IMPORT FROM ELECTION COINS -- Doomed to deletion
HOW MANY POPES?
I say John Paul II was pope No. 263. Some will disagree, but here’s my logic and my source.
When I began collecting papal coins, I wanted to know how many men have been pope, bishop of Rome if you will. I needed a sane way to number the coins in my
collection. The succession presents a bewildering list of names: John Paul II succeded John Paul I, who succeded Paul VI, who succeded John XXIII [the second man to use the number], who succeded Pius XII, who succeded Pius XI. I could give the first pope to issue a coin the number 1, but even which pope first issued a coin remains a numismatic controversy.
So, I set out to number my coins in regnal order of popes, giving Peter the number 1, even though the first 64 or so popes had nothing to do with coinage. I knew I was in trouble when "The Economist" tagged John Paul II with an impossible numeral, something like 150th pope. "Time" had another number; other publications promulgated similar fantisy numbers.
I asked a priest, who informed that the number of popes might be a "Mystery of Faith." After exploring antipopes and intracies in numerology, he might be right.
I found Walsh’s 6-page table, He lined up the popes in chronological order, tagged them with an ethnic, such as Italian, Roman, African, French, German, Spanish, English, Flemish, or Polish, gave year of birth [if known], and dates of election and of death, resignation or deposition. Most critically, for me, the left-hand column gave numbers with Peter as No, 1 and John Paul II as 263.
Michael Walsh. "The Popes from Peter to John Paul II." St. Martin’s Press,
New York, 1980, 256 pp. His revelation fills pages called "Chronology of the Popes," pp. 248 – 253.
The book proves to be a hop, skip and a jump history. Walsh hits the high points, bad for a coin collector. Popes with interesting coins often prove to have dull or unimportant reigns, which Walsh skips. Popes with highly historical reigns often have dull or, worse, no coins. At least 109 popes out of the 236 strike coins.
Walsh lists 35 men who claimed the papacy but are called antipopes by the Catholic Church. The earliest was St. Hippolytus (217-235) – yes he was canonized as a martyr; the most recent, Amadeus VIII, Count of Savoy, who called himself Pope Felix V (1439-49). Amadeus issued coins as count but none as Felix V.
I do collect coins of the antipopes who issue coins, but I call the men by their birth names. I list one coin as "Baldasare Cosa, the antipope John XXIII (1410-1515). Cossa’s employment may be listed as pirate and lawyer, before he found religion more profitable than his previous occupations.
While some will take exception to Walsh’s expulsion of the antipopes from his numerical order, several popes he does number cause controversy. Prime example: Pope 92, Stephen II [March 23-25, 752]. Poor Stephen dropped dead after a less than 40 hour reign, although one of my sources generously states that his reign may have lasted as long as 96 hours. No coins! He was considered a pope from the 1500’s till 1960, when he was dropped from the Vatican’s official list.
Leo VIII stands as the Grover Cleveland of the papacy; he got to be pope twice [963-967, 964-965]. He only gets one number, No. 132. Pope 133, Benedict V ruled May 22 – June 23, 964. Leo and Benedict both have coins.
I see a solution. If I ever throw Stephen II out of the list, I’ll give Leo VIII two numbers, so John Paul II is still the 263d pope. More importantly, it will preserve my numbers for the popes from 1300 till now.
Follibus Fanaticus