Reason For Request Price Reduction

Pope man or woman? Una sedia forata permette di accertarlo

Jean era una giovane donna inglese bella e colta. Come mai finì in un convento maschile travestita da monaco? Questo è il punto. Se riusciamo a trovare una risposta a questa domanda, poi non ci sarà difficile rispondere al secondo quesito: come diavolo fece a farsi eleggere Papa?
Dopo sette anni di ricerche, la scrittrice americana Donna Woolfolk Cross, docente di letteratura, In 1996 he released the first edition of a book (" Pope Joan") on the controversial figure of Pope Joan. Text that has been the subject of the film by Sönke Wortmann " Päpstin Die" (The High Priestess), presented at the Berlin Film Festival in 2009 and released in May of this year (2010) in Italy.
Now, together with the film, the book also appeared in Italy by a publisher who the world of beauty esteem, for two reasons: 1. also deals with things Roman and Rome than once (and when it was called Avanzini & Torraca published the first paperback edition of the Sonnets with hints of Cagli), 2. makes beautiful books, well made, well printed, that do not break, and cheaply (The High Priestess , Newton Compton, 2010, € 4.90).
the United States, beginning the book did not sell many copies: The publisher, as often happens, was too lazy: do not believe it. The Cross was decided to take the field personally and to engage the public on the subject intriguing and modern "young woman trying to overcome the social conventions and gender stereotypes by relying on his intelligence and tenacity." The idea was successful. There was already, in 1972, the first film adaptation of the story of Pope Joan (with Liv Ullmann in the role of Joan, with the participation of Olivia de Havilland and Trevor Howard in the role Pope Leo). Now is the feature film shown at the "Berlinale" based on the book of the Cross. The writer was able to take advantage of the reputation that comes from the cinema for a reprint of the first revised edition (see cover image).
writer Lawrence Durrell, who was not only English but in his youth had been in the Secret Service, and therefore not used to drink anything, he rebuilt the medieval ambience in which he could be a possible story that would be impossible today. An orphan girl but acute intelligence, adopted by a preacher who monaco travel throughout Europe, the dresses as a friar in order to protect the rapists, allows her to enter the monastery of Fulda, makes studying in Mainz (Mainz, Rhineland). Gradually becomes learned in theology to impress bishops, cardinals and the Sacred College, who had never seen such a wonder. And here is the name of Johannes Anglicus make a prodigious career in the church, to ascend the papal throne under the name of John VIII. (The Pope Joan , Longanesi 1973). The first and only female pope in history.
But is it history? The story would happen to the 850 to 855 of our era, just after the pontificate of Pope Leo IV Benedict III or before, that in the few months of his pontificate would be worried - he says the popular tradition - to eliminate thoroughly any document or evidence of the name of the intruder. To complete the complaint, the name of Pope John VIII, that of the female pope, Pope was used by a slightly later (in 872). A sign that the wound, shame, still burning, otherwise what was the need to resume the same name and number? A rage, a true damnatio memoriae, which is permitted more than one suspect.
"We are quite certain documents," "could," says the official church today. Objection and the other popes of that period we have historical documents safe? Many are just names. Those were
not forget the centuries of the darkest and most chaotic storia dell’Occidente. I famigerati "secoli bui" dell’Alto Medioevo, bui non solo perché se ne sa poco, ma anche perché all'opposto del "secolo dei Lumi", il Settecento, illuminato dalla luce della Ragione, erano dominati dalle tenebre del caos e del delitto, della violenza e della superstizione. Visti con gli occhi di oggi, tutto appare possibile in quei lunghissimi nove secoli, quando nel disfacimento dello Stato romano che proprio la Chiesa di Roma aveva fatto crollare con la carica eversiva del suo fanatismo, i vescovi erano di fatto le uniche autorità politiche e amministrative sul territorio. La Chiesa si trovò a riunire nelle proprie mani l’unico vero potere politico ed economico della Penisola. La professione di Roman Church was not at all a spiritual office, who assured them that he wanted gold, castles, titles and power. The election of the popes was often by chance, when not directly depend on political and military balance of power of local lords and aristocrats, for reasons that had nothing to do with religion, nor with the sanctity of life of cardinals and popes .
"The chronicles of the time are full of murders, coups, revolts of the building. The clergy, left to itself, mired in corruption. The Popes and bishops living in a luxury Thousand and One Nights. They lived in palaces of marble and glittering gold. It is surrounded by servants e concubine, imbandivano mense degne di Trimalcione, organizzavano concerti, danze e feste mascherate (...). La Chiesa, lacerata da lotte intestine e prigioniera della sua mondanizzazione, non era mai caduta tanto in basso". Marozia, una donna di Spoleto sfrenatamente sensuale e ambiziosissima, divenne l'amante di papi e principi e comandò a lungo su Roma e sulla Chiesa. Il suo amante papa Sergio III arrivò al punto da far strangolare i suoi avversari. Papa Giovanni X che si era opposto al matrimonio di Marozia con un conte Guido, fu deposto e lasciato morire di fame in carcere. Marozia impose come papa il giovanissimo figlio avuto da papa Sergio III. Si chiamò Giovanni XI, ed aveva solo dodici anni. (I.Montanelli e R.Gervaso, L'Italia of the Dark Ages, Rizzoli, Milan 1965).
Imagine if he could cause a major scandal, the election of a pope and women, albeit in disguise. Seen through the eyes of today, a woman disguised as a man in that environment, as well as being technically feasible given the effeminacy of many clergymen, was, after all, an accident, a venial sin. The history of the popes of that time is full of blackmail, charges and testimony violent murders. Other than masked. Just scroll down the list of the popes before and after the "Pope Joan" to notice a worrying fact: almost all strangely remained in office a few years or months, often deposed by force or died prematurely in a mysterious and suspicious. Yet we know that were on average younger and more vital of the popes of today. The duration of the pontificate of Pope Joan is quite in line with the average duration of the popes of the time: two years. So how do you explain so fiercely suspicious of the Church to deny, to erase, to censure any trace? With the ancient contempt for the Christian woman, a shame that apparently exceeds that for the crimes, robberies and lust.
The Church today denies it, of course, that the hundreds of papers and citations on a woman to be elected pope were valid, and points to a "campaign anti-papist," perhaps of the English press. There were already the Reformers and anti-clericals in 800 AD? No, but the Church fa notare che stampe e documenti risalgono per lo più al tardo Medioevo e al primo Rinascimento.
Vero è, invece, che i primi a darne notizia furono proprio i religiosi, e non i perfidi inglesi, ma i francesi don Giovanni di Metz, studioso domenicano della Lorena, nel 1240, e poi il confratello don Martino di Troppau che he nel suo Chronicon pontificum et imperatorum parla di Johanna, originaria di Mainz o dell'Inghilterra.
"Si trattava di un papa o piuttosto di una papessa, perché era donna. Travestendosi da uomo grazie al proprio ingegno diventò dapprima segretario della Curia romana, poi cardinale ed infine papa", si legge a proposito di una Johanna inglese o nativa di Mainz nella Chronica Universalis brother of Jean de Mailly (ca. 1250).
and hundreds of prints, quotes, writings, including prestigious intellectuals, who give to the Pope Joan really existed. Like those of the famous philosopher and Franciscan theologian William of Ockham. In the cathedral of Siena, his image appears in one of the real popes. The great Boccaccio, the father of Italian language and great collector of curious tales in the Decameron , wrote in his De claris mulieribus (The famous women): So for him the female pope was a "famous women" really existed . But it also speaks platinum, which was not a humanist, whatever, but it was the intellectual confidence of several popes and was made prefect of the Vatican Library by Pope Sixtus IV.
In short, although there is no evidence or if there were destroyed, the cards, all repeated entries and consistent (in the pure legends, however, the variations are endless and conflicting at the end), in short all quotes that speak to her are too many clues - an investigator would say - because the Pope Joan could easily be considered, as it sees today the Church, a wholly invented character, and does not contain much or some truth.
Meanwhile, as the Church denied the extraordinary event of the pope and women, took steps to protect themselves from possible future disguises. The popular imagination magnified forse l’importanza della cerimonia, ma certo questa sembrava fatta apposta per rassicurare non solo il popolino ma anche i cardinali, la Curia e l’intera comunità ecclesiale. E se non ci fosse stato il precedente della papessa Giovanna – argomentarono i critici della Chiesa di Roma – l’intero rito sarebbe stato inutile, anzi grottesco e perfino offensivo per la dignità del papa neoletto e dei cardinali coinvolti.
In che cosa consisteva? In una prova molto rozza, al limite della volgarità. Il papa, dopo l’elezione veniva fatto sedere su un’apposita sedia di porfido rosso con un largo foro sul pianale. Un bell’esemplare è conservato nei Musei Vaticani ( v. immagine ). Si An elegant chair "excretory" of Roman origin, probably a relic of latrines luxury spa removed from who knows what areas reserved for VIPs at the time, the rich patricians, or by other "seat from birth" for ladies (in Antiquity was much used the "birth sitting").
Well, seated on the special chair, the pope was neo-key through the hole in the lower parts by a deacon or the youngest cardinal of the Conclave, which introduced the arm to a side opening. And if the investigation was successful, exclaimed loudly: " Virgam et testiculos Habet !" ("He has a penis and testicles"). And all the church respond in chorus: " Deo Gratias "(" Thank God "). Only then will proceed to the consecration of the pope-elect. (Hamerlin F., et Rusticitate and finished De Dialogus (ca.1490)." He has two balls, and They Are well hung "(" She has two balls and well-hung "), was instead the report of a cardinal, almost taste physician, according to the Swedish traveler L. Banck who had witnessed the coronation of Pope Innocent X in 1644 ( see the old print taken from his report), as reported by P. Stanford, The Legend of Pope Joan , Berkley Books, New York 1999, pp.11-12.
It said there was "not here Testiculos Pope Habet they do not posset "(F. Sorrentino, test of manhood, in "Middle Ages", De Agostini, No. 7, 2008 pp.90 et seq.). Which means, translated into simple terms for the use of ambitious ecclesiastics of yesterday and today: you can also have a big head, but if you do not have testicles, forget the Papacy! Which is really a misuse of the gonads. And the law of "equal opportunities" raises disturbing parallels. It would be like saying that if certain groups of men have the power thanks to the hilt, then, carrying the women's reasoning, why would escort women interns or "small virtues" in a career, money or politics with the vagina.
A confirmation on the role of the chair also comes from Teologia portatile o Dizionario abbreviato della Religione Cristiana del barone d'Holbach, acuminato redattore delle voci religiose della Encyclopédie di Diderot e d’Alembert. Definisce la sedia stercoraria come "sedia bucata su cui il pontefice appena eletto pone le sue sacre terga, affinché possa essere verificato il suo sesso, onde evitare l'inconveniente di una papessa".
Ma Bartolomeo Sacchi (il famoso "Plàtina" autore del libro di gastronomia De honesta voluptate et valetudine, tratto dal grande cuoco Martino da Como), era un umanista di Curia a stipendio dei Papi, e per di più prefetto della Biblioteca Vaticana. Quindi non poteva rischiare. E infatti, ricorda la sedia dung in vague and hypocritical: "This chair was designed so that one who is hit by a power so great to know that he is not God but a man, and therefore is subject to the needs of nature."
where "nature" does not quite know which of the three functions of the chair with holes Platina intended focus, if the shit, the bear - but then, the Pope Joan was fine! - Or have (and use if necessary) in order to generate the testicles. Generate? And always go back there. The language of the Church fights where the tooth aches.
fact is that even where trustworthy Platina puts the fateful chair bored? In his Life of Pope Joan, by chance, thereby strengthening and at the highest level instead of a link that excludes the Church today. For CoE 'Onofrio had a religious rite, but not being able to climb on mirrors rises in his chair. For him it is a "birthing chair," and none would symbolize the Holy Mother Church which "generates" ( aridaje! ) her children destined for eternal life ( thousand years of legend: A woman on the throne of Peter , Romana Soc.Ed 1978). In addition, the seventeenth-century historian and pastor D. Blondel denied that the perforated seat served to prove the existence of the Pope's testicles.
The ritual of the chair would have been drilled in force until 1513. Indeed the seats on which to lay the pontifical Terga were two - remember A. Boureau - called "curule seats. But, objectively, the ritual curulis seat, reserved for more senior judges Etruscans and Romans in the ceremonies could not be of marble, because it was originally folded in short, a seat carved and gilded wood in the shape of X. However, the first seat the newly elected pope had received the scepter of command and the keys of St. Peter, the second a red belt from which hung twelve stones. E 'probable that the ancient commentators and common people are impressed by these perforated seats and have them connected to the story, or rather the legend of Pope Joan ( The Pope Joan. History una leggenda medievale , Einaudi 1991).

A proposito, come andò a finire la papessa? A Giovanna Angelica (così la chiama il Boccaccio) fu dato per segretario un giovane prete, erudito e raffinato, che standole sempre accanto finì per per scoprire il suo vero sesso. Così narra la storia. Ma il dramma, anzi il colpo di teatro, si compì in pubblico durante la processione di Pasqua. Tornando il Papa in Laterano, quando il corteo papale era vicino alla basilica di San Clemente, il cavallo che portava la Pontefice si imbizzarrì per la folla plaudente che stringeva la processione, e per lo spavento Giovanna ebbe doglie violente e un parto prematuro. Immenso lo scandalo. La folla - racconta la storia - fu impietosa, attribuendo il parto ad un prodigio del diavolo. La papessa fu fatta trascinare per i piedi da un cavallo e poi lapidata a morte nei pressi di Ripa Grande. Un dettaglio della leggenda vorrebbe che sulla sua tomba fosse stato inciso un verso che ricorda l’occultismo satanista: Petre Pater Patrum Papissa Pandito Partum . Parole attribuite ad un indemoniato durante il passaggio della papessa. Ma qui siamo in pieno esoterismo.
Sul luogo in cui fu svelata la vera natura della papessa, all’angolo tra via dei SS. Quattro Coronati e Via dei Querceti, fu eratta una piccola edicola votiva tuttora esistente, buia e in stato d'abbandono, nota come il "Sacello". E' chiusa da un'inferriata e risale almeno all’XI secolo. Ma nel Seicento also the route of the ancient Easter procession was denied by G. Blondel. According to him, the traditional papal procession on Easter about 800 did not pass in the street where, according to popular history - all believed to be true until the end of Rinaascimento - would take place the birth of Pope Joan.
Vera, legendary or symbolic-that teaching is the story, remains its clear semantic meaning: the obsession of the people of the Church and its hierarchy, violent and confused at a time when the ecclesiastical power is required as more and more power politically and economically, to the sexuality of the Pope, the Vicar of God, yes, but also dangerously man and woman, in which Satan was always ready to incarnate. Three fears - the sex, the woman and the devil - that have fueled almost to the day notri the fanaticism of the Church of Rome, and that the story of Joan had the merit of synthesizing and symbolize perfection. Giuseppe Gioachino Belli
And how does it get twisted in this adventure? Like Boccaccio, he could not miss such a wonderful story of the popular, and said in a sonnet with the usual synthesis of a virtual sculpture and ignorant Roman citizen:
.
the High Priestess was GGIUVANNA
ppropio woman. Bbuttò vvia 'r smock
first of all and ss'ingaggiò ssordato;
double if Fesce priest, then bishop, and ppoi
bishop, and Arfin Cardinale.
E cquanno er Papa maschio stiede male,
e mmorze, c’è cchi ddisce, avvelenato,
fu ffatto Papa lei, e straportato
a Ssan Giuvanni su in zedia papale.
Ma cquà sse ssciorze er nodo a la Commedia;
ché ssanbruto je preseno le dojje,
e sficò un pupo llí ssopra la ssedia.
D’allora st’antra ssedia sce fu mmessa
pe ttastà ssotto ar zito de le vojje
si er pontescife sii Papa o Ppapessa.
26 novembre 1831
.
Versione . La papessa Giovanna. Fu proprio donna. Prima di tutto gettò via il grembiule e divenne soldato, poi si fece prete, poi prelato, then bishop, and finally a cardinal. And when the pope stood evil and male died (some say poisoned) was made pope, and transported her to St. John on the papal chair. But this broke the knot of the play, because abruptly [suddenly] took them into labor and gave birth to a child over a chair. Since then, another chair was introduced, to probe beneath the site if the Pope desires to be Pope or Pope Joan.
.
IMAGES. 1. The manifesto of the German film Die Papstin (published this year in Italy under the title The High Priestess ) based on the book Pope Jean, Donna Woolfolk Cross. 2 . The book cover of the Cross (published in Italy by Piemme). 3. The chair dung in red porphyry, of Roman origin, preserved in the Vatican Museums. 4. Papa-woman with child, a fanciful popular press appeared in Germany. 5. The P apessa painted on a tarot card for the Visconti-Sforza by Bonifacio Bembo (ca. 1450). The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York. The High Priestess, is still one of the most famous tarot cards, portrayed as the "prostitute on the beast" mentioned in Revelation. 6. newly elected Pope Innocent X (1644) is referred to the "chair test" to the question of manhood.