CLEMENTINE III, POPE. — The Roman Paolo Scolari, cardinal since 1179 and bishop of Palestrina since 1181, was elected pope at Pisa on 19 December 1187 and took the name CLEMENT III. His first concern was to make peace with the Roman Republic, which had been in conflict with the popes since the time of Arnold of Brescia. He was able to establish himself in the city (February 1188) and conclude an agreement with the Commune that secured the rights of the Holy See (31 May 1188). In the previous year, Saladin had wrested Jerusalem from the Christians (3 October 1187). CLEMENT III worked energetically to organize a Crusade, the third, with such vigor that even the three most powerful sovereigns of Europe took the Cross: Philip Augustus, Richard the Lionheart, and Frederick Barbarossa. CLEMENT III did not live to see the outcome, which was not particularly encouraging.
Meanwhile, William II of Naples had died (1189). The only legitimate heir was Constance, wife of Henry, son and heir of the Barbarossa. To prevent the union of the two kingdoms of Naples and Germany under a single ruler, CLEMENT III favored the election of Tancred of Lecce, an illegitimate son of Roger II. Henry, who had become emperor after his father’s wretched end in the East, did not resign himself to this and soon came to Italy to be crowned and take possession of Naples. Death spared CLEMENT III the trouble of resolving this matter.
He left behind a vast correspondence, a testament to his intense activity during his brief pontificate: he granted and confirmed privileges and protection to monasteries, resolved matrimonial disputes, regulated complex disciplinary matters, freed the Scottish Church from English primacy to place it directly under the Holy See, and established the ecclesiastical province of Bremen-Hamburg. He canonized Otto of Bamberg and Stephen of Thiers, ended the discord with the emperor over the election of the bishop of Trier, and died on 20 March 1191, being buried in the Lateran.