ANASTASIO II, POPE. — Successor of Gelasius I, he was consecrated on 24 November 496 and died on 19 November 498. His foremost concern was to resume relations with the Churches of the East, severed since 484 because of the Acacian schism. He therefore sent two bishops, Cresconius and Germanus, to Constantinople, charged with informing the emperor Anastasius I of his election and with delivering him a friendly letter. In it the Pope exhorted him not to break the unity of the Church on account of a single rightly condemned individual, and asked that the name of Acacius be erased from the diptychs; nevertheless, he declared that he recognized the baptisms and orders conferred by him (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 744). The results of this mission were, however, meagre, despite the personal machinations of the senator Festus, Theodoric’s envoy.
The conciliatory attitude of A. aroused bitter criticism among the Roman clergy, especially after the Pope’s benevolent reception of the deacon Photinus, delegate of Andreas, bishop of Thessalonica, formerly an ardent supporter of Acacius, apparently sent to report on the strong anti-Acacian reaction that had occurred in the aforementioned diocese (cf. letter of 497: Jaffé-Wattenbach, 746). Indeed, according to the Liber Pontificalis (ed. Duchesne, I, p. 258), part of the Roman clergy is said actually to have separated itself from communion with A. The same source, which is very hostile to the Pontiff, sees in his premature death a punishment from God and attributes to him the intention of rehabilitating the memory of Acacius. This is false and contrary to the Pope’s genuine letters. Nevertheless, the unfavourable judgment of the Liber Pontificalis contributed greatly to defaming his memory in the Middle Ages, to such an extent that Alighieri (Inf., XI, vv. 6-9) places him in the sixth circle among the heretics.
We possess of this Pope a letter of 497, containing a profession of faith in Christ (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 747), and another sent to the bishops of Gaul in 498 (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 751), traducianism (v.). It is now almost universally agreed that the letter A. is said to have sent to Clovis (Jaffé-Wattenbach, 745) on the occasion of his baptism is a forgery of the seventeenth century, attributable to Jérôme Vignier.
Pietro Goggi — A. Pietro Frutaz