GREGORY III, Pope, Saint. - A Syrian, learned and active, he was pope from 731 to 741; he continued the struggle against the iconoclasts, whom he excommunicated at the Roman Synod of Nov. 731. In retaliation the emperor Leo III confiscated the pontifical patrimonies in southern Italy and in Sicily and separated the dioceses of those regions and of Illyricum from the Western Roman patriarchate, placing them under the patriarch of Byzantium.

GREGORY III, POPE, saint (731-41) - Part of the marble slabs containing the foundation of the oratory of the B. V. in the Basilica of St. Peter - Vatican Grottoes.(from A. Silvagni, Monumenta epigraphica, Vatican City III, pl. II, 1)

He was also threatened by Liutprand, king of the Lombards, and in that emergency he asked help of Charles Martel, mayor of the palace of the Franks, sending him a legation that carried the keys of the tomb of St. Peter and relics of his chains. But since Charles Martel was allied with Liutprand, he refused military intervention. G. III was, like his predecessor, an intelligent promoter of the missionary work of St. Boniface, whom in 732 he named archbishop and charged, as apostolic legate, with organizing the Church in Bavaria, Thuringia and Hesse.

Bibliography5 works

BIBL.: Lib. Pont., I, pp. 416-25; Jaffé-Wattenbach, coll. 2229-2257; Codex Carolinus, in MHG, Epistolae, III, nn. 1-2; L. Hartmann, Geschichte Italiens im Mittelalter, II, II, Leipzig 1897, p. 169 ff.; A. Schäfer, Bedeutung G. II. u. III. für die Gründung des Kirchenstaates, Münster 1913.

Lucchesis Spätling

@incollection{ec6_gregorio_iii_papa_santo, author = {Spätling, Lucchesio}, title = {Gregorio III, papa, santo}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {VI}, pages = {1127--1128}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1951}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/gregorio-iii-papa-santo} }

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Gregory III, Pope, Saint

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