Pius II in the Bath: Papal Ceremony and Cultural History

This article examines Pope Pius II (1458–1464) as a performer, receiving an ambassador while being undressed for the bath in May 1460 and directing the translation of St Andrew’s head to Rome in April 1462. An analytical comparison of anti-ceremonial and ceremonious conduct at the papal court of the High Renaissance, the study challenges antitheses conventionally drawn between popular and high culture, and questions the pertinence of secular models to this pope’s theatricality. Not the humanist on the throne of St Peter whom cliché calls him, Pius II emerges as an exponent of clerical courtliness that was based on the Bible and directed towards reform of the Roman Curia. His gift for dramatic shock and surprise, which cannot be explained in terms of the ceremonial literature of the period, invites us to reflect on the traditional but inadequate distinction between the two personae of the pope that is still current in cultural history.