Nicholas III

Pope, was originally John Cajetanus, of the noble Roman house of Orsini, and bore the surname of "the Accomplished," because, as his Italian con, temporaries alleged, "in him met all the graces of the handsomest clerks in the world." Cajetanus was a man likewise of great ability, of irreproachable morals, and of vast 'ambition.' The last proved his strong enemy, and attached an infamous stain to his name. He is known in history as a Nepotist (see Dante's Inferno, 19:66, 95). Previous to his elevation to the papacy, which occurred Nov. 25, 1277, he had played no unimportant part in ecclesiastical affairs. In the papal chair he distinguished himself especially by his activity against the schismatics and heathens. He sent legates to Michael Palaeologus, and missionaries to the Tartars. He compelled Charles of Anjou, king of Sicily, to resign his offices of vicar of the empire and governor of Rome, and with it to relinquish the supreme power which that title gave him in the city, and caused himself to be elected senator, thereby advancing the interests of the papacy; but he entrusted the discharge of the office to his relatives, and thus deprived the state of faithful and trustworthy officers, his relatives seeking simply to enrich themselves. Under pope Nicholas III's rule the power of the Romish see was further greatly increased, by his inducing the new Roman emperor, Rudolph of Hapsburg, to restore to it a number of its former possessions which the emperors had at various times wrested from Rome. (See Fontainni, Del Donzinio Temporale delia Santa Chiesa, and his controversy with Muratori on the subject.) Pope Nicholas III was laboring to secure the union with the Greek Church resolved on at the Council of Lyons in 1274, when he died, August 22, 1280. A treatise entitled De electione dignitatum is attributed to him. He embellished Rome considerably, and built a splendid palace near the church of St. Peter. See two short biographies in Muratori, Rerum Ital. Scriptores, vol. 3, pt. i, p. 606 sq.; also Leo, Gesch. der ital. Staaten, 4:627 sq.; Baronius, Annales Ecclesiastici, 22:436; Bower, Hist. of the Popes (see Index in vol. vii); Riddle, Hist. of Papacy, 2:233 sq.; Milman, Hist. of Latin Christianity, 6:135 sq.; Hefele, Conciliengesch. 6:141 sq., 161 sq., 179,'188; Wetzer u. Welte (R. C.), Kirchen-Lexikon, 7:583-585.