PIUS XII (1876- ) was elected pope on his 63rd day, March 2, 1939, and was crowned on March 12. He was born in the Palazzo Pediconi, via degli Orsini, in Rome. The second of the four children of Filippo Pacelli, he was given the baptismal name of Eugenio. His family was noted for its traditional loyalty to the Vatican. Filippo, his father, was dean of the Consistorial Advocates of the Vatican, and was a municipal councillor of Rome.
His grandfather, Marcantonio, was under-secretary of the Interior, Papal States, from 1851 till the absorption of the Papal terri tory by Italy in 187o. His great-grandfather was a minister of finance under Gregory XVI. Donna Virginia Graziosi, his mother, was descended from a noble family of Acquapendente, near Viterbo, equally well known as the Pacelli family for its closeness to and service of the Vatican.
Eugenio Pacelli attended the State primary schools of Rome and finished his secondary studies, with honours, at the famous Vis conti Institute. Instead of following the legal tradition of his family, as he had early intended, he decided to enter the priest hood. Since his health, at that time frail, did not permit him to live the trying routine of the seminary, he was permitted to attend the courses of philosophy and theology as a day student at the Capranica seminary, the Gregorian university, and the Pontifi cal Institute of the Apollinare. He was ordained priest on April 2, 1899. For two years more he engaged in post-graduate studies in theology, specializing in civil and canon law.
Because of his brilliant record as an ecclesiastical student he was offered, in 1901, occupation in the papal secretariate of State, first as apprentice (apprendista), and then as a minor official (minutante). His immediate superior was Msgr. Giacomo della Chiesa (Benedict XV), Cardinal Rampolla being then secretary of State and Leo XIII being pope. During these same early years, he devoted his energies to the care of souls, delivering lectures and conferences, conducting spiritual retreats, acting as a chap lain to religious communities. He was also attached to the faculty
of the Apollinare as professor of canon law, as well as to that of the Academy of Noble Ecclesiastics, as professor of diplomacy and international law.
In 1904, the then Archbishop Gasparri was appointed by Pius X to undertake the momentous task of the codification of canon law, a work that was finally issued in 1917. Young Father Pacelli was drafted as an assistant and, in due time, became the valued co worker of Gasparri, who persuaded him, about 1909, to relinquish his professorial duties in favour of his work in the secretariate of State. He was attached to the Department of Extraordinary Af fairs, that section of the secretariate which prepares all matters concerning civil law, international law, concordats, etc., for the Sacred Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs. Under Cardinal Merry del Val and Pius X, he was named under secretary of the department in 1912, and a short time later pro secretary. In 1914, when Cardinal Gasparri became secretary of State, under Benedict XV, Msgr. Pacelli was appointed his succes sor as secretary of the Department of Extraordinary Affairs.
When the World War convulsed Europe in 1914, Msgr. Pacelli drew up, at the direction of Cardinal Gasparri, a series of notes to various Governments for the exchange and repatriation of prison ers of war. He actively engaged, also, in spiritual ministrations to the German, Austrian, and Italian soldiers. In 1917, the post of apostolic nuncio at Munich was vacant. This nunciature offered the only diplomatic contact between the German Empire and the Holy See. No one more competent than Msgr. Pacelli could have been found for this most delicate and vastly important diplomatic mission. Accordingly, on April 20, Benedict XV designated him as apostolic nuncio to Bavaria and, three days later, raised him to the episcopacy, as titular archbishop of Sardes. The pope him self consecrated him on May 13, in the Sistine Chapel.