The papal conclave of 1623 was the papal conclave

Papal conclave

A papal conclave is a meeting of the College of Cardinals convened to elect a Bishop of Rome, who then becomes the Pope during a period of vacancy in the papal office. The Pope is considered by Roman Catholics to be the apostolic successor of Saint Peter and earthly head of the Roman Catholic Church...

 of Cardinal

Cardinal (Catholicism)

A cardinal is a senior ecclesiastical official, usually an ordained bishop, and ecclesiastical prince of the Catholic Church. They are collectively known as the College of Cardinals, which as a body elects a new pope. The duties of the cardinals include attending the meetings of the College and...

s called on the death of Pope Gregory XV

Pope Gregory XV

Pope Gregory XV , born Alessandro Ludovisi, was pope from 1621, succeeding Paul V on 9 February 1621...

. It lasted eighteen days from 19 July 1623 to 6 August 1623 and chose Maffeo Barberini, who took office as Pope Urban VIII

Pope Urban VIII

Pope Urban VIII , born Maffeo Barberini, was pope from 1623 to 1644. He was the last pope to expand the papal territory by force of arms, and was a prominent patron of the arts and reformer of Church missions...

.

History

The College of Cardinals

College of Cardinals

The College of Cardinals is the body of all cardinals of the Catholic Church.A function of the college is to advise the pope about church matters when he summons them to an ordinary consistory. It also convenes on the death or abdication of a pope as a papal conclave to elect a successor...

 was then made up of 66 members, of whom all but 12 cardinals were in Rome at the time the conclave was called, so the conclave had 54 participants, chosen by the following popes:

• pope Gregory XV
  Pope Gregory XV
  Pope Gregory XV , born Alessandro Ludovisi, was pope from 1621, succeeding Paul V on 9 February 1621...
  
  : 9 cardinals
• pope Paul V
  Pope Paul V
  -Theology:Paul met with Galileo Galilei in 1616 after Cardinal Bellarmine had, on his orders, warned Galileo not to hold or defend the heliocentric ideas of Copernicus. Whether there was also an order not to teach those ideas in any way has been a matter for controversy...
  
  : 32 cardinals
• pope Clement VIII
  Pope Clement VIII
  Pope Clement VIII , born Ippolito Aldobrandini, was Pope from 30 January 1592 to 3 March 1605.-Cardinal:...
  
  : 8 cardinals
• pope Gregory XIV
  Pope Gregory XIV
  Pope Gregory XIV , born Niccolò Sfondrati, was Pope from 5 December 1590 until his death in 1591.- Early career :...
  
  : 2 cardinals
• pope Sixtus V
  Pope Sixtus V
  Pope Sixtus V , born Felice Peretti di Montalto, was Pope from 1585 to 1590.-Early life:The chronicler Andrija Zmajević states that Felice's family originated from modern-day Montenegro...
  
  : 2 cardinals
• pope Gregory XIII
  Pope Gregory XIII
  Pope Gregory XIII , born Ugo Boncompagni, was Pope from 1572 to 1585. He is best known for commissioning and being the namesake for the Gregorian calendar, which remains the internationally-accepted civil calendar to this date.-Youth:He was born the son of Cristoforo Boncompagni and wife Angela...
  
  : 1 cardinal

The conclave divided up into four factions:

• The elderly, who had risen to cardinal even before the accession of pope Paul V
  Pope Paul V
  -Theology:Paul met with Galileo Galilei in 1616 after Cardinal Bellarmine had, on his orders, warned Galileo not to hold or defend the heliocentric ideas of Copernicus. Whether there was also an order not to teach those ideas in any way has been a matter for controversy...
  
  
• The prince-cardinals from the Farnese and d'Este families, as well as the cardinal of Savoy
• The 22 to 25 Borghesiani, created by the Borghese pope Paul V
• The Ludovisiani, the cardinal-nephew
  Cardinal-nephew
  A cardinal-nephew is a cardinal elevated by a Pope who is that cardinal's uncle, or, more generally, his relative. The practice of creating cardinal-nephews originated in the Middle Ages, and reached its apex during the 16th and 17th centuries. The word nepotism originally referred specifically to...
  
  s of Gregory XV and their supporters, led by Ludovico Ludovisi, initially including only 15 cardinals but later rising to 20.

Participants

• Cardinal Dean
  Dean of the College of Cardinals
  The Dean of the Sacred College of Cardinals is the president of the College of Cardinals in the Roman Catholic Church, and as such always holds the rank of Cardinal Bishop. The Dean is not necessarily the longest-serving member of the whole College...
  
  : Antonio Maria Sauli
• Sub-dean: Francesco Maria Bourbon del Monte
• Maffeo Barberini
  Pope Urban VIII
  Pope Urban VIII , born Maffeo Barberini, was pope from 1623 to 1644. He was the last pope to expand the papal territory by force of arms, and was a prominent patron of the arts and reformer of Church missions...
  
  
• Giovanni Battista Deti
• Francesco Sforza di Santa Fiora
• Ottavio Bandini
• Federico Borromeo
  Federico Borromeo
  Federico Borromeo was an Italian ecclesiastic, cardinal and archbishop of Milan.-Biography:Federico Borromeo was born in Milan as the second son of Giulio Cesare Borromeo, Count of Arona, and Margherita Trivulzio...
  
  
• Andrea Baroni Peretti Montalto
• Bonifacio Bevilacqua
• Alessandro d'Éste
• Domenico Ginnasi
• Carlo Gaudenzio Madruzzo
  Carlo Gaudenzio Madruzzo
  Carlo Gaudenzio Madruzzo was an Italian Roman Catholic cardinal and statesman.-Biography:Born in the castle of Issogne, Aosta Valley, he was the son of Baron Giovanni Federico Madruzzo and Isabelle of Challant, and nephew of Cardinal Ludovico Madruzzo, Prince-Bishop of Trento.After his studies in...
  
  
• Giovanni Doria
  Giovanni Doria
  Giovanni Doria , called Giannettino, the son of Giovanni Andrea Doria, 6th Prince of Melfi, and Princess Zenobia Doria del Carretto, 5th Princess of Melfi, who studied philosophy and theology in Spain being promoted to the Cardinalate at the instance of King Felipe II of Spain...
  
  
• Carlo Emanuele Pio di Savoia
  Carlo Emanuele Pio di Savoia
  Carlo Emanuele Pio di Savoia was an Italian cardinal of the Pio di Savoia family.-Life:His father was Enea Pio di Savoia, Signore di Sassuolo, Consigliere di Stato in Piedmont , knight of the Ordine dell'Annunziata , Piedmontese ambassador to Rome and governor of Reggio...
  
  
• Scipione Caffarelli-Borghese
• Giovanni Garzia Millini
• Marcello Lante della Rovere
  Marcello Lante della Rovere
  Marcello Lante della Rovere was an Italian people Catholic Cardinal appointed Dean and Camerlengo of the College of Cardinals.-Family and early life:...
  
  
• Maurizio di Savoia
• Fabrizio Veralli
• Giovanni Battista Leni
• Luigi Capponi
  Luigi Capponi
  Luigi Capponi was an Italian Catholic Cardinal who became Archbishop of Ravenna.-Biography:Capponi was born in 1582, the son of Senator Francesco Capponi and Ludovica Macchiavelli. The Capponi family had extensive links to Italian political circles and to senior members of the Catholic Church...
  
  
• Dezio Carafa
• Domenico Rivarola
• Pietro Paolo Crescenzi
• Giacomo Serra
• Agostino Galamini
• Gaspar Borgia
• Felice Centini
• Roberto Ubaldini
  Roberto Ubaldini
  Roberto Ubaldini was a bishop and cardinal of the Catholic Church.He was born in Florence. He was appointed Bishop of Montepulciano in 1607, and ordained to that post in 1608. He was elevated to the status of cardinal in 1615, and made Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of the Council in 1621...
  
  
• Tiberio Muti
• Gabriel Trejo Paniagua
  Gabriel Trejo Paniagua
  Gabriel Trejo Paniagua was a Spanish cardinal, bishop and rector of the University of Salamanca.-Life:...
  
  
• Carlo de Medici
• Giulio Savelli
• Melchior Klesl
  Melchior Klesl
  Melchior Klesl was an Austrian statesman and cardinal of the Roman Catholic church during the time of the Counter-Reformation...
  
  
• Pietro Campora
• Matteo Prioli
• Scepino Cobelluzz
• Francesco Cennini de´Salamandri
• Guido Bentivoglio
• Pietro Valier
• Eitel Friedrich von Zollern
• Giulio Roma
  Giulio Roma
  Giulio Roma was an Italian Catholic Cardinal and Bishop of Recanati and Loreto.Roma was born 16 September 1584, in Milan, one of 16 children born to noble parents and was educated at the University of Pavia and the University of PerugiaAt a young age he became a chamberlain to Cardinal Federico...
  
  
• Cesare Gherardi
• Desiderio Scaglia
• Stefano Pignatelli
  Stefano Pignatelli
  Stefano Pignatelli was an Italian cardinal.Despite the name, he was not a member of the well-known Neapolitan noble family. His father was a potter...
  
  
• Ludovico Ludovisi
• Antonio Caetani
• Francesco Sacrati
  Francesco Sacrati
  Francesco Sacrati was an Italian composer of the Baroque era, who played an important role in the early history of opera. He wrote for the Teatro Novissimo in Venice as well as touring his operas throughout Italy...
  
  
• Francesco Boncompagni
• Ippolito Aldobrandini
  Ippolito Aldobrandini (cardinal)
  Ippolito Aldobrandini was a Catholic Cardinal. He served as Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church from 1623 to 1638. Pope Clement VIII, whose birth name was also Ippolito Aldobrandini, was his great-uncle....
  
  
• Lucio Sanseverino
• Marco Antonio Gozzadini
• Cosmo de Torres
• Ottavio Rodolfi

Absent cardinals

• Franz Xaver von Dietrichstein
• Francois de Sourdis d´Escobleau
• Antonio Zapata y Cisneros
  Antonio Zapata y Cisneros
  Antonio Zapata y Cisneros was a Spanish bishop, archbishop and cardinal-priest of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, as well as councillor to Philip III of Spain, viceroy of Naples and inquisitor general of Spain...
  
  
• François de la Rochefoucald
• Baltasar de Moscoso y Sandoval
• Alessandro Orsini
• Francisco Gómez de Sandoval y Rojas
• Ferdinand of Austria
• Louis de Nogaret d´Epernon de la Valette
• Agostino Spinola
• Armand-Jean du Plessis de Richelieu
• Alfonso de la Cueva

Sources

• vaticanhistory.de: Urban VIII.