PIUS VII. (Luigi Barnaba Chiaramonti), pope from 1800 to 1823, the son of Count Scipione Chiaramonti and the deeply religious Countess Ghini, was born at Cesena on Aug. 14, 174o (not 1742). He entered the Benedictine monastery of St. Mary at Cesena, and held various teaching appointments in the colleges of his order at Parma and at Rome. He was created an abbot of his order by his relative Pius VI., who also appointed him bishop of Tivoli in 1782, and raised him to the cardinalate and the see of Imola in 1785. He became pope on March 14, 1800.
His attention was at once directed to the ecclesiastical anarchy of France, and he negotiated the celebrated concordat of 18o1.
(See CONCORDAT.) The importance of this agreement was, how ever, considerably lessened by the "articles organiques" appended to it by the French government on April 8, 1802. In 1804 Na poleon opened negotiations to secure at the pope's hands his formal consecration as emperor. After some hesitation Pius was induced to perform the ceremony at Notre Dame and to extend his visit to Paris for four months; but in return for these favours he was able to obtain from Napoleon merely one or two minor concessions. Napoleon soon began to disregard the Italian con cordat of 1803, and himself decreed the dissolution of the mar riage of his brother Jerome with Miss Patterson of Baltimore. The irritation between France and the Vatican increased so rapidly that on Feb. 2, 1808 Rome was occupied by General Miollis; a month later the provinces of Ancona, Macerata, Fermo and Urbino were united to the kingdom of Italy, and diplomatic relations between Napoleon and Rome were broken off ; finally, by a decree issued from Schonbrunn on May 17, 1809, the em peror united the Papal States to France. Pius retaliated by a bull excommunicating the invaders ; and, to prevent insurrection, Miollis—either on his own responsibility, as Napoleon afterwards asserted, or by order of the latter—employed General Radet to take possession of the pope's person. On July 5 Pius was made prisoner; he was taken to Grenoble, and then to Savona, where he steadfastly refused canonical institution to the bishops nomi nated by Napoleon. In 1812 the aged and sick pontiff was re moved to Fontainebleau, where he was lodged in a suite of regal magnificence to await the return of the emperor from Moscow. When Napoleon arrived, he entered into personal negotiations with the pope, who on Jan. 25, 1813 assented to a concordat so degrading that his conscience found no relief until, on the advice of the cardinal Pacca and Consalvi, he abrogated it (March 24) ; and on the 9th of May he defied the emperor by declaring invalid all the official acts of the new French bishops. Napoleon sent him
back to Savona for safe keeping ; but the course of events in 1814 forced him to liberate the pope and give back the States of the Church. On the 19th of March Pius left Savona, and was received with rejoicing at Rome on May 24. Reaction set in at Rome; the Jesuits were restored; the French legislation, much of which was of great social value, was repealed ; the Index and the Inquisition were revived. On his return from the congress of Vienna Consalvi conducted a more enlightened and highly centralized administration, based largely on the famous Motu proprio of 1816; nevertheless the finances were in a desperate condition. Discontent centred perhaps in the Carbonari, a Liberal secret society condemned by the pope in 1821. Consalvi nego tiated a series of valuable concordats with all the Roman Catholic powers save Austria. In the latter years of Pius's life royalty often came to Rome; the pope was very gracious to exiled kings and showed notable magnanimity toward the family of Napoleon. He attracted many artists to the city, including the greatest sculptors of the time, one of whom, the Protestant Thorwaldsen, prepared the tomb in which repose the remains of the gentle and courageous pontiff, who passed into rest on Aug. 20, 1823. His successor was Leo XII.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.—See Zopffel and Benrath, "Pius VII.," in Herzog Hauck, Realencyklopddie, xv. 451-458 (Leipzig, 1904) (long list of older literature) ; Ilario Rinieri, La Diplomazia pontifica nel secolo XIX. (Rome, 5902), two volumes treating the years 1800—o5, based largely on Vatican sources; I. Rinieri, Napoleone Pio VII. (1804-1813), relazioni storiche su documenti inediti dell' archivio vaticano (Turin, 5906) ; H. Chotard, Le Pape Pie VII. a Savone (Paris, 1887) ; Mary H. Allies, Pius the Seventh (London, 1897), a popular Roman Catholic biography ; Leo Konig, S.J., Pius VII. Die Sdkularisatio-n and das Reichskonkordat (Innsbruck, 1904), based chiefly on Vienna material; H. Welschinger, Le Pape et l'empereur, 1804-1815 (Paris, 1905) ; Louis Madelin, La Rom: de Napolior: la domination francaise a Rome de 1800 a 1814 (Paris, 1906) , an elaborate study L. G. Wickham-Legg, "The Concordats" (Cambridge Modern History, vol. ix. ch. 7, 1906) ; Lady Blennerhassett, "The Papacy and the Catholic Church" (Cam bridge Modern History, vol. x. ch. 5, 5907). Both these last have good bibliographies.