Here is a land that teems with the works of man’s imagination, met with continually in the massed fortresses and embattled monasteries, the Roman playgrounds and places of amusement, the peaceful cloisters and places of worship.
Avignon, the Avenio of the Romans, was a Celtic city (the Sovereign of the Waters) before its conquest by the great empire-makers of the pre-Christian era; but its character was changed out of all recognition by the mediæval inhabitants of the town. It is known to-day as the City of the Popes, and its fame is inseparably connected with the seventy years during which seven of the Popes had their residence within its protecting walls. The “Babylonish Captivity,” as it was called by Petrarch, which lasted from 1305 to 1375, made history not only for Avignon but for the rest of Christendom.
The events which led up to the serious step of breaking the continuity of the Papal residence at the Holy See of Rome are worth recalling. During the latter part of the first millennium of the Christian era the power of the Papacy had assumed alarming sway over the many small States into which Europe had become divided after the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
The Papal Empire that had arisen had inspired the world anew with the ancient terror of the name of Rome. The occupant of St. Peter’s Chair was the maker and unmaker of kings. From the beginning of the eleventh century this power had been growing, to the great satisfaction of Churchmen and the keen chagrin of the laity. The scheming ambition of the Popes knew no bounds, and it culminated in the claim of Boniface VIII. for the absolute supremacy of the Papacy over all temporal authorities. It was just at the close of the thirteenth century that the inevitable conflict came.
Two of the most powerful kings in Europe, Philip the Fair of France and Edward the First of England, began at the same time to lay an arbitrary hand upon the revenues of the Church. The English King resisted the commands of the Pope, who was compelled to give way. Philip was not so fortunate in his quarrel with Rome, which in the first year of the next century came to a head. A legate sent by Boniface to Philip behaved himself so insolently that the French Monarch placed him under arrest. The Pope, enraged at the indignity offered to his representative, issued a series of Bulls to the King and Clergy of France, in one of which he set up the claim that the King of France was subject to Rome in temporal as in spiritual affairs. This was the first time that such a contention had been explicitly put forward in an official document, and Philip at once replied by a rude letter, by publicly burning the Papal Bulls, and by calling together the three great Orders of his Kingdom, the Nobles, Commons, and Clergy. This was the first Convocation in France of the States General, an assembly which four centuries later was to play so important a part in the Great Revolution.
Boniface strained the Papal Authority to the breaking-point, reached at last when one of Philip’s nobles, joined with some of the discontented Colonna in Italy, arrested the Pope himself when on a visit to his native town, Anagni, a few miles out of Rome. Although the townsfolk eventually came to the outraged Pope’s assistance and liberated him, the indignity was more than the choleric Boniface could stand, and he died, some say of temper, others of a broken heart. The reaction against the Papacy had set in, and Benedict XI., successor to Boniface, was neither willing nor able to continue the struggle. Anxious to reinstate the Papacy in the good opinion of France, he rescinded the excommunication of Philip and abandoned all pretensions to temporal power.
His occupancy of the pontifical chair was, however, of short duration. His death brought about a new crisis, for the French and Italian cardinals, met in conclave, could not agree; and for months the election of the successor to the chair was delayed. Eventually the powerful influence of Philip was successful in securing the election of a Frenchman, Bertrand de Goth or d’Agoust, Archbishop of Bordeaux, whom he compelled to assume the title of Clement V. and remove the court to France.
Provence about fifty years before this period had passed to Charles I. of Anjou, who inherited the kingdom through his wife, a daughter of the fourth Raymond Berenger. When their son Charles II. came into his patrimony of Anjou and Provence, with Naples, he united them, and during his reign great prosperity came to the kingdom. But upon his death, in 1305, a dispute arose amongst his son and grandsons, their rival claims being argued at great length in Avignon before Clement V. who was the feudal superior of the Neapolitan kingdom. His decision favoured Robert the son of Charles II., who therefore succeeded to the throne, but afterwards left a troubled inheritance to his granddaughter the unfortunate Joan.
History is conflicting with regard to the character of this Princess, and she has her partisans to-day, in the same way as Mary, Queen of Scots, whose tragic story is very similar.
Joan, or Joanna, reared at Naples in the midst of every luxury and refinement that the age could offer, was in her early years betrothed to her cousin Andrew (a son of Carobert, King of Hungary), who, although brought up along with his wife at the Neapolitan court, inherited the rough tastes and barbarous manners of his native country.
Their union was the foundation of tragedy and civil war, for Andrew soon grew imperious, and the princely couple drifted apart; the husband to assert an independent right to the crown which he only held by virtue of his wife. He was urging Pope Clement VI. to consent to his coronation when he was assassinated, some say at the direct instigation of Joan herself.
The rumours connecting the widow with the crime soon spread, and Louis of Hungary, brother of the murdered man, invaded Naples to seek revenge. Joan, who had taken to herself another husband, fled with him to Provence to take shelter under the Papal See and to raise money and an army for the protection of her kingdom.
The Pope, after a solemn investigation into the circumstances of the murder, acquitted Joan of the charge. Taking advantage of her pressing need, he bargained with her to sell Avignon to him for eighty thousand crowns. This transaction did little credit to Clement, for although he and his successors retained the town thus acquired, the money was never paid—possibly, as is
thought, on the ground that Joan was amply compensated by receiving the Papal absolution for the murder of her husband. Certainly Clement would have no scruples, for his Court was as licentious as it was magnificent. Amidst its regal splendour gay and beautiful women played an important part, the Pope himself not impervious to their influence. The Countess of Turenne, suspected of being one of his mistresses, and as rapacious as she was handsome, unblushingly sold positions and preferments procured by her ascendancy.
Joan’s subsequent matrimonial career, although full of variety (she had in all four husbands), was unproductive of issue; and her presumptive heir, Charles, Duke of Durazzo, offended at her last