Urban II

French pope (1088-1099)

• Born: c. 1042
• Birthplace: Châtillon-sur-Marne, France
• Died: July 29, 1099
• Place of death: Rome (now in Italy)

By practicing a quiet, astute diplomacy, Urban II laid the foundation for papal supremacy within the medieval Church in Europe and lifted the Papacy to the leadership of Western Christendom during the High Middle Ages.

Early Life

Urban II was born Odo in Châtillon-sur-Marne, France. Most scholars place his birth in the year 1042, others as early as 1035. Odo came from a knightly family. His father was Eucher, the lord of Lagery.

From the beginning of his education, Odo was destined to play a role in the reform movement that swept through the Church during the eleventh and twelfth centuries. He began his education for the clergy in the cathedral school at Reims, in northeastern France. There, he studied under Saint Bruno, a canon of the cathedral and master of the school, who later founded the strict Carthusian order of monks.

Odo’s character and administrative talents were recognized early by his superiors at Reims. He rose rapidly through the ranks. He served as canon and around 1055 was appointed archdeacon of the cathedral church. Perhaps following the example of his former teacher, Saint Bruno, Odo sought the more disciplined atmosphere of the monastery. Sometime between 1067 and 1070, he entered the famous monastery of Cluny, just north of Lyon, in central France.

Cluny was the birthplace and incubator of the reform movement. From Saint Hugh, leader of the order during Odo’s tenure at Cluny, he learned the art of diplomacy that was to serve him so well later as one of the three reform popes to come out of Cluny. Again, Odo’s talents were recognized and appreciated. In 1076, he was appointed prior of the monastery. In 1078, Pope Gregory VII, himself a former monk from Cluny, asked Hugh, then the abbot of Cluny, to send some monks to work under him at Rome. Odo was one of those sent in 1079 or 1080.

Gregory VII appointed Odo cardinal-bishop of Ostia. From then until Gregory VII’s death in 1085, Odo served as one of his closest advisers. Although he remained close to the pope, Odo occasionally was sent on important missions as papal legate (1082-1085) to France and Germany. During one mission to Germany, Odo was held prisoner (1083-1084) by Emperor Henry IV , the chief opponent of the reform movement in the Church. So closely were Odo and Gregory VII in agreement on the principles and goals of the reform program that, prior to his death, Gregory VII recommended Odo as his successor.

Life’s Work

On the death of Gregory VII, the cardinals chose as his successor Victor III, also a monk from Cluny. Although Odo opposed Victor III’s election, the new pontiff bore him no malice. Indeed, as Victor III lay dying, he chose Odo as his successor. Victor III’s choice, and that of Gregory VII, was honored by the cardinals when they met on March 12, 1088, at Terracina, south of Rome. There Odo was unanimously elected pope and took the name Urban II.

The circumstances surrounding Urban II’s election exemplified the issues and problems that preoccupied his reign. The cardinals had to meet outside Rome, in Terracina, because Rome was occupied by the antipope Clement III, who enjoyed the support of Henry IV. Indeed, Urban spent most of his reign outside Rome, establishing the legitimacy of his election, upholding the authority of the pope within the reformed Church, and defending the independence of the Church against the claims of the imperial party.

From the beginning of his reign, Urban II affirmed and pursued the reform policies of Gregory VII. He held a council at Melfi in southern Italy in September, 1089. There, he renewed Gregory VII’s decrees against simony, clerical marriage, and lay investiture. He also anathematized both Henry IV and Clement III, an act he repeated several times during his reign. If Urban II agreed in principle with Gregory VII, however, his pursuit of reform was very different.

Urban II was in many ways different from his illustrious predecessor. Contemporary sources describe him as a tall, handsome, bearded man whose speech was eloquent and learned. In his relationships with friend and foe alike, he was friendly, gentle, and always courteous. The fact that he chose to pursue his goals through persuasion rather than direct confrontation did not mean that he was weak. Always uncompromisingly committed to the principles of reform, he cautioned church authorities to exercise reason in their implementation.

As a skillful diplomat, Urban II had few equals. He saw clearly that to maintain the program of reform begun by Gregory VII, it was necessary to win the support of the secular princes. To do so, he chose not to press the exaggerated claims to political sovereignty made by Gregory VII and instead emphasized the spiritual leadership of the Papacy. To combat Henry IV in Germany, Urban II allied himself with Matilda of Canossa, countess of Tuscany. He arranged a marriage (1089) between the forty-three-year-old countess and the seventeen-year-old Welf V, duke of Bavaria, whose father had been deposed by Henry IV. By astute diplomacy, in 1093, Urban II was able to attract Henry IV’s son, Conrad, to the alliance with Matilda and Welf V.

Urban II was rewarded for diplomatic maneuvers. In 1093, he was able to enter Rome, and on Easter, 1094, he sat on the papal throne for the first time. His entry into the Lateran Palace was achieved by “diplomacy.” The governor of the Lateran Palace offered to surrender it in exchange for a bribe supplied by a wealthy abbot. The event signaled the defeat of Henry IV’s ambitions in Italy and, with them, those of Clement III.

The Crusades, 1095-1270
Crusade	Dates	Leaders	Destination
First	1095-1099	Urban II, Bohemond I, Raymond IV	Nicaea, Dorylaeum, Antioch, Jerusalem
Second	1147-1149	Eugenius III, Bernard of Clairvaux, Louis VII, Conrad III	Outremer, Iberian Peninsula, Damascus
Third	1189-1192	Gregory VIII, Richard I, Philip II, Frederick I Barbarossa	Acre, Arsuf
Fourth	1202-1204	Innocent III, Enrico Dandolo	Zara, Constantinople
Fifth	1217-1221	Innocent III, Honorius III, Andrew II, John of Brienne	Damietta in Egypt
Sixth	1227-1230	Honorius III, Frederick II	Sidon, Tyre, Acre, Jerusalem
Seventh*	1248-1254	Louis IX	Damietta and Mansurah in Egypt
Eighth**	1270	Louis IX	Tunis

*Sometimes known as the Eighth Crusade**Sometimes known as the Ninth Crusade

Throughout his struggle with Henry IV, Urban II never ceased in his efforts to reform Church government. His efforts were directed at increased centralization. His goal was a papal monarchy modeled after that of the secular princes. The role of the College of Cardinals, founded in 1059, was transformed. The cardinals henceforth had authority to excommunicate secular and ecclesiastical lords and to decide disputed episcopal elections. As with the king’s council in England and France, the College of Cardinals became the pope’s supreme advisory body, participating in the highest levels of Church government.

As the cardinals became a more integral part of the administrative structure of Church government, political duties distracted them from their traditional religious functions. These were increasingly assigned to chaplains. Thus, Urban II gave birth to the papal chapel, which, like the new role of the College of Cardinals, was modeled after the chapels at the courts of the secular kings.

Similarly, Urban II reorganized papal finances and the papal secretariat. He chose Cluny as the model for the former and appointed a monk from Cluny as the first treasurer, or camerarius. Many scholars believe that Urban II’s creation of the papal treasury (called a camera) was one of his most important innovations in Church government.

Nothing demonstrated Urban II’s success in enhancing the position of the Papacy more than his initiation of the Crusades. His call, at the Council of Clermont in 1095, for a crusade to rescue the Holy Land from the clutches of the Seljuk Turks was one of the key events of the Middle Ages. It was in part a culmination of efforts by Urban II to restore the unity between the Western and Eastern churches fragmented since the schism of 1054.

Soon after his election as pope, Urban II opened negotiations with the Eastern Christians. He met with ambassadors from the Byzantine court at the Council of Melfi in 1089. There, in their presence, he lifted the ban of excommunication against the Emperor Alexius I. Another embassy from Alexius visited Urban II in 1090. It may be assumed that at these and other possible meetings, Alexius’s desire for Western military aid against the Turks and Urban II’s desire for unity between the two churches were discussed.

By March, 1095, Urban II felt secure enough to call the first great council of his reign at Piacenza, north of Rome. Ambassadors from Constantinople were present and may have addressed the assembly. For the first time, Urban II called on the Christian knights of Western Europe to go to the aid of the Eastern Christians. It was at the Council of Clermont in Auvergne, France, in November, 1095, however, that the effectual call went out and the call was heard.

Some thirteen archbishops, two hundred bishops, more than ninety abbots, and thousands of nobles and knights assembled before Urban II at Clermont. It was the moment of triumph not only for Urban II but also for the reformed Church. Standing before the crowd on a specially constructed platform in an open field, Urban II, with all of his eloquence, called on the knighthood of Western Christendom to embark on an armed pilgrimage to Jerusalem. When he finished speaking, the crowd spontaneously broke out with shouts of “God wills it.”

Following Clermont, Urban II continued to preach the Crusade at subsequent synods and councils, while consolidating his control of the Church. A group of Crusaders stopped off at Rome on their way to the Holy Land and drove the antipope, Clement III, from the city. Clement retired to his archbishopric of Ravenna. Jerusalem fell to the first wave of Crusaders on July 15, 1099. Urban II never heard of the victory. He died two weeks later, on July 29, in Rome.

Significance

The Council of Clermont was the crowning achievement of Urban II’s reign. His speech before the assembled ecclesiastical and secular lords has been ranked with the great orations of history. At Clermont, the pope supplanted the Holy Roman Emperor as the leader of Western Christendom. Historians often view the Crusades as Europe’s first imperialistic venture and note that economic greed played a key motivational role. In the context of the High Middle Ages, however, the Crusades were, above all, a religiously motivated pilgrimage. The Crusades brought unity to Western Christendom and elevated the pope to the moral leadership of Europe for the next two centuries.

It may be argued, however, that the Crusades eventually undermined papal leadership in European affairs. Renewed contact between Western Europe and the Levant awakened forces that had been dormant in Europe since the fall of the Roman Empire in the fifth century. The Renaissance of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the scientific revolution of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and the rise of the secular nation-state were all stimulated by the Crusades. Each in its own way contributed to the eventual fragmentation of the Church in the West and the loss of papal leadership in Europe.

Urban II’s greatest achievement lay in his creation of the Papal Curia (papal court). By giving the Church a monarchical form of government, complete with an administrative structure modeled after the courts of the kings of England and France, Urban II placed the Papacy on an equal footing with the secular monarchs. As with the courts of the kings, the papal court was henceforth both a central administration and a court of law. The power and influence of the pope has waxed and waned since Urban II’s reign, but the Papal Curia he founded has only grown stronger.

Bibliography

Barraclough, Geoffrey. The Medieval Papacy. New York: W. W. Norton, 1979. Discusses Urban II’s role as a reform pope. Particularly helpful for understanding his contributions to the construction of the papal monarchy. Emphasizes Urban II’s pontificate as a turning point in the history of the medieval Church.

Bull, Marcus. “The Pilgrimage Origins of the First Crusade.” History Today 47, no. 3 (March, 1997). The author explores Urban II’s speech at Clermont and then traces the Crusades from their start as a Christian pilgrimage to a holy war.

Bury, J. B., ed. Contest and Empire. Vol. 5 in The Cambridge Medieval History/Middle Ages, edited by C. W. Previté-Orton and Z. N. Brooke. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1968. Chapter 2, “Gregory VII and the First Contest Between Empire and Papacy,” discusses the reform movement within the Church and the accompanying clash with imperial interests. Urban II’s role in initiating the First Crusade is examined in chapter 7, “The First Crusade.”

Cowdrey, H. E. J. Popes and Church Reform in the Eleventh Century. Burlington, Vt.: Ashgate/Variorum, 2000. A study on the topic of Church reform and renewal in medieval times.

Krey, August C. The First Crusade: The Accounts of Eye-Witnesses and Participants. Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith, 1958. This source is of particular value not only for its factual content but also for its ability to communicate a sense of participation. Urban II’s role in summoning the First Crusade is presented through the words of those present.

Mourret, Fernand. Period of the Later Middle Ages. Vol. 4 in A History of the Catholic Church. St. Louis, Mo.: B. Herder, 1947. Chapter 6, “From the Death of St. Gregory VII to the Death of Urban II (1085-99),” discusses Urban II’s reign as pope, emphasizing his struggle to reform the Church and defend its independence from imperial control.

Phillips, Jonathan. “Who Were the First Crusaders?” History Today 47, no. 3 (March, 1997). Looks at the history of the First Crusade and Crusaders, including Urban II and his role.

Riley-Smith, Jonathan. The First Crusaders, 1095-1131. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. The story of the First Crusade, including recruitment, preparation, preaching, the holy war, and the return. Includes an appendix listing the Crusaders, illustrations, maps, and index.

Runciman, Steven. The First Crusade and the Foundation of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. Vol. 1 in A History of the Crusades. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985. One of the best histories of the Crusades. Provides an in-depth understanding of the background and course of the First Crusade. In addition to Urban II’s role, the author provides some information about his early life and election to the papacy.

Somerville, Robert, and Stephan Kuttner. Pope Urban II, the Collectio Britannica, and the Council of Melfi (1089). New York: Clarendon Press, 1996. Part II introduces the council, presents its history in the context of canon law, and comments on the papal letters.