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Religious leader · theologian · Writer
Pope of the later Middle Ages. He clashed with King Philip IV of France and strongly asserted the universality of papal power. He is important for considering the rise and decline of the papacy.
View in catalogRome
Work
Unam Sanctam
1302
Law
Map: Natural Earth (PD)
Born into a prominent Italian family, he gained experience in canon law and diplomacy. He rose as an administrative churchman who knew the institutions of the papal court and international politics.
As pope, he asserted superiority over royal power and issued the bull Unam Sanctam. Conflict with the French monarchy, however, brought a crisis of papal authority symbolized by the Affair of Anagni.
During the Affair of Anagni, the pope was briefly seized by forces aligned with France. The event is remembered as a symbol of an age when once-powerful papal authority was pressed by secular monarchy.
Boniface VIII's failure shows how the papal-centered order of the high Middle Ages was shaken by the growth of national monarchies. Through him, one can trace the changing relationship between religious authority and state power on the way to the early modern period.
