Burney says: "Nor was it until after the Reformation that Papessa Joan’s reign became questioned."

The record seems clear to us: Regarding the story of Pope Joan as a mere tale, the Roman Catholic authority gives a summary: "After Leo IV (846-855) the English John of Mainz occupied the papal chair for two years, seven months and four days ...it is alleged, a woman! When a girl, she was taken to Athens in male clothes by her lover, and there made such progress in learning that no one was her equal. She came to Rome, where she taught science, and thereby attracted the attention of learned men ...and was finally chosen as pope, becoming pregnant by one of her trusted attendants. She gave birth to a child during a procession from St. Peter’s to the Lateran.... There she died almost immediately, and it is said, she was buried at the same place" (Opera vi, 1706).

Moreover, the same authority speaks of the papessa, amazingly transformed into a man 850 years after her death, and no one offered to question her existence. Since the 16th century, Catholic historians determinedly began to deny the existence of the papessa.

Lois Sweet wrote in a Toronto newspaper: "Joan was born in 818, went to school in Cologne and fell in love with a Benedictine monk. In order to go with him to Athens, she disguised herself as a man. When he died, she went to Rome and studied to become a priest. A combination of scholarly brilliance and characteristic unfeminine ambition led her to a quick rise in the Vatican hierarchy. In 853 Joan became Pope John VIII" (The Nuremburg Chronicle, 1493; Chronicle of Saxony).

Further interest in the papessa was arrested by two Montreal feminists, Debra D’Etremont and Kathlene McFall, who saw her as a way of pointing out the staunchly anti-feminine sentiment of the Roman Catholic Church. Pope Joan T-shirts were made and some 3,000 Canadian women felt that wearing such a T-shirt was one way for women to make a silent protest. Pope John Paul II was not at all impressed. (Rhoidis, Chronicles)!

The celebrated author, Biovanni Boccaccio, makes the Papessa play a conspicuous part among celebrated women, and compares her to Semiramis (Encyclopedia of Universal History, p.161).

Polonius, who believed in the reality of Pope Joan, was a noted historian, as was Anastasius (886). He would, therefore, be a contemporary of Pope Joan. Spanheim also says, he is the first to mention Joan (The Catholic Encyclopedia)

Frehero and Bouclere says that Pope Joan was mentioned in both of the manuscripts of Anastasius, at Paris and Heidelberg (The Toronto Star, October 19, 1984).

Alamiaric D’Auger gives details about Pope Joan, and dedicates his work to Pope Urbino (Canadian Revivalist).

Amabric (1370), in his writings, admits Pope Joan among the other popes. Corio mentions that it was a regular custom with all popes to submit to the test of the sedes.

In the Romanist approved history it was stated that some "mention should be made of the Papessa Joan, a female who is supposed to have occupied the Holy See at this period" (De Cleris Mutieribus).

Llorente, the Spanish Romanist historian of the inquisition, accepts Pope Joan. The historian Jurien remarks: "As Joan was wise, eloquent and beautiful, the apostolic throne, which had been occupied by so many ignorant and wicked monks, has been more honoured than dishonoured by her" (History of the Popes).

It has been firmly confirmed that the ancient statue of a mother and child had always stood upon the route (now never used in any papal procession) and was transformed into a statue of the erring Joan and her betrayer (Exercitatiode de Papa Foemina ii, p. 577). "The fact that papal processions no longer went down that particular street became condemning evidence of papal guilt and shame --though other streets were cut out of the processional route from time to time and no similar motives were implied" (Lives of the Popes).

Bernard Guy of Galicia was inquisitor under Pope John XXII, persecutor of the Albigenses, and an historian of repute, and he says that he had read a number of Chronicles so as to discover the truth; and yet places Joan among the popes" (D’Auger, Nomenclature Chronologique des evegues de Rome, 1362).

Anastasius was the papal librarian, a contemporary with Pope Joan, and records her reign (Corio, History of Milan).

Platina, keeper of the Vatican Library under Pope Sixtus (1471) said that "He could not omit the relation, because all men then believed it to be true"; and further: "Joan had ordained 14 bishops, built five churches, added a new article to the creed, wrote three books against the Iconoclasts, cleared the Emperor Lothaire, crowned his successor Louis, and performed many other memorable deeds.... Chroniclers record with suitable admiration that Joan became pope. They attribute some of these acts to her predecessor and some to her successor; or else, they simply erase them altogether from the records of papal history."

Felix Amerlin relates the event in his day, there were many books of Liturgies still extant, which had been composed by Pope Joan. He also mentions the use of the commode, the sedes. Martin le Franc likewise mentions the Liturgies of Pope Joan, as well as the Chasse pierce.

Pope Pius II, one of the most learned of the popes, disliked Joan’s story, but he did not venture to say more than "the story was not certain."

Pope John XXIII at the Council of Constance did not venture to rebuke Hus for taunting the assembly with the female pope scandal.

D’Auger dedicated his work, in which he upholds Pope Joan, to Pope Urban V, which he could hardly have done if that pope rejected her.

Neim was the secretary of Pope John XXII. Polonius was the penitentiary of Popes John XXII and Nicholas III. Bishop Guy was inquisitor under Pope John XXII, Chancellor Gerson, in his sermon before Pope Benedict XIII, mentioned Pope Joan as a reality. The popes would hardly allow Pope Joan’s Liturgies to be used, if she were not a reality. These learned ecclesiastics, holding such high and confidential positions under these popes, would not have accepted Pope Joan unless their popes did!

Even before the days of the Reformation which exposed many to the evils then presented in the Roman church, the story was believed firmly by chroniclers, bishops, and even by popes. Pope Anastasius mentions her (Pageant of the Popes). Actually all textbooks before the Reformation mention Pope Joan, either in the margin or in the text itself.

Horatius Bonet was Prior to Challon, and author of a work, dedicated to Charles I of France. In it he says "And it was no small affliction for people to think that they had a woman for a pope" (Historie de Papisme).

Othon, German Bishop of Fressingue, was grandson of Henry IV and half-brother of the Emperor Conrad II. In his work he mentions without a doubt Pope Joan as a matter of fact (Llorente, The Privileges of Empire).

Stephen de Bourbon, of the Royal House of France, mentions Joan as one of the Popes of Rome (D’Aubigne, History of the Reformation).

Theodoric Neim, learned secretary of John XXII, says that Joan taught publicly at Rome in the Greek school where Augustine had lectured, and became the Papessa.

Neim found at Florence a work he published, supplemented by notes wherein he writes of Joan (who) ...was "delivered of boy during the progress of solemn procession, near the Temple of Peace" (Anastasius, History of the Popes).

Theodore Neim says: "There existed at Rome a marble statue representing the fact that as it took place...that of a woman who was delivered of a child." Pope Benedict erected the statue in order to inspire a horror of the scandal which took place on that spot.

Launoy gives his testimony in these words: "Any person who was not blind might have seen this statue between those of Leo and Benedict ...inscribed ‘Johannes VIII, Femina de Anglia’" (Ibid.)

Martin Luther, while visiting Rome, before his conversion, passing along a principal street leading to St. Peter’s Cathedral, stopped in amazement before the statue representing a pope, under the figure of a woman holding a sceptre, clothed in a mantle and bearing a child in her arms. He was told, when he asked: "It is the girl of Mainz ...who was chosen pope by the cardinals, and was delivered of a child on this spot; therefore no pope ever passes through this street."

"I wonder," observed Luther, "That the popes allow the statue to remain." Forty years after Luther’s death, the statue was removed when Pope Sixtus V (1585) had the statue cast into the Tiber.

Dr. W. H. Dollinger, before he refuted the papal infallibility, wrote, "We are quite unable to explain how it has come about that it should be precisely from the ranks of this faithful militia of the Holy See, that we meet the most astute propagators of a history so injurious to the papacy" (Anastasius, History of the Roman Pontiffs).

While definitely rejecting Pope Joan as mythical, Dollinger stated: "In the 15th century hardly any doubt about Joan shows itself. At the beginning of the century the bust of Pope Joan was placed in the Cathedral of Sienna, along with the busts of other popes, and no one took offence at it. The Church of Sienna, in the time that followed gave three popes to the Holy See.... Not one of them ever thought of having the scandal removed. It was not until centuries later that, at the pressing demand of Pope Clement VIII (appr. 1600), Joan was metamorphosed into Pope Zacharias."

Two quotes of Pollard tell us "The subject of Pope Joan has not yet lost the interest which belong to it as fact in the province of historical criticism.... When one remembers that Pope John XIII was an atheist, and that seductive Theodora and her daughters intruded false pontiffs into the papal chair, is there much wrong with a Pope Joan? Better by far the Roman church made the best of a bad job by boosting her as The Pope that Shook the World!"

Many a contemporary writer referred in one way or another to the life of the papessa, and one cannot dispose speedily of scholars like W. H. Dollinger, Marianus Scotus, Theodoric Rhoidis, Platena, and other authorities we have listed (Bayle, L ’Arbe des Batailless).

Such are some of the testimonies of numerous learned and able classes of Romanists, from the popes down, to the existence and reigning of a woman pope. There are also testimonies of numerous learned Protestants upon the same reality.

Great was the consternation when a premature infant was produced from the voluminous robes of papal vestments, after the papessa fainted and fell to the ground in agony. Archdeacons recoiled in horror, worshippers pressed closer, screaming and crossing themselves. Hierarchs sought to save the situation and change disgust to amazement by crying out, "A miracle! A miracle! They bellowed loudly calling upon the faithful to kneel and worship. In vain --a male saint as pregnant and bringing forth a child was too much! Shouts were engulfed by the swelling thunder of the mob expressing their utter rejection of both papessa and child, shrieking that they both must be thrown into the Tiber.

Joan died on the street, her last words, reputedly: "My face I gave for strokes, as a shame and a rebuke." These words are reported by several hundred chroniclers. In the presence of such an assembly of witnesses we can only bow our heads in acknowledgement! The body of the papessa was, indeed, buried on the spot where she fell. Her grave bore a marble relief depicting a woman and her babe. Pious pilgrims, afraid of contaminating their feet by walking in the footsteps of the sacrilegious woman pope, have, ever since, we are told, taken another route to the Lateran.

This is but one shameful episode In Rome’s long, dark past.

So also were events like St. Bartholomew’s Eve massacre, the slaughter of the Irish Protestants, the sadistic inquisition and the like!

Talk about miracles! Imagine a woman marvelously transformed into a man 850 years after her death: "In the 14th and 15th centuries," Rome tells us, "this papessa was counted as an historical personage, whose existence no one doubted. She had her place among the carved busts which stood in Sienna Cathedral. Under Pope Clement’s magic (1592-1595) she was transformed into Pope Zacharius. The heretic, Hus, in defense of his doctrine before the Council of Constance, referred to the papessa and no one offered to question her existence.... Since the 15th century, historians began to deny the very existence of the female pope" (Rhoidis, Annals).

Rome deals so much in legends and spiritual fantasies that she cannot complain if others feel obliged to believe what she is pleased to call legend, myth and fable! The fact is that no one has put forward any convincing reason for the non-existence of this female pope. The account of her success to the papal throne is overwhelming. The evidence, we are told, is circumstantial, but if the reader was a member of a panel of jurists, and was called upon to render a verdict in this case, he would surely say: "It is factual!" -To Be Concluded

("The Papessa, Whose Name Was Joan" appeared in The Protestant Challenge, the Voice of The Canadian Protestant League, September-October 1994; Jonas E. C. Shepherd, Editor; 600 Woodview Road, Burlington, Ontario L7N 3A3. Reprinted with permission)

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