428

THE GLORY OF CHRISTENDOM

THE GREAT WESTERN SCHISM
429
until morning, but canvassing proceeded among the electors. Cardinals
d'Aigrefeuille and Malesset asked Tebaldeschi, the senior Italian cardinal, if he
would accept Prignano. He replied that he assuredly would.lo
After Mass in the morning someone in Rome began ringing the tocsin-church
bells sounded rapidly as an alarm-and the Bishop of Marseilles, who had the
difficult task of guarding the conclave, told the cardinals there was real danger of
violence and even killing if they did not elect an Italian. But still, no name of any
cardinal or bishop was included in the demand, only nationality. The cardinals
debated the threat. They could have gone to the famous and formidable fortress
of Castel Sant' Angelo close by, which was strongly guarded by a man they
trusted. They did not do so. The Roman Cardinal Orsini was sent outside to try to
quiet the crowd, without much success. By now it was nine o'clock in the morning.
The cardinals assembled in the chapel and prepared to vote." Cardinal Pedro de
Luna nominated Prignano. "Since God has not given us to be of one mind as to the
choice of one of the members of the sacred college," he said, "I think we should
elect someone from outside. I do not see anyone as worthy as the Archbishop of
Bari. He is a saintly man, known to us all, a man of ripe age and fitting
attainments. I propose him freely and spontaneously. ,12
It was immediately evident that a substantial majority already favored
Prignano. No one opposed him, but Cardinal Orsini did propose delaying the
election and pretending that they had elected a Roman Pope, to appease the
crowd. The others rejected his proposal, and called for the ballot. All voted for
Prignano except Orsini, who abstained. Several cardinals specifically declared
their choice to be free and that Prignano should "be undeniably Pope."13
Orsini then went outside to try to announce the results. In an age long
before microphones, without even a convenient raised platform to speak from,
nobody could hear him; most probably assumed that he had come again to try to
quiet them, and so shouted louder than ever. "You Roman pigs, get away from
here!" he finally snapped in disgust, and went back inside the palace. 14
Archbishop Prignano and six other bishops summoned by Orsini made their way
with some difficulty and danger to the Vatican, but did not join the cardinals, who
were still officially confined. By the dinner hour much of the vocal tumult had finally
died down (even the most leather-lunged Roman must
alois, France et le grand schisme, I, 36-39; Ullmann, Origins of the Great Schism, pp. 16-17, 33-34;
Smith, Great Schism, p. 7.
11
Valois, France et le grand schisme, I, 39-43; Ullmann, Origins of the Great Schism, p.17; Salembier,
Great Schism, p. 37.
12
Salembier, Great Schism, p. 38.
13
Valois, France et le grand schisme, I, 43-47; Ullmann, Origins of the Great Schism, p. 35.
la
Valois, France et le grand schisme, I, 47; Ullmann, Origins of the Great Schism, p.

36.
have felt a need to rest his voice after 24 hours of shouting) and the cardinals
enjoyed a leisurely dinner. Most of them went to the chapel after dinner. In the
chapel, Cardinal Tebaldeschi suddenly proposed taking advantage of this period
of quiet by confirming the election of Archbishop Prignano under less immediately
threatening conditions (perhaps it had already occurred to him that someone
might challenge the validity of the election on grounds of duress). All of the 13
present in the chapel but Cardinal Noellet agreed to do this, and all (including
Noellet) again voted for Prignano except for the abstaining Orsini, though the
three lingering in the dining room never got to vote in this unusual confirmation
ballot. 15
By now rumors had begun to run through the crowd that a Pope had been
elected, but no one knew his identity or nationality. Cardinal Orsini tried again to
announce the election, and this time some tried to listen, but others were still
making too much noise for anyone to hear clearly. Prignano was Archbishop of
Bari in southern Italy, and Orsini began screaming "Bari! Bari!" at the top of his
lungs. Most heard only the first syllable; by a malign coincidence, there was a
French relative of the late Pope Gregory XI named Jean de Bar who was highly
unpopular in Rome, and many thought Orsini was saying "Bar! Bar!" In a fury the
mob now began throwing stones at the windows of the palace and attacking the
doors with picks and axes. There was no effective defending force; the crowd
stormed in. The terrified cardinals begged Tebaldeschi, the Roman senior cardinal
known to everyone, to pose as Pope to satisfy the mob. Tebaldeschi firmly
refused, but the desperate cardinals and their aides, taking advantage of the
physical weakness of his years (he was past eighty), pushed him onto the papal
throne (one of his nephews literally knocking him down into the seat), dropped a
papal cope over his shoulders, and put a papal miter on his head, with
Tebaldeschi crying out over and over that he was not the Pope, that Prignano was
Pope. The crowd called for a pontifical blessing; Tebaldeschi refused it, saying
again that he was not the Pope. Meanwhile the cardinals fled, six of the French
cardinals going to Castel Sant'Angelo, while Prignano locked himself up in a small
out-of-the-way room. Finally those in the crowd nearest to Tebaldeschi began to
listen to him, and passed the word. They had an Italian Pope, but it was not
Tebaldeschi.lb
It might have helped to have written a sign, but there is no indication that
anyone thought of that in the wild vortex of confusion and fear, and in any case
undoubtedly the majority in the mob could not read.
The Spanish Cardinal de Luna, from the land of the Reconquest where men
did not panic easily, seems to have kept his wits and his courage about him all
during that wild day of April 8. That night he calmly wrote a letter to several
1s
Valois, France et le grand schisme, I, 48-51.

"Ibid., I, 51-55; Ullmann, Origins of the Great Schism, pp. 18-21, 36-38, 40-41; Smith, Great Schism, pp. 138-
139; Salembier, Great Schism, pp. 39-41.