Pope Innocent XII, born Antonio Pignatelli, was Pope from 12 July 1691 to his death in 1700. He took a hard stance against nepotism in the church, continuing the policies of Pope Innocent XI, who started the battle against nepotism but which did not gain traction under Pope Alexander VIII. To that end, he issued a papal bull strictly forbidding it. The pope also used this bull to ensure that no revenue or land could be bestowed to relatives.
Biography
Early life
Antonio Pignatelli was born on 13 March 1615 in Spinazzola to one of the most aristocratic families of the Kingdom of Naples, which had included several Viceroys and ministers of the crown. He was the fourth of five children of Francesco Pignatelli and Porzia Carafa. His siblings were Marzio, Ludovico, Fabrizio and Paola Maria. He was educated at the Collegio Romano in Rome where he earned a doctorate in both canon and civil law.
Diplomatic career
At the age of 20 he became an official of the court of Pope Urban VIII. Pignatelli was the Referendary of the Apostolic Signatura and served as the Governor of Fano and Viterbo. Later he went to Malta where he served as an inquisitor from 1646 to 1649, and then governor of Perugia. Shortly after this, he received his priestly ordination.
died in 1691 and the College of Cardinals assembled to hold a conclave to select his successor. Factions loyal to the Kingdom of France, Kingdom of Spain and the broader Holy Roman Empire failed to agree on a consensuscandidate. After five months, Cardinal Pignatelli emerged as a compromise candidate between the cardinals of France and those of the Holy Roman Empire. Pignatelli took his new name in honour of Pope Innocent XI and was crowned on 15 July 1691 by the protodeacon, Cardinal Urbano Sacchetti. He took possession of the Basilica of Saint John Lateran on 13 April 1692.
Actions
Immediately after his election on 12 July 1691, Innocent XII declared his opposition to the nepotism which had afflicted the reigns of previous popes. The following year he issued the papal bull, Romanum decet Pontificem, banning the curial office of the Cardinal-Nephew and prohibiting popes from bestowing estates, offices, or revenues on any relative. Further, only one relative was to be raised to the cardinalate. At the same time he sought to check the simony in the practices of the Apostolic Chamber and to that end introduced a simpler and more economical manner of life into his court. Innocent XII said that "the poor were his nephews" and compared his public beneficence to the nepotism of many predecessors. Innocent XII also introduced various reforms into the States of the Church including the Forum Innocentianum, designed to improve the administration of justice dispensed by the Church. In 1693 he compelled French bishops to retract the four propositions relating to the Gallican Liberties which had been formulated by the assembly of 1682. In 1699, he decided in favour of Jacques-Benigne Bossuet in that prelate's controversy with Fénelon about the Explication des Maximes des Saints sur la Vie Intérieure of the latter. Innocent XII's pontificate also differed greatly from his predecessors' because of his leanings towards France instead of the Habsburg Monarchy; the first in the 20 years following France's failure to have its candidate elected in 1644 and 1655.
Consistories
Innocent XII created 30 cardinals in four consistories; two of those he elevated were those he reserved in pectore.
Innocent appears as one of the narrators in Robert Browning's long poem The Ring and the Book, based on the true story of the pope's intervention in a historical murder trial in Rome during his papacy. Innocent is the most recent pope to have decorative facial hair.
