Alle origini della “imperializzazione” del papato (secc. XI-XII)

The first phase of the imperialization of the papacy, during the pontificate of Leo IX, concerned not so much the symbolic aspects as the functioning of the imperial institution, with the construction of an itinerant and 'international' papal curia/court. At the initiative of Ildebrando di Soana during the pontificate of Nicholas II, the imperialization of the papacy also involved the appropriation of the symbolic elements of the imperial tradition, which would culminate in the claim contained in the Dictatus pape for the pope's exclusive use of the imperial insignia. The elasticity of the feudal terminology used by the papacy to describe relations with Christian sovereigns opened up spaces of interlocution and negotiation with kingdoms that provided the Apostolic See with objectively ‘imperial’ margins of action. Also with Gregory VII, Rome became the symbolic centre of a properly political construction whose textual, monumental and iconographic traces spread with hitherto unknown intensity. The imperialization of the papacy continued with Calixtus II and Innocent II, who accompanied this intense activity of symbolic production with a series of initiatives aimed at transforming the Lateran palace and basilica into the functional centre of the Church, with clear references to the ancient and Roman tradition of the Apostolic See. The pliability of the pontiffs in the face of the protests of Frederick I Barbarossa, who was almost scandalised by the processes of the imperialization of the papacy, shows the experimental nature of that transformation, which also met with strong resistance in part of the ecclesiastical world. However, while the assumption of a royal crown by Nicholas II had caused a scandal among the episcopate of imperial obedience, less than a century later even the most loyal supporters of the empire now considered the wearing of the tiara with its political implications to be absolutely normal.