Chapter Representing the space of papal government at the time of Lothar I: the claim of fines Romani

Overview & Synopsis

Studying the extent of the physical space over which papal policy was implemented between the late eighth and ninth centuries is extremely complex. The sources are ambiguous and difficult to interpret: the territory over which the popes claimed to exercise their jurisdiction was not necessarily that over which they actually managed to enforce their authority, especially after the fall of the Lombard kingdom; the practices of papal government on their territory are elusive and lacking continuity. Historiography oscillates between an either overplaying or underplaying both the papal political activity in this territory, and the consistency of papal policy. I will deal with the problem of the representation of physical boundaries of papal territory in the biographies of the popes included in the Liber pontificalis during the years of the Emperor Lothar I’s rule. Before doing so, I will dwell on the break represented by 774, the year when the lives of the popes lose their narrative sections and are reduced to a list of reports on building interventions and papal donations for the benefit of Roman churches. From 774 onwards, therefore, the action of the popes is limited to the Roman urban space. I will then deal with the lives of Paschal I (817-824), Sergius II (844-847) and Leo IV (847-855), to show how the authors of the three lives attempted, first covertly and then more openly and clearly, to address the question of how the papal territory outside Rome is actually defined in political terms.