Pope Pius VII
Pope Pius VII was Napoleon's prisoner for five years and outlasted him. Born Barnaba Chiaramonti at Cesena in 1742 into a noble family, he became a Benedictine monk at sixteen, taught theology, and was made Bishop of Tivoli and then of Imola and a cardinal. He was elected in March 1800 at a conclave held in Venice under Austrian protection, because Rome was occupied and his predecessor had died a French prisoner. He negotiated the Concordat of 1801 with Napoleon, which restored Catholic worship in France after the Revolution had abolished it, in exchange for accepting the loss of church lands and state nomination of bishops. Napoleon then published it alongside the Organic Articles, which subordinated the church to the state and which Pius had not agreed to. He travelled to Paris in December 1804 for the coronation, and Napoleon took the crown from the altar and placed it on his own head. Relations broke down over the Continental System and the Papal States, which France annexed in 1809. Pius excommunicated the annexers without naming Napoleon, and was arrested in July 1809, held at Savona and then Fontainebleau, and pressed into signing a new concordat in 1813, which he retracted. He returned to Rome in May 1814 after Napoleon's abdication, and recovered his territories at the Congress of Vienna through Cardinal Consalvi. He then behaved with unusual magnanimity: he offered asylum to Napoleon's mother and relatives, pressed Britain to improve his conditions on St Helena, and sent a chaplain. He restored the Jesuits in 1814, funded museums and excavations, and died in 1823.
- Lived: 1742 CE – 1823 CE
- Nationality: Italian
- Roles: pope, cleric
