HONORIUS II, POPE. – He pontificated from 1124 to 1130. When the Sacred College, not without difficulty, gave its votes (21 Dec. 1124) to the name of Lamberto, cardinal bishop of Ostia, one of the negotiators of the Concordat of Worms of 1122 and one of the guiding figures of the Ninth Ecumenical Council of the Lateran (1123), it oriented the new pontificate toward the effective implementation of ecclesiastical reform. Good relations with almost all the kings of the West secured for H. II a peaceful and fruitful pontificate.
The election of Lotario of Saxony as king of Germany, which took place in 1125 through the efforts of the archbishop of Mainz Adalberto, against the final wishes of Enrico V, placed on the imperial throne a prince amenable to the influence of the Church. Episcopal elections were conducted regularly, and the King left it to the papal legate to decide in disputed cases, as in the succession to the bishopric of Würzburg. In return, the Pontiff and the episcopate supported Lotario III against his rival Corrado, excommunicating the latter and his supporters, including, for example, the ambitious archbishop of Milan Anselmo, who had already bestowed the iron crown upon the pretender (1228).
The moderation and patience of H., which astonished even s. Bernardo, led to the submission of Luigi VI the Fat, who was in conflict with the bishop of Paris, Stefano di Senlis, and with the archbishop of Sens, Enrico Sanglier; and the King allowed the elections to be carried out freely. The same occurred in England, where the episcopate was entirely in the hands of the Pope. In every kingdom there was a papal legate who conveyed the will of Rome.
Only in Italy was H.’s pontificate not equally successful. He was unable to settle as he wished the succession of Guglielmo of Apulia, nephew of Roberto il Guiscardo, nor to prevent Ruggero II of Sicily from seizing II. The Papacy, reconciled with the Empire, had no need of a refuge for the time being; nevertheless, in Rome the rivalry between the Frangipani and the Pierleoni, which had remained latent during H.’s pontificate, broke out violently in the Pope’s final days, when he was dying in the monastery of S. Gregorio al Celio, where he died on the night of 12–13 Feb. 1130.