Scroll through the whole page to download all images before printing.Pope Francis during his 2014 visit to South Korea — Source (Photo by Korea.net / Korean Culture and Information Service (Jeon Han))
This afternoon, the College of Cardinals will convene in the Sistine Chapel to elect a new Bishop of Rome after the death of Pope Francis last month. They have entered the period known as conclave: swearing an oath of secrecy, the cardinals eligible to vote will be locked in the Apostolic Palace until a new leader of the Catholic Church has been chosen. The cardinals will vote continuously — one vote today (the first day of conclave), four votes for every day that follows, with voting paused at regular intervals to allow for reflection if the conclave progresses without the emergence of a Supreme Pontiff — until a two-thirds-plus-one supermajority is formed in favor of a candidate. After each vote is counted, the ballots are burned; if the smoke that emerges over St. Peter’s Square is white, it is a sign that a new pope has been chosen. Elections can last months, if not years (see below), although since the election of Pope Gregory XVI in 1830–1831, no conclave has lasted for more than a week.
_Liber_Chronicarum_(serietitel)%2C_RP-P-2016-49-68-10.jpg?fit=max&w=640&h=1200&auto=format,compress)
Scroll through the whole page to download all images before printing.Woodcut of Pope Clement IV, 1493 — Source.
Following the death of Pope Clement IV, nineteen cardinals gathered in Viterbo to elect a new leader. Factions quickly developed, between those faithful to the papacy and those whose allegiances lay with the Holy Roman Empire, and external political powers sought to sway the election. Deadlocked for years, the cardinals faced hardships that exceeded mere protracted ecclesiastical squabbling. Frustrated with the slow-going process, magistrates in Viterbo locked the cardinals in the Palazzo dei Papi — this is the origin of *conclave*, from the Latin for “with key” — fed them only bread and water, and eventually removed the roof of their accomodation. After 1006 days, Gregory X emerged as the new pope. One of his first acts? Passing the papal bull known as *Ubi periculum*, which limited cardinals’ meals if they did not choose a pope expeditiously, forced them to lodge together, and locked them in for the duration of their debates — measures intended to prevent a repeat of his own path toward popehood.
_Liber_Chronicarum_(serietitel),_RP-P-2016-49-68-10.jpg){kind=link}