals, convinced England to join the Holy League, and convened the Fifth Lateran Council in 1512 to oppose the schismatic meeting at Pisa and reassert his own papal authority.

After a number of setbacks, Julius and the Holy League finally defeated the French at the Battle of Ravenna and drove them across the Alps. With a few concessions to Maximilian, the pope’s campaign to oust foreign troops from Italy came to a successful conclusion. Yet, even though Julius had regained large tracts of land for the Papal States, the nature of Italian politics and diplomacy frustrated him in providing definite and long-lasting resolutions to many territorial problems.

Weary with war and in ill health, Julius turned his attention to the Lateran Council and church reform. Initially, the council was preoccupied with problems surrounding the French presence in Italy and with the illegitimate council at Pisa. With the defeat of the French and the dissolution of the assembly at Pisa, Julius pushed for needed reforms and the Lateran council responded. One of the most important of Julius’s papal bulls confirmed by the council voided any papal election tainted with simony; any offender would suffer the loss of his office and endure large financial penalties. The council also confirmed Julius’s renewal of a bull by Pius II, which prohibited switching an ecclesiastical appeal from a pope to a council.

One of Julius’s last acts as pope, and one of the most far-reaching, was to grant a dispensation to Prince Henry of England, later King Henry VIII, enabling him to marry Catherine of Aragon. Julius II died on February 21, 1513, in Rome, but the Fifth Lateran Council he had convened remained in session for another four years.

Significance

The goal of consolidating the Papal States, Julius II believed, could be attained only by keeping France and the Holy Roman Empire out of Italy. This strategy was achieved in three stages: the regaining of lost territories, the expelling of all so-called foreigners from the Italian peninsula, and the assuring of papal authority in Rome and throughout the Papal States. For these reasons, Julius is regarded by many historians as one of the earliest and most important proponents of Italian unification.

Yet because the great powers returned to plague Italian politics after the pope’s death, it is arguable that Julius’s more significant and lasting contribution to the Papacy involved his patronage of the arts. He beautified Rome and initiated a large amount of new construction, including new and rebuilt churches, such as Santa Maria del Popolo and Santa Maria della Pace, and he helped establish the Vatican Library. He commissioned Raphael to paint new frescoes for the papal apartments. Michelangelo, against his will, was browbeaten by the pope into painting the ceiling for the Sistine Chapel ; working alone on a scaffold for almost four years, Michelangelo allowed no one but Julius to view his work.

Donato Bramante was one of the pope’s favorite artists; Julius assigned Bramante the task of designing and building the courts of the Belvedere, where he started a collection of ancient sculpture. The monument to Julius’s papacy was also given to Bramante to execute the demolition of the old Basilica of St. Peter’s and the construction of a new one. The cost of replacing the older building with a grander edifice significantly exceeded existing papal revenues and led Julius to implement a practice of dire consequence, the public sale of indulgences in Papal States. When the next pope extended the practice to Germany, it precipitated a revolt by a disillusioned and angry young cleric named Martin Luther.

Bibliography

Beck, James H. Three Worlds of Michelangelo. New York: W. W. Norton, 1999. One of these three interconnected studies of Michelangelo is an analysis of his relationship to Julius II. Includes illustrations, bibliographic references, index.

Chambers, D. S. Cardinal Bainbridge in the Court of Rome, 1509 to 1514. London: Methuen, 1965. An account of one cardinal’s tenure in Rome and his eyewitness observations of the persons and events surrounding the Papacy during Julius’s reign. Particularly good in relating the machinations involved in ecclesiastical politics.

Erasmus, Desiderius. Julius Exclusus. Translated by Paul Pascal. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1968. This work was completed after the pope’s death. Julius is characterized as the embodiment of war and all its accompanying evils. An extremely hostile polemic against Julius. Not until the twentieth century was Erasmus’s authorship verified.

Gilbert, Felix. The Pope, His Banker, and Venice. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980. A detailed examination of Julius’s involvement in the League of Cambrai and his war against the republic of Venice. Stresses the financial arrangements made by both the pope and the Venetian republic to carry out the extended conflict. An excellent insight into the diplomatic and financial policies at work in the Papacy. Notes at the end of the book shed light on some of the more elusive historical problems during Julius’s pontificate.

O’Malley, John W. “Fulfillment of the Christian Golden Age Under Pope Julius II: Text of a Discourse of Giles of Veterbo, 1507.” Traditio 25 (1969): 265-338. A contemporary interpretation of Julius’s policy that temporal power gives authority and prestige to the Church. Focuses on the interaction between secular and spiritual pursuits in war, diplomacy, and art.

Shaw, Christine. Julius II: The Warrior Pope. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1996. Primarily a very useful political history of Julius’s tenure as pope, this volume also contains a chapter on his patronage of the arts, but it is weak on theological analysis. Includes photographic plates, illustrations, bibliographic references, and index.

Stinger, Charles L. The Renaissance in Rome. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1998. Julius figures prominently in this study of the resurgence of Rome’s cultural, religious, and political importance in the Renaissance. Includes maps, illustrations, bibliographic references, and index.

Tuchman, Barbara. The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1984. A general overview of how the late Renaissance popes set the stage for Martin Luther’s Reformation movement. More specifically, a character study of Julius II that raises questions about the propriety of his decision to lead an army into battle.