SILVESTRO III, ANTIPOPE. — Giovanni, bishop of Sabina. Little is known about him, except that, in order to put an end to the discontent aroused in Rome by the authoritarian Benedetto IX, the Romans elected him in January 1045 as his opponent; but this lasted only a short time.
In March, the brothers of Benedetto IX forced him to leave and to restore the fugitive Pontiff in the Lateran Palace. In December 1046, under pressure from Enrico III, the situation was clarified at the Council of Sutri, which deposed S. III.
BIBL.: A. Fliche, La Réforme grégorienne, I, Lovanio-Parigi 1924, p. 108; J. Gay, Les papes du XIe siècle et la chrétienté, Parigi 1926; Fliche-Martin-Frutaz, VII, nn. 96-97, 100. Guglielmo Mollat