Editing Pope Martin I (section)

==Papacy (649–653)==
When Martin I was elected pope, the capital of the erstwhile Roman Empire was [[Constantinople]].<ref>To serve as the new capital of the Roman Empire in 324, the ancient city of Byzantium had been chosen. Its straddled the Bosporus strait and lay in both Europe and Asia. Its location, between the [[Golden Horn]] and the [[Sea of Marmara]], minimised the need for defensive walls. [[Constantine the Great|The Emperor Constantine]] renamed the city Nova Roma, or 'New Rome'. It was again renamed Constantinople (''city of Constantine'') on 11 May 330, seven years before his death. The city was built intentionally to rival Rome. There then followed the economic and military collapse of the empire's western half, and with it Rome's importance, in the late 5th century. By the seventh century Constantinople was well established as the administrative and political capital of the whole empire. As the gateway between two continents ([[Europe]] and [[Asia]]), and between two seas (the [[Mediterranean Sea|Mediterranean]] and the [[Black Sea]]), prosperity was guaranteed. From the mid-5th century, it was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe, and remained so until the early 13th century. Its massive and complex ramparts were famous: the most sophisticated defensive architecture of its time. The [[Walls of Constantinople|Theodosian Walls]] consisted of a double wall, the second fortification lying about 2 km (1.2 mi) west of the first. In front was a [[moat]] with [[palisade]]s. Constantinople's defenses proved impenetrable for nearly nine hundred years, despite being besieged by various armies on numerous occasions.</ref> It sat amidst the eastern domains, where the most influential Church leader was the [[Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople]] who was also guardian of [[Christendom|Christendom's]] holiest relics, such as the [[Crown of thorns]] and the [[True Cross]].<ref name=Foley>{{cite web| url = http://www.americancatholic.org/Features/Saints/saint.aspx?id=1352| title = Foley, Leonard OFM. "St. Martin I", ''Saint of the Day'', Franciscan Media}}</ref> To bring teaching prevalent in Constantinople into line with that elsewhere, and hastening to heal fissures appearing within the [[Catholic Church]], decisiveness distinguished Martin from the start. According to Piero Bargellini,<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/26750#google_vignette | title=San Martino I }}</ref> he neither sought nor waited for the Byzantine emperor Constans II's consent to his election. To emphasise the point, it was without the customary [[Byzantine Papacy|imperial ratification]]<ref name="ce"/> that Martin had himself [[episcopal consecration|consecrated]].

In the previous year, the emperor had published the [[Typos of Constans]]. This document defended the heretical Monothelite thesis, which watered down the Catholic faith by claiming that [[Jesus|Christ]] had not in fact had a human will. To silence this, and the confusion it caused, Pope Martin convened, within his first three months, the [[Lateran Council of 649]],<ref>The Council did not achieve ecumenical status, but represented the first attempt of a pope to assemble an ecumenical council without the emperor being in charge</ref> to which all the bishops of the West were invited. The Council met in the [[Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano|basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome]]. It was attended by 105 bishops (chiefly from [[Italy]], [[Sicily]], and [[Sardinia]], with some from [[Africa]] and other quarters). Over five sessions or ''secretarii'' from 5 to 31 October 649, resulting in twenty [[canon law|canon]]s, the Council censured Monothelitism, its authors, and the writings via which Monothelitism had spread and caused rifts within the Catholic Church. This condemnation embraced not only the latest emperor's ''Typos'' but also the ''[[Ecthesis]]'' (the exposition of faith of Patriarch [[Sergius I of Constantinople]], for which [[Heraclius|Emperor Heraclius]] had stood sponsor).<ref>{{cite book|last=Norwich|first=John J.|title=Byzantium: The Early Centuries.|year=1988|place=London|publisher=Penguin|isbn=0-670-80251-4|pages=317–318}}</ref>

Imperial interference in matters theological had been soundly rejected. Condemnation of all Monothelite writings provoked an angry reaction from the Byzantine court. Martin, unabashed, hastened to publish the Lateran Council decrees in an [[encyclical]]. Constans responded by getting his [[exarch]] [[Olympius (exarch)|in Italy]] to arrest the pope should he persist, and to send him as a prisoner to Constantinople. Martin was also accused by Constans of unauthorised contact and collaboration with the [[Muslims]] of the [[Rashidun Caliphate]]—allegations which he remained unable to convince the infuriated imperial authorities to drop.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Emmanouela Grypeou|author2=Mark (Mark N.) Swanson|author3=David Richard Thomas|title=The Encounter of Eastern Christianity With Early Islam|url=https://archive.org/details/encountereastern00gryp|url-access=limited|date=2006|publisher=Brill|isbn=9789004149380|page=[https://archive.org/details/encountereastern00gryp/page/n85 79]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author1=Walter E. Kaegi|title=Muslim Expansion and Byzantine Collapse in North Africa|date= 2010|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=9780521196772|page=89}}</ref>

The arrest orders could not be carried out for more than three years. On 17 June 653, Martin was arrested in the [[Lateran Palace|Lateran]], along with [[Maximus the Confessor]].{{sfn|Bury|2005|p=294}} He was hurried out of Rome and conveyed first to [[Naxos, Greece]], and subsequently to Constantinople, where he arrived on 17 September 653. He was saved from execution by the pleas of Patriarch [[Paul II of Constantinople]], who was himself gravely ill.{{sfn|Richards|1979|p=190}} Martin hoped that a new pope would not be elected while he lived but the imperial Byzantine government forced the Romans to find a successor. [[Eugene I]] was elected on 10 August 654, and Martin apparently acquiesced.{{sfn|Attwater|1939|p=72}} After suffering an exhausting imprisonment and reportedly many public indignities, Martin was banished to [[Chersonesus|Cherson]],{{sfn|Siecienski|2010|p=74}} where he arrived on 15 May 655. He died there on 16 September.{{sfn|Richards|1979|p=190}}