Sergius I

Pope Sergius I, bishop of Rome from December 687 until his death in 701, was a Sicilian of Syrian ancestry. The Liber Pontificalis describes him as of Syrian nation from the region of Antioch, born at Palermo (Panormus) to a father named Tiberius. Seventh-century Sicily belonged to the Byzantine Empire, and the family's Antiochene origin reflects the substantial Eastern Christian presence in the island's cities. Sergius came to Rome during the pontificate of Adeodatus II and was trained in the Lateran schola cantorum. Pope Leo II ordained him priest and assigned him the title church of Santa Susanna, which he later restored and embellished.

His election followed the death of Pope Conon in 687 and a bitterly contested succession. The archpriest Theodore and the archdeacon Paschal each gathered a faction; Paschal had already sought the support of the exarch John Platyn at Ravenna with a promised bribe. A majority of the Roman clergy and people then put forward Sergius as a candidate acceptable to both sides. The exarch entered Rome, extracted a large payment corresponding to the sum Paschal had pledged, and allowed Sergius to be consecrated on 15 December 687. Paschal was later accused of necromancy and confined to a monastery.

The defining political crisis of the pontificate was Sergius's refusal to endorse the canons of the Quinisext Council (the Council in Trullo) of 692. Emperor Justinian II forwarded the acts for papal signature; several canons—on clerical marriage, Saturday fasting in Lent, the ranking of sees, and other points of discipline—conflicted with Roman custom, and Sergius would not subscribe. Justinian ordered his arrest and transfer to Constantinople, as had been done to Martin I. When the imperial officer Zacharias attempted to seize the pope, the Roman militia and troops from Ravenna and the Pentapolis rose in Sergius's defence; Zacharias took refuge from the crowd and was driven out. The emperor's deposition in 695 ended the immediate threat and left the papacy's practical independence from Constantinople more visible.

Sergius's relations with the English church were unusually close. In 689 Caedwalla, king of Wessex, abdicated, travelled to Rome, and received baptism from the pope at Easter; he died shortly afterwards and was buried at St Peter's. In 695 Sergius consecrated the Northumbrian missionary Willibrord as bishop for the Frisian mission, giving him the name Clement, an act that tied the new church on the lower Rhine to Rome. The pope also heard the long-running case of Wilfrid of York and issued decisions in Wilfrid's favour. In the Roman liturgy he is credited with introducing the singing of the Agnus Dei at the fraction of the host and with establishing solemn processions for the Marian feasts of the Annunciation, the Dormition (Assumption), the Nativity of Mary, and the Presentation (Hypapante). He repaired and endowed several Roman churches and is reported to have discovered a relic of the True Cross in a silver casket at St Peter's. He died in Rome on 8 September 701 and was buried in Old St Peter's Basilica. He has been venerated as a saint from an early date; his feast is kept on 8 September.