Pope Stephen VIII
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Stephen VII, Pope (December, 928 – 931).
Stephen VII was a Roman by birth. He was elected—probably handpicked—by Marozia from the Tusculani family, the unquestioned mistress of Rome during this period, as a stop-gap measure until her own son John was ready to assume the throne of Peter. This was the darkest period of papal history, when noble faction clans in Rome turned the papacy into a temporal fiefdom. Little is known of Stephen's reign, except that he confirmed the privileges of a few religious houses in France and Italy. He may, like several popes in this period, have been assassinated.
The validity of Stephen's papacy is subject to question. Like his predecessor, Leo VI, he was elected while Pope John X was still alive and in prison. Thus, if John's removal from office was invalid, then neither the election of Leo nor of Stephen was valid and they weren't genuine popes. In any event, Leo and Stephen had brief reigns, are not well remembered, and are not likely to have impacted Catholic policy very much. Stephen's reign was brief and few records remain.
Template:Start box Template:Succession box Template:End boxcs:Štěpán VII. de:Stephan VII. (Papst) es:Esteban VII fr:Étienne VII ko:교황 스테파노 8세 it:Papa Stefano VIII hu:VIII. István pápa nl:Paus Stephanus VII (VIII) pl:Stefan VIII pt:Papa Estêvão VIII sv:Stefan VIII zh:司提反八世