URBAN VI. (Bartolommeo Prignano), pope from April 8, 1378, to Oct. 15, 1389, was born at Naples in 1318. He was made bishop of Acerenza in 1364, and in 1377 was translated to the archiepiscopal see of Bari and placed in charge of the papal chancery. On the death of Gregory XI., who had finally returned to Rome from Avignon, he was elected pope. Urban VI. turned his attention at once to the reformation of the higher clergy, and, in spite of the warnings of Catherine of Siena, so angered the cardinals by his harsh and ill-tempered measures that they assem bled at Anagni in July 1378, and revoked his election, in which they declared they had acted under fear of violence. On Sept. 20, they elected at Fondi the Cardinal Robert of Geneva, who called himself Clement VII. and took up his residence at Avignon. Urban, on the other hand, remained at Rome, where he appointed twenty-six new cardinals and excommunicated Clement and his adherents. Thus began the Great Schism which divided the Western Church for about fifty years. Urban deposed Joanna of Naples (April 21, 138o) for adhering to France and Savoy in support of the antipope, and gave her kingdom to Charles of Durazzo. Charles was crowned at Rome on June 1, 1381, but three years later quarrelled with the pope and shut him up in Nocera. Urban escaped to Genoa, where he put several of his
cardinals to death for suspected disloyalty. On the death of Charles he set out with an army apparently to seize Naples for his nephew. To raise funds he proclaimed, by bull of April 1I, 1389, a jubilee for every thirty-three years, but before the celebration could be held he died of injuries caused by a fall from his mule.
The chief sources for the life of Urban VI. are in Baluzius, Vitae Pap. Avenion. (Paris, 1693) ; Theoderici de Nyem De schismate Libri tres, ed. by G. Erler (Leipzig, 2890) ; Sauerlande, "Actenstiicke zur Gesch. des Papstes Urban VI. " in Hist. Jahrbuch der Gorres-Gesell schaft, xiv. (1893) ; "Acta Urbani VI. et Bonifatii IX.," ed. C. Krofta, in Monumenta vaticana res gesta,s Bohemicas iltustrantia (Prague, 1905) ; Der Liber Cancellariae Apostolicae vom Jahre 1380, ed. by G. Erler (Leipzig, 1888) ; Il Trattato di S. Vincenzo Ferrer intorno at grande scisma d'Occidente, ed. by A. Sorbelli (Bologna, 1906). See also W. St. C. Baddeley, Charles III. of Naples and Urban VI. (1894) J. B. Christophe, Histoire de la papaute pendant le XlVe siecle, vol. 3 (Paris, 1853).