THE POPE WHO MET THE KING OF THE SCOTS

HOW THE FUTURE PIUS II UNDERTOOK A SECRET MISSION TO SCOTTISH KING JAMES I

Margaret Stenhouse

Pius II is one of the most original popes of the early Renaissance... an adventurous traveller, an acute observer, a womaniser, a town planner and the author of a best-selling novel of unrequited love. While still a layman, he was sent on a dangerous mission to the northern reaches of Europe.

A land “rude, uncultivated and unvisited by the winter sun.” So wrote Aeneas Silvius Bartolomeus Piccolomini, the future Pope Pius II, describing his visit to the kingdom of Scotland in Commentaries, his 13-book-long biography, which he wrote in the third person to conceal his identity. Aeneas was 30 years old, an ambitious and up-and-coming player in the diplomatic field. He had been sent as an envoy on behalf of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III, on a secret mission to the court of the Scottish king James I.*

His journey to the remote and dismal north in 1435 could hardly have got off to a worse start. It was the winter solstice and he had endured a terrifying passage from the Flemish port of Sluys to the Scottish town of Dunbar, with days and nights of relentless gales battering his ship. Aeneas had feared for his life and he had sworn to walk barefoot to offer thanks at the celebrated shrine of Our Lady at Whitekirk if he was delivered safely to his destination. The shrine was over 12 kilometres away from his landing place and by the time he arrived, his feet were so frozen that his servants had to carry him back on a litter.

When he had recovered from his ordeal he requested an audience with James I, who appears

to have received him favourably: “When he was at last admitted to the King’s presence, he obtained all he had come to ask”. His mission had been top secret and he kept it so. Historians speculate that he was charged with the task of persuading the Scottish king to enter into war against England in order to support the French, who were locked in conflict with the English over territorial disputes.

The historic encounter has been immortalised by Pinturicchio in the Piccolomini Library attached to the Duomo of Siena. Pintoricchio obviously had a free hand and used his imagination. Although the king at that date was only in his early 40s, he is depicted as an elderly sage with a long white beard, seated in majesty on a high throne. An open window at his back shows a serene panorama with a river, a lake, trees and a castle that looks more Austrian than Scottish. And, of course, the sky is blue and it isn’t raining. The emperor’s envoy, Aeneas Piccolomini, is shown standing at the foot of the dais.

Aeneas does not seem to have been successful. James did not want yet another war against his historic enemy. He had virtually grown up in the English court, after he was captured as a boy of 11 while he on his way to France and subsequently held hostage for 18 years until his impoverished subjects could raise the ransom money to free him. In England he had been well treated and had acquired an English wife – Joan Beaufort, the English king’s cousin. He returned to his kingdom to reclaim his throne in 1424.

According to a contemporary admirer, Walter Bower, the Abbot of Incholm, James was “strong limbed and unbelievably active.....”. Bower described the king as a keen sportsman who could “wrestle any of his nobles of any size”. He also apparently excelled in throwing the hammer, archery and jousting. Bower waxed lyrical over the king’s polyvalent musical talents, at playing the organ, the flute, the drums and the lyre: “not just as an enthusiastic amateur but as a master”.

When Aeneas met him, however, the king was 10 years older and not such a romantic figure. In the Commentaries, James is described as “stocky and weighed down with fat”. He had, however, “clear and piercing eyes”. Aeneas gives the impression that the king and he did not quite hit it off but, in fact, James seems to have treated him well. His account that: “He was reimbursed for his travelling expenses and was given fifty nobles for the return journey and two horses called trotters” indicates that the cashstrapped monarch held him in high regard.

In common, the two men had a love of poetry. While in captivity in the English court James had written a long love poem called The Kingis Quaire, perhaps to win over the Lady Joan, whom he could observe strolling in the garden under his prison window. Aeneas, on the other hand, had held the prestigious post of Imperial Poet to the Holy Roman Emperor.

James I of Scotland ruled from 1406 to 1437.

Aeneas had a lively mind and was a keen observer. He wrote: “It is said there are two Scotlands, one cultivated, the other wooded with no open land. The Scots who live in the latter part speak a different language and sometimes use the bark of trees for food”.... “It is a cold country where few things will grow..... Below the ground is found a sulphurous rock which the Scots dig up for fuel.”.... “The cities have no walls; the houses are usually constructed without mortar: their roofs are covered with turf.”

“The common people, who are poor and rude, stuff themselves with meat and fish, but eat bread as a luxury.” He regretted that “they have no wine except what they import” but, on the plus side: “the oysters are larger than those in England and many pearls are found in them” and “There are no wolves in Scotland.”

Regarding the inhabitants, he noted: “There is nothing the Scotch like better to hear than abuse of the English”....“The men are short and brave; the women fair, charming, and easily won. Women here think less of a kiss than in Italy of a touch of the hand.” This latter trait he found particularly attractive. Aeneas had so far shrunk from taking Holy Orders, as would have been the natural upward step for an aristocrat from an impoverished family like himself, because he did not wish to commit himself to becoming celibate. In fact, he admitted that he had fathered various children in his travels round the European countries, Scotland included.

Only two years after Aeneas’ encounter with the King of Scots, James was assassinated by a group of rival barons who did not approve of reforms he was trying to introduce into Scotland, following models he had observed at the English court.

Aeneas instead went on to have a brilliant career. He finally took the plunge and was ordained in

1447, going on to make a rapid ascent up the church career ladder. He ended up as pope, just two years after he had been made a cardinal, by unanimous vote at the second ballot in the 1458 conclave.

Becoming Pope Pius II meant a drastic change in habits and attitudes for the new pontiff, especially with regard to women. A man who had written, shortly before his 40th birthday, an erotic best seller entitled: The Tale of Two Lovers, (original title “Historia de duobus amantibus”), albeit under a false name, would obviously not have been considered a suitable candidate for the Throne of St Peter.

Set in Siena, Aeneas’ novel recounts a forbidden love story between Lucretia, a married noblewomen, and Euryalus the Frank, a knight in the emperor’s train, and the tale is embellished with purple prose like: her “coral lips made to be bitten”, “Oh lovely bosom, most glorious breasts! Can it be that I touch you, possess you, hold you in my hands? Smooth limbs, sweet-scented body, are you really mine?” and “Lucretia... burnt by a secret flame completely forgets that she is a wife. She hates her husband, and cherishes love’s wound, keeping Euryalus face stamped on her heart, nor gives her body any rest.”

As pope, however, he made a total turnaround in his attitude to women, adopting the typical prejudices of churchmen from the Middle Ages onwards: “Woman is an imperfect creature.... without faith, without fear, without constancy, without piety!” and “When you see a woman, think that you see a devil.”

Despite his alleged poor opinion of the female sex, he canonised St Catherine of Siena, the 14thcentury mystic who persuaded Pope Gregory XI to move back to Rome from Avignon, and he had a great admiration for Joan of Arc, “that astonishing and marvellous maid”, dedicating several pages of his memoirs to her exploits. She was put to death in 1431, just four years before his trip to Scotland.

During his six-year papacy, he concentrated much energy on attempting to organise another crusade against the Turks, who had captured Constantinople. Among the rulers he tried to involve was Vlad III Dracula of Romania (yes, the same notorious Dracula the Impaler who has lived on in legend). He also took an interest in antiquities and issued a papal bull prohibiting damage to ancient Roman ruins. His most lasting heritage, however, has been the creation of his “Ideal City”, a masterpiece of city planning, on the site of Corsignano, his home village, which he re-named Pienza, or “City of Pius”.

Meeting between James and Aeneas in the Pinturicchio frescoes of the Piccolomini Library.

Note: Commentaries was first published in 1584, many years after Aeneas’ death, by Cardinal Francesco Bandini Piccolomini, a relative, who cut out all the passages he thought might damage the pope’s reputation. Therefore, most available copies are in the abridged version. A rare unabridged copy is in the Rare Books Collection of the National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh. *James I of Scotland (1394-1437), not to be confused with the Stuart King, James I of England (1566-1625).