Pope John XVIII

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John XVIII
Birth name	Fasanius
Papacy began	January, 1004
Papacy ended	July, 1009
Predecessor	John XVII
Successor	Sergius IV
Born	??? Rapagnano, Italy
Died	July, 1009 Rome, Italy
Other popes named John

John XVIII (died June or July 1009) was Pope from 1004 to 1009.

He was born Fasanius at Rapagnano, near Ascoli Piceno, the son of a Roman priest named Leo.

During his whole pontificate he was allegedly subordinate to the head of the Crescentii clan who controlled Rome, the patricius (an aristocratic military leader) Johannes Crescentius III. The period was disturbed by the conflicts between the Ottonian Emperor Henry II (1002–24) and Arduin of Ivrea, who had styled himself King of Italy. Rome was wracked with bouts of plague, and Saracens operating freely out of Sardinia ravaged the Tyrrhenian coasts.

As Pope John XVIII occupied his time with details of ecclesiastical administration. He authorized a new see at Bamberg to serve as a base for missionary activity among the Slavs, a concern of Henry II's. He adjudicated a squabble between the abbot of Fleury and the bishops of Sens and Orléans.

Ultimately he abdicated and, according to one catalog of Popes, retired to a monastery, where he died shortly afterwards. His successor was Pope Sergius IV (1009–12).

(A note on numbering: Pope John XVIII was only the seventeenth pope called John, because John XVI was an antipope. However, this was not recognized at the time so the true sixteenth Pope John called himself XVII. Thus the true seventeenth pope called John took the regnal number XVIII. But some historians (perhaps due to the numbering of Pope John XXI), however, often called him Pope John XIX or "John XVIII (XIX)" due to the legend of another Pope John between Pope John XIV and the true Pope John XV (whom historians sometimes thus called XVI). This legend of a pope between John XIV and John XV, and the antipapacy of John XVI, is why there is so much confusion of the numbering of Popes John, and why the sequence of Johns is now two off.)

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This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913. (The article can be found here: [1])

Roman Catholic Church titles
Preceded by John XVII	Pope 1004–09	Succeeded by Sergius IV

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