At this period the papal city fell under female rule, that of the
mysterious, but undoubtedly notorious Theodora, who wielded the power
gained by her beauty, wealth and cleverness, of absolute queen of Rome.
Her husband was a certain Theophylactus, a consul, senator and patrician
of Rome, and she had two daughters, Marozia and Theodora, both of whom
emulated their mother in wickedness. The chief interest attaching to
these infamous women is that they made St. Angelo their chief residence
and the principal theatre of their misdeeds. The elder daughter,
Theodora, after the death of her husband, favoured a young ecclesiastic
whom she brought to Rome; and eventually she procured his election as
pope, bequeathing him the castle of St. Angelo at her death. Marozia
hated him, drove him forth, became chatelaine and in her turn ruler of
Rome. When Marozia lost her first husband she married a second, Guido,
duke of Tuscany, associated with whom she was guilty of many crimes. She
had two sons; one she made pope as John XI, and the other, Alberic,
conspired against her. Being by this time a widow, she married a third
husband, Hugo of Provence, king of Italy, and the nuptials were
celebrated with great pomp in St. Angelo, in the vault where the
porphyry sarcophagus of the Emperor Hadrian still stood. Alberic soon
quarrelled with his stepfather and summoning the Roman people to his aid
he upbraided them for submitting to the tyranny of a woman and stranger;
he incited them to storm the castle, whence Hugo escaped by letting
himself down by a rope from the walls and Marozia fled to a convent
where she died.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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