Palace of the Popes
Palace of the Popes historical timeline
Last updated on October 8, 2026- Alexander IV moves the Papal Curia to Viterbo, driven out of Rome by the hostility of the commune and of the nobles under the senator Brancaleone degli Andalò, and by constant urban violence. The city's bishop's palace is enlarged to give the popes an adequate residence.
- The enlargement is probably complete. Ordered and overseen by the Capitano del Popolo Raniero Gatti, and built with the consent of Clement IV, it centres on a great audience hall communicating with a loggia raised on a barrel vault above the city street.
- The wide staircase up from piazza San Lorenzo is finished, and the Loggia delle Benedizioni is raised -- credited by the Italian account to the Capitano del Popolo Andrea Gatti, during the pontificate of Clement IV.
- The papal election opens in the great hall. It will run 1,006 days, the longest in the history of the Church, and end only after the roof of the hall is removed. Gregory X is elected in 1271, and the room has been the Sala del Conclave ever since.
- On 11 May part of a recently built wing collapses and fatally injures John XXI, who dies in the building. The English account identifies the room as his study.
- Martin IV is elected here and moves almost immediately to Orvieto, ending twenty-four years of Viterbo as the residence of the papacy. Alexander IV, Urban IV, Clement IV, Gregory X, John XXI, Nicholas III and Martin IV were all elected in the same hall.
- Nicholas V commissions a bath palace at Viterbo. Building at the Bagno del Papa continues through later pontificates, the Vatican accounts recording payments under Calixtus III, Paul II and Sixtus IV, and there is evidence that Pius II added a western wing.
Verified against Wikipedia, October 2026.