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Stephen (Name of several popes some)

the name of several popes; some authorities reckon 9, and others 10, the discrepancy arising from the omission of a pontiff who died between election and consecration (752). (The table under POPE (q. v.) includes him, hence the numeration there is different.) STEPHEN I., ascended the pontifical chair after Lucius, in 253. He had a difference with St. Cyprian and Firmilian about rebaptizing repentant heretics, which practice this Pope condemned. He died in 257.

STEPHEN II., a native of Rome; elected Pope in 752. Astolphus, King of the Lombards, having menaced the city of Rome, Stephen implored the aid of Emperor of the East; but he being engaged in a war recommended his cause to Pepin, King of the Franks, who marched into Italy and deprived Astolphus of the exarchate of Ravenna and several cities, which he gave to the Pope, thus laying the foun- STEPHEN STEPHEN dation of the temporal sovereignty of troduced Christianty into his kingdom. the Church of Rome. He died in 757.

STEPHEN III., succeeded Paul I. in 768. Throughout his career he was at variance with the Lombards and threatened to excommunicate Charles (afterward Charlemagne) and Carloman, sons of Pepin, if they entered into an alliance with them, or intermarried with the daughters of the Lombard king.

Charles, however, married Hermengarda, daughter of Desiderius, King of the Lombards, but put her away a year afterward. Stephen was succeeded by Adrian I. He died in 772.

STEPHEN IV., succeeded Leo III. in 816, but died in the same year.

STEPHEN V., elected in succession to Adrian III., in 885. He was a learned pontiff and greatly contributed to relieve the people of Rome from the effects of a terrible famine which had desolated the country shortly before his accession. He died in 891.

STEPHEN VI., became Pope in succession to Boniface VI. in 896. He caused the body of Pope Formosus to be disinterred and cast into an ordinary grave, on the plea that the Pope had been excommunicated by John VIII. anterior to his elevation to the tiara. In 898 the partisans of Formosus burst into an insurrection, and having seized Stephen strangled him.

STEPHEN VII., the successor of Leo VI., was elected to the papacy in 929.

There are no reliable records of his pontificate. He died in 931.

STEPHEN VIII., the successor of Leo VII. At the time of his election, 939, Rome was governed by Alberic, son of Marozia, who styled himself "Prince and Senator of all the Romans." The records of his papacy are extremely untrustworthy; but it is stated by one authority that Stephen VIII. was, during a revolt of the Roman populace, rendered a cripple for life. He died in 942.

STEPHEN IX., elected to the papacy in succession to Victor II. in 1057. He had previously filled the office of papal legate at the court of Constantinople. After his elevation, he dispatched legates to Milan to enforce celibacy among the clergy of that church; the disputes on which decree lasted during a quarter of a century. He was a learned and energetic pontiff, but too ambitious of worldly influence. He died in 1058.