The Pope's House
As we were walking along discovering Old Briançon, we passed in front of a lovely wooden door with an inscription above it that really intrigued me. It read: House of the Pope; below, it continued: Pope Pius VI and his entourage stayed in this house from 30th April to 27th June 1799. I wondered why in the world a Pope would come to Briançon, let alone stay in a relatively modest house for so long, almost two months. Since there was no explanation right on the spot, I had to wait a while to get an answer. But I did get that answer eventually, on the Internet. It goes like this:
After the French Revolution of 1789, the Pope and the revolutionaries did not see eye to eye on a number of issues including the anti-cleric policies of the new French constitution. The Pope adopted a number of countermeasures that strongly displeased the French including the excommunication of the French Nation. This instigated Napoleon to invade Italy, annex some of the Papal States including Avignon which had been a papal enclave in France since 1309. When the Pope refused to submit to the terms dictated by the French, he was forcibly taken out of Rome on the night of February 20th 1798, and brought to France via Siena, Florence, Parma, Piacenza, Turin, Briançon, Grenoble, and ended up in Valence (a town on the Rhone, 140 km west of Briançon). The Pope was very sick by then and he died in Valence on August 29th 1799, two months after departing Briançon. He was 82. So, his passage through Briançon was as a sick old man (which might explain why he was there for two months) and a prisoner.
The Pope's House
As we were walking along discovering Old Briançon, we passed in front of a lovely wooden door with an inscription above it that really intrigued me. It read: House of the Pope; below, it continued: Pope Pius VI and his entourage stayed in this house from 30th April to 27th June 1799. I wondered why in the world a Pope would come to Briançon, let alone stay in a relatively modest house for so long, almost two months. Since there was no explanation right on the spot, I had to wait a while to get an answer. But I did get that answer eventually, on the Internet. It goes like this:
After the French Revolution of 1789, the Pope and the revolutionaries did not see eye to eye on a number of issues including the anti-cleric policies of the new French constitution. The Pope adopted a number of countermeasures that strongly displeased the French including the excommunication of the French Nation. This instigated Napoleon to invade Italy, annex some of the Papal States including Avignon which had been a papal enclave in France since 1309. When the Pope refused to submit to the terms dictated by the French, he was forcibly taken out of Rome on the night of February 20th 1798, and brought to France via Siena, Florence, Parma, Piacenza, Turin, Briançon, Grenoble, and ended up in Valence (a town on the Rhone, 140 km west of Briançon). The Pope was very sick by then and he died in Valence on August 29th 1799, two months after departing Briançon. He was 82. So, his passage through Briançon was as a sick old man (which might explain why he was there for two months) and a prisoner.