Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 5 (1897).djvu/320

 298 THE DECLINE AND FALL darker ages ^^^ the fable ^^^ of a female pope.^'*^ The bastard son, the grandson, and the great-grandson i*'^"* of Marozia, a rare genealogy, were seated in the chair of St. Peter, and it was at the age of nineteen years that the second of these became the head of the Latin church. His youth and manhood were of a suitable complexion ; and the nations of pilgrims could bear testimony to the charges that were urged against him in a Roman synod, and in the presence of Otho the Great. As John XII. had renounced the dress and decencies of his pro- fession, the .soldier may not perhaps be dishonoured by the wine which he drank, the blood that he spilt, the flames that he kindled, or the licentious pursuits of gaming and hunting. His open simony might be the consequence of distress ; and his blasphemous invocation of Jupiter and Venus, if it be true, could not possibly be serious. But we read with some surprise that the worthy grandson of Marozia lived in public adultery with the matrons of Rome ; that the Lateran palace was turned into a school for prostitution ; and that his rapes of virgins and widows had deterred the female pilgrims from visiting the tomb of St. Peter, lest, in the devout act, they should be violated by his successor. 1^1 The Protestants have dwelt with malicious i''8The advocates for pope Joan produce one hundred and fifty witnesses, or rather echoes, of the xivth, xvth, and xvith centuries. They bear trstimony against themselves and the legend, by multiplying the proof that so curious a story musi have been repeated by writers of every description to whom it was known. On those of the ixth and xth centuries the recent ercnt would have flashed with a double force. Would Photius hare spared such a reproach ? Could Liutprand have missed such scandal ? It is scarcely worth vrhile to discuss the various readings of Martinus Polonus, Sigebert of Gemblours, or even Marianus Scotus ; but a most palpable forgery is the passage of pope Joan, which has been foisted into some Mss. and editions of the Roman Anastnsius. [The legend of Pope Joan has been finally dealt with by DoUinger in his Papbstfaheln des Mittcl- alters, p. i sqq. She has been made the heroine of a clever Greek novel by E. Rhoides, i? TraTrto-ua 'laioii'l'a.] '^'■'■^ As false, it deserves that name; but I would not pronounce it incredible. Suppose a famous French chevalier of our own times to have been born in Ital)', and educated in the church, instead of the army ; her merit or fortune might have raised her to St. Peter's chair ; her amours would have been natural ; her delivery in the streets unlucky, but not improbable. I'CTill the Reformation, the tale was repeated and believed without offence; and Joan's female statue long occupied her place among the popes in the cathedral of Sienna (Pagi, Critica, torn. iii. p. 624-626). She has been annihilated by two learned Protestants, Blondel and Bayle (Dictionnaire Critique, Pai'ESSE, Polon'U.S, BLONnEL) ; but their brethren wi^-re scandalized by this equitable and generous criticism. Spanheim and Lenfant attempt to save this poor engine of controversy ; and even Mosheim condescends to cherish some doubt and suspicion (p. 289). i4na[joii„ XI. was the legitimate, not the bastard, son of Marozia ; and it is not true that her great-grandson was Pope.] i'*i Lateranense palatium . . . prostibulum meretricum. . . . Testis omnium gentium, prosterquam _/eg. praeter] Romanorum, absentia mulierum, qua; sancto-