Marozia

Engraving depicting the wedding of Marozia and Hugh of Italy, from Francisco Bertolini, Historia de Roma.

Marozia, born Maria and also known as Mariuccia or Mariozza (c. 890 – 937), was a Roman noblewoman who was the alleged mistress of Pope Sergius III and was given the unprecedented titles senatrix ("senatoress") and patricia of Rome by Pope John X.

Edward Gibbon wrote of her that the "influence of two sister prostitutes, Marozia and Theodora^[1] was founded on their wealth and beauty, their political and amorous intrigues: the most strenuous of their lovers were rewarded with the Roman tiara, and their reign may have suggested to darker ages the fable of a female pope. The bastard son, two grandsons, two great grandsons, and one great great grandson of Marozia—a rare genealogy—were seated in the Chair of St. Peter." Pope John XIII was her nephew, the offspring of her younger sister Theodora. From this description, the term "pornocracy" has become associated with the effective rule in Rome of Theodora and her daughter Marozia through male surrogates.

Early life

Marozia was born about 890. She was the daughter of the Roman consul Theophylact, Count of Tusculum, and of Theodora, the real power in Rome, whom Liutprand of Cremona characterized as a "shameless whore... [who] exercised power on the Roman citizenry like a man."

At the age of fifteen, Marozia became the mistress of Theophylact's cousin Pope Sergius III, whom she knew when he was bishop of Portus. The two had a son, John (the later Pope John XI). That, at least, is the story found in two contemporary sources, the Liber Pontificalis and the Antapodosis sive Res per Europam gestae (958–62), by Liutprand of Cremona (c. 920–72). But a third contemporary source, the annalist Flodoard (c. 894–966), says John XI was brother of Alberic II, the latter being the offspring of Marozia and her husband Alberic I. Hence John too may have been the son of Marozia and Alberic I.

At any rate, Marozia married Alberic I, duke of Spoleto, in 909, and their son Alberic II was born in 911 or 912. By the time Alberic I was killed at Orte in 924, the Roman landowners had won complete victory over the traditional bureaucracy represented by the papal curia. Rome was virtually under secular control, the historic nadir of the papacy.

Guy of Tuscany

In order to counter the influence of Pope John X (whom the hostile chronicler Liutprand of Cremona alleges was another of her lovers), Marozia subsequently married his opponent Guy of Tuscany, who loved his beautiful wife as much as he loved power. Together they attacked Rome, arrested Pope John X in the Lateran, and jailed him in the Castel Sant'Angelo. Either Guy had him smothered with a pillow in 928 or he simply died, perhaps from neglect or ill treatment. Marozia seized power in Rome in a coup d'état. The following popes, Leo VI and Stephen VII, were both her puppets. In 931 she even managed to impose her son as pontiff, under the name of John XI. John was only twenty-one at the time.

Hugh of Arles, and death

When her husband died in 929, Marozia negotiated a marriage with his half-brother Hugh of Arles, who had been elected King of Italy. Hugh was already married, but had that marriage annulled so that Hugh and Marozia could be wed. Alberic II, Marozia's son, led the opposition to the rule of Marozia and Hugh. After deposing them in 932, at the very wedding ceremonies, Alberic II imprisoned his mother until her death. Hugh escaped the city.

Marozia would remain in prison for some 5 years before she died. Marozia may well have had the misfortune of having eloquent detractors: the Liber Pontificalis and the chronicle of Liutprand of Cremona are the main sources for the details of her life. Although given the level of widespread violence and corruption of the period, there was more than likely little to be exaggerated.

Alberic II was in his turn father of Octavian, who became Pope John XII in 955. Popes Benedict VIII, John XIX, Benedict IX, and antipope Benedict X of the House of Tusculani were also Marozia's descendants. By Guy of Tuscany she had a daughter named Berta Theodora, who never married.

Family tree

Theophylact I, Count of Tusculum 864–924

Theodora

Hugh of Italy 887-924-948 (also married Marozia)

Alberic I of Spoleto d. 925

Marozia 890–937

Pope Sergius III 904–911

Alda of Vienne

Alberic II of Spoleto 905–954

David or Deodatus

Pope John XI 931–935

Gregory I, Count of Tusculum

Pope John XII 955–964

Pope Benedict VII 974–983

Pope Benedict VIII Pope 1012–1024

Alberic III, Count of Tusculum d. 1044

Pope John XIX Pope 1024–1032

Peter, Duke of the Romans

Gaius

Octavianus

Pope Benedict IX 1033–1045; 1045; 1047–1048

Sources

• Chamberlin, E. R. (1969). The Bad Popes.
• Williams, George (1998). Papal genealogy, the families and descendants of the popes.
• di Carpegna Falconieri, Tommaso (2008), Marozia, in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, 70, pp. 681–685

Footnotes

1. Here Gibbon (the author of the famous The History of the Decline of the Roman Empire) confused Theodora (the mother of Marozia) with Theodora (the sister of Marozia)