Pope Pius VII (14 August 1742 – 20 August 1823), born Barnaba Niccolo Maria Luigi Chiaramonti, was Pope from 14 March 1800 to 20 August 1823, succeeding Pope Pius VI and preceding Pope Leo XII.
Biography[]
Barnaba Niccolo Maria Luigi Chiaramonti was born in Cesena in the Papal States (present-day Italy) in 1742. In 1756 he joined the Benedictine Order and was ordained as a priest in 1765, serving as Bishop of Tivoli after 1782. In 1785 he was made Bishop of Imola, a title which he held until 1816; the same year he was also created Cardinal-Priest of San Castillo, a title that lasted to 1800.
He was elected as Pope Pius VII after being made a cardinal in 1785 to succeed Pope Pius VI, and was made Pope in an era of warfare between France and Europe's great powers. Pius VII was forced to sit on the bench outside of the Notre Dame Cathedral when Napoleon Bonaparte was coronated as Emperor of France on 2 December 1804, and did not take this insult lightly. He allied with the Kingdom of Naples and Kingdom of Sicily during the War of the Third Coalition, but Napoleon could not lose his northern Italian allies by attacking the Pope. Henceforth, he remained pope until his death in 1823.