Joëlle Rollo-Koster, an eminent specialist of medieval Avignon and its papacy, has successfully managed to compress the history of the seven Avignon popes in their complex political and religious environment into just over three hundred pages. One of the stars of this study is the city of Avignon itself, which Rollo-Koster brings to vibrant life, especially in chapter five, based almost entirely on her own archival research.
After a very useful overview of previous scholarship, the first three chapters offer a chronological account of the three phases of the Avignon papacy, each section highlighting particular controversies. In “Early Popes,” Rollo-Koster elucidates why Clement V (1305–1314) moved to Avignon after the spectacular conflict between the French King Philip the Fair and Pope Boniface VIII that led to the latter's death in 1303 and the brief reign of Benedict XI. Rome had become a “precarious” (29) place with constant civil strife, which made the special status of Provence, under the control of Naples's Angevin kings, and its proximity to Vienne and its Council, a logical choice for a new papal residence. Clement's pontificate was marked by the persecution of the Templars and, among other issues, attempts to rein in lay religious movements such as the beguines. How a holy woman like Marguerite Porete fits into these schemes is not made clear by Rollo-Koster in a fleeting reference on page 39. John XXII (1316–1334), an elderly, extremely efficient workaholic in Rollo-Koster's lively characterization, had different priorities: the pacification of Italy, the conflict with Louis of Bavaria, and the seemingly endless controversies about Franciscan poverty and the Beatific Vision. In a section entitled “Satanic Beginnings” Rollo-Koster also demonstrates that it was during John XXII's reign that the foundations for the later witch crazes and the Inquisition were laid: “John upgraded magic to a powerful reality as dangerous and unorthodox dogma” (47), motivated in part by a suspected assassination plot of the bishop of Cahors, Hugues Géraud, aimed at the pope. Here, as in many other instances, Rollo-Koster manages to frame more abstract ideas, such as witchcraft or necromancy, by the reality of life in the dangerous fourteenth century. The reign of the last of the “early popes,” Benedict XII (1334–1342), who as Jacques Fournier was the protagonist of Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie's pathbreaking study Montaillou, saw the beginnings of the Hundred Years War and, important for any researcher interested in Avignon, the move of the papal archives to that city (59). Throughout this section Rollo-Koster provides background and frameworks (such as the political ideas of Marsilius of Padua) that keep the Avignon papacy firmly anchored in its political and social reality.
Chapter two (“Papal Monarchy”) covers Clement VI (1342–1352) and Innocent VI (1352–1362). Clement VI was a great administrator and, as Etienne Anheim has shown recently, an extremely cultured humanist (see Clément VI au travail: Lire, écrire, prêcher au XIVe siècle, Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2014). Rollo-Koster provides brief analyses of the major conflicts and crises of his reign (Cola di Rienzo, Joanna of Naples, Milan and Louis of Bavaria, the Hundred Years War, and the Black Death) and emphasizes how the construction of the magnificent papal palace in Avignon reshaped the image of the Avignon papacy. Innocent VI had his eye on restoring peace in the Papal States and sent his legate Albornoz on military missions into Italy. As a result, the idea of returning to Rome grew more acceptable and the next two popes, Urban V (1362–1370) and Gregory XI (1370–1378), both desired this return. Urban returned briefly in 1368 to Rome where he met with the Byzantine emperor John V Palaeologus who sought help against the ever-growing threat from the Turks and promised an end of the East-West schism of the Church in return for military assistance and protection. King Peter I of Lusignan of Cyprus and others not mentioned here (such as the French diplomat and author Philippe de Mézières) also approached the pope and a number of European rulers with projects for a new crusade. Gregory XI, egged on by the holy women Birgitta of Sweden and Catherine of Siena, finally returned to Rome in 1377, but died a year later.
In chapter four Rollo-Koster abandons her chronological approach and takes us deep into the heart of the papal administration. What could be a dry account actually turns out to be extremely engaging. The chapter traces the “growing monetization of the Avignon papacy” (165) through the award of benefices that generated taxes and the levying of huge fees for all sorts of services. The enormous expenses of the papal court are detailed as well as the spy-movie-worthy scenario of the bullatores in charge of sealing documents filled with secret information: they were illiterate and “resided in an undisclosed area” outside the papal palace (166).
Chapter five paints the portrait of the seven parishes of Avignon based on Rollo-Koster's extensive archival work. We learn about migration and immigration, the treatment of the Jewish population, taxes, effects of the plague, the distribution of various professions, executions, hygiene, and fires—all the elements that shaped life in a medieval city. Rollo-Koster's research into the status of single women and especially prostitutes, who were generally not stigmatized and sometimes even owned property, is enlightening.
The last chapter traces the origins and development of the Great Schism (1378–1417). Rollo-Koster disentangles these complicated events and shows, among many other things, how Gallicanism emerged from this conflict (268). Rollo-Koster does not believe that the “common folk” cared about the Schism, an opinion I obviously do not share since I tried to prove the opposite in my recent work. Rollo-Koster's analysis of a small sample of testaments does show that there was a “liturgical democratization” (278), but does not really tell us much about attitudes toward the Great Schism. A brief account of pilgrimages and a quick nod to saintly figures engaged in Schism polemics closes the chapter.
Each chapter is followed by notes and an annotated bibliography appears at the end, but there is no full alphabetical bibliography.
Inevitably in such a complex study some mistakes creep in: on page 43 the emperor Henry VII dies in 1314 while on page 51 he correctly dies in 1313. Innocent VI was still pope in 1350 when King John the Good visited Avignon and therefore he did not meet Innocent's “successor” there (115). The poet Eustache Deschamps is rebaptized Gilles Deschamps on page 261.
All in all, Avignon and its Papacy is an impressive achievement, a lively and accessible study that will undoubtedly become the standard work on the Avignon papacy.
