Cadaver Synod

council · 897 · Lateran Palace

Stephen VI had the body of his predecessor Formosus exhumed, dressed in vestments and propped on a throne to answer charges, with a deacon appointed to speak for it. The corpse was condemned, the fingers of its blessing hand struck off, and it was thrown into the Tiber; every ordination Formosus had performed was declared void — which included Stephen's own. Rome rioted, Stephen was deposed and strangled in prison, and two later synods reversed the verdict. This is the lowest point of the tenth-century papacy and it is a matter of record, not legend.

The Cadaver Synod is the name commonly given to the ecclesiastical trial of Pope Formosus, who had been dead for about nine months, in the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome during January 897. The trial was conducted by Pope Stephen VI, the successor to Formosus's successor, Pope Boniface VI. Stephen had Formosus's corpse exhumed and brought to the papal court for judgment. He accused Formosus of perjury, of having acceded to the papacy illegally, and illegally presiding over more than one diocese at the same time. At the end of the trial, Formosus was pronounced guilty, and his papacy retroactively declared null.

Was Formosus lawfully pope — and if he was not, what becomes of everyone he ordained?

The corpse condemned, its ordinations annulled, and the pope who staged it strangled within the year.

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