Pope Romanus

Of this pope very little is known with certainty, not even the date of his birth nor the exact dates of his consecration as pope and of his death. He was born at Gallese near Civita Castellana, and was the son of Constantine. He became cardinal of St. Peter ad Vincula and pope about August, 897. He died four months later. He granted the pallium to Vitalis, Patriarch of Grado, and a privilege for his church; and to the Spanish Bishops of Elna and Gerona, he confirmed the possessions of their sees. His coins bear the name of the Emperor Lambert, and his own monogram with "Scs. Petrus". The contemporary historian Frodoard has three verses about him which argue him a man of virtue. It is possible he was deposed by one of the factions which then distracted Rome, for we read that "he was made a monk", a phrase which, in the language of the times, often denoted deposition.

JAFFE, Regesta Pont. Rom., I (Leipzig, 1888), 441; DUCHESNE, Liber Pontificalis, II (Paris, 1892), 230; MANN, Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle Ages, IV (London, 1910), 86 sq.

Horace K. Mann.