INNOCENZO IV, POPE. — Sinibaldo Fieschi, of the counts of Lavagna and of a Genoese family, toward the end of the twelfth century; he studied under the guidance of a paternal uncle who was bishop of Parma, attended the celebrated schools of canon and Roman law at Bologna, listening to illustrious masters such as Azone and Accursius, and himself became one of the most renowned canonists of his time (among other things, he played a major role in the development of the doctrine of juridical persons); in 1226 he moved to Rome, where he held offices in the Curia and carried out legations; on 23 September 1227 Gregory IX, who had known him for some time, raised him to the cardinalate, assigning him the presbyteral title of S. Lorenzo in Lucina. After the death of Celestine IV (10 November 1241), there followed a vacancy of no less than eighteen months, while the Church was in an extremely serious condition because of the hostility of the emperor Frederick II; finally, the few surviving cardinals unanimously elected Fieschi (24 June 1243), and he assumed the name I.
(from P. Frison, Gallia Purpurata, Paris 1635)
INNOCENZO IV, pope — I. IV presides over the First Council of Lyon.
Frontispiece of the Gallia Purpurata by P. Frison, Paris 1638.
Copy in the Vatican Library.
a period of struggles with alternating fortunes, which ended with the Emperor’s death (17 December 1250). I. then set out on his return journey, but entered Rome only on 6 October 1253, when new dissensions had already broken out with Frederick’s heirs, Conrad and Manfred; a year later I., who had long been ill, died in Naples (7 December).
Among his works as a jurist, mention must be made of the Apparatus in quisque libros Decretalium, composed for practical purposes, which enjoyed wide circulation and great authority. In addition, I. promulgated three authentic collections of canons containing 41 of his Decretals and sent them to the Universities of Bologna and Paris so that they might insert them into Gregory IX’s compilation under the corresponding titles; the principal constitution was the one entitled Romana Ecclesia, issued at the First Council of Lyon; he also wrote a commentary on his own Decretals.
I.’s legal writings were commented on by Giovanni di Dio, Pietro di Sampson, Bernardo di Compostella the younger, and the Ostiense. A work of the Pope stands apart, entitled Apologeticus or De iurisdictione imperii et auctoritate Romani Pontificii, directed against Pier della Vigna, but which today cannot be identified with certainty.
BIBL. - Nicola da Calvi, Vita Innocentii IV papa, in RIS, III (there also a life by an anonymous author); Matteo Paria, Chronicon, in MGH, Scriptores, XXVIII, pp. 107-389; MGH, Epistolae suec. XIII ecc., II; E. Berger, St Louis et Innocent IV, Parigi 1887; id., Les registres d'Innocent IV, 4 vols., there 1894; A. Folz, Kaiser Friedrich II. und Papst Innocenz IV., Strasburgo 1905; I. Uminski, Niewozpieczenstwo Tatariskie w Polowie XIII w. i Papież Innocenty IV., Lwowie 1922; B. Sütterlin, Die Politik Kaiser Friedrichs II. und die römischen Kardinäle (1239-50), Heidelberg 1929; P. Brezzi, Roma e l'Impero medievale, Bologna 1947, p. 443 ff. On I. IV as a jurist, see I. F. Schulte, Beiträge zur Literatur über die Decretalen Gregori IX., Innocenz IV. ecc., Vienna 1871, pp. 55-127; F. Ruffini, La classificazione delle persone giuridiche in Sinibaldo Fieschi (I. IV), ecc., in Studi Schapler, II, Torino 1898, p. 313 ff.; B. Kurtscheid-F. A. Wilches, Historia iuris canonici, I, Roma 1943, p. 259; A. van Hove, Prolegomena, 2nd ed., Malines-Roma 1945, pp. 362-63, 453, 477, 480; H. Marc-Bonnet, Le Sa-Siège et Charles d'Anjou sous Innocent IV et Alexandre IV, in Revue historique, 200 (1948), p. 38 ff. Paolo Brezzi