Tusculan Papacy

The Tusculan Papacy was a period of papal history from 1012 to 1048 where three successive Counts of Tusculum installed themselves as pope.

Theophylact I, Count of Tusculum, his wife Theodora, and daughter Marozia held great sway over the appointment of popes from 904 to 964. The lovers of Theodora and Marozia, as well as the son and grandson of Marozia rose to the papacy during this period. However, a Count of Tusculum had not yet attempted to appoint himself as pope until 1012. Their rivals, the Crescentii had taken over the papacy from 974 to 1012.

According to Cushing, "in many ways, increasing respect for papal authority from the mid-tenth century to mid-eleventh centuries can be best viewed through the spectrum of two Roman families: the Crescentians and the Tusculans, whose control of the papacy would have important ramifications for both the control and direction of reform." Both the Crescentii and the Counts of Tusculum were descended from Theophylact I, the former papal vestararius. The Crescentii had cooperated with German empress Theophanu and Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor, who resided in Rome from 999 to 1001.

The Tusculans did not expropriate church property to increase the already substantial holdings of their family; in fact, they appear to have expended their own resources to increase the power of the papacy. According to Luscombe and Riley-Smith, "in contrast to the Crescentians, who had largely relied on the entrenchment of their own dynasty and their supporters in the duchy of Rome as secular magnates and landowners - often at the expense of the temporal power of the Roman church - the Tusculans used their secular power and successes to shore up the standing of the papacy among the Roman nobility. The position of Patrician, so important to Crescentian rule, remained vacant."

Abbot Odilo of Cluny flourished during this period receiving support form Benedict VII and John XIX for monastic immunity. The power of the Tusculan popes derived both from their assertions of papal supremacy and from their ability to balance power between the competing families of Rome.

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