on the field of falsehood. So it was again when, at the invitation
of Charles the Fat, Pope Adrian III. came ( 885) to the diet of
Worms in which death prevented him from taking part. The
interview which Pope Adrian II. had with Lothair at Mount
Cassin ( 869) took place likewise at the request of that prince.
The maritime expedition of John VIII. against the Saracens
( 875), in which the Pope gained the brilliant victory of Tircé,
must be placed in a special category.

From the fall of the Carolingian empire to the accession of
Otto, when there was a desire to get rid of the Pope, time was
not given him for flight. He was slain, or sent to prison to
await death. ¹ Stephen VI. was strangled ( 897), John X. was
smothered ( 928), Leo V. and Christopher died in prison ( 904).
In 915 occurred the expedition of John against the Saracens;
in a letter to the archbishop of Cologne the Pope boasts of
having twice charged the enemy.

Under the Ottos ( 962-1002) we observe the succession of
national and of imperial popes who fled one after the other
unless they were killed, mutilated, or exiled. ² John XII. with-
drew to Tivoli at the time when Otto I. deposed him ( 963).
His successor, Benedict V., was sent into exile at Hamburg,
where he died ( 965); Boniface VII., banished by Otto II. in
974, fled to Constantinople and did not return until after the
death of his imperial enemy ( 984); John XVI. was captured by
Otto III., who had his nose and ears cut off, his eyes put out,
and his tongue torn out. It was now the turn of the imperial
popes. Leo VIII. was driven away by John XII. ( 964); John XIII.
was imprisoned by the Romans ( 965); Benedict VI. was strangled
by order of Boniface VII. ( 974); John XIV. also was condemned
to death by the same Pope; Gregory V. was banished from
Rome for more than a year ( 996).

From the end of the reign of the Ottos until that of Henry
III. the only thing to be mentioned here is that Benedict IX.,
who had been driven by the Romans from the Holy See, sold
the pontificate ³ ( 1033-1045). Nor is there more to be said of
the popes of Henry III., except that Leo IX., unfortunate in his
expedition against the Normans, was for nine years their
prisoner at Benevento ⁴ ( 1053). For more than half a century
the popes lived for the most part in peace; and Leo IX., who is

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