Last week saw the bicentenary of the death of Cardinal Ercole Consalvi, who died on 24 January 1824. Brilliant, erudite and Anglophile, Consalvi was Secretary of State to Pius VII for over 20 years – there was a gap in the middle when Pius was abducted and carried off to Paris by Napoleon – and Papal Plenipotentiary at the Congress of Vienna.
His diplomatic achievements included the 1801 Concordat which restored the Catholic Church in France after the Revolution, the restoration of the Papal States and the independence of the papacy in 1815, and the passing of laws to protect art in Rome which are still in force today.
This year the date was used by the Vatican and the British Foreign Office to organise a series of events to mark the bicentenary of the reestablishment of formal diplomatic relations between the Holy See and the Court of St James. As part of the proceedings, an historical symposium was organised by Professor Maurice Whitehead, the Venerable English College’s Director of Heritage Collections, and Dr Richard Smith, the Senior Historian at the Foreign Office.
As the English biographer of Consalvi, I was asked to give a paper about his youth: his upbringing in the household of the Cardinal Duke of York, his education and early career up to the conclave in Venice in 1800 (the last to take place away from Rome) and his subsequent appointment as Secretary of State. It provided the opportunity for a truly memorable week in Rome, where I stayed first at the Venerabile and then elsewhere in Rome to catch up with friends and revisit favourite places.
The main focus was, of course, the Consalvi celebrations: from talks at the Vatican and the English College to dinner at the official residence of the British Ambassador to the Holy See, Chris Trott, which was attended by Archbishop Paul Gallagher, a native of Liverpool who serves as the Holy See’s Secretary for Relations with States, as well as by the organisers and various speakers.
The anniversary day itself was packed with activity. In the morning, the Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, laid a laurel wreath on Consalvi’s cenotaph in the Pantheon, and afterwards celebrated a Solemn Mass at San Marcello al Corso, where Consalvi and his family are buried. Attended by the Diplomatic Corps, it was a magnificent occasion; a good choir sang Gregorian chant and polyphony, and the cardinal and his deacons (students from the Venerabile) wore new white-and-gold vestments. At the end of Mass Cardinal Parolin prayed at Consalvi’s large marble tomb (made by the Roman neoclassical sculptor Rinaldo Rinaldi) in the family chapel, sprinkling it with holy water.
The symposium followed lunch at the English College, and took place in the recently-restored library there, with its handsome black-and-gold bookcases. This was a highly appropriate venue, as in 1819 it had been reinstated by Consalvi, who was also Cardinal Protector of the college, after the French occupation and looting of Rome. Archbishop Gallagher and Fr Stephen Wang the Rector of the English College, and a most generous host – presided, along with Maurice Whitehead and Richard Smith. The audience included members of the British Embassy to the Holy See, the Curia, Italian and English scholars, clergy, patrons and friends – including the present Count Brunacci, head of the Consalvi family.
The other papers given were by Professor Judith Champ of Oscott College on Consalvi and English and Irish Catholic Emancipation; Tim Knox, Director of the Royal Collection, on Sir Thomas Lawrence’s portraits of Consalvi and Pius VII in the Waterloo Chamber at Windsor Castle; and Alice Martin, curator at Chatsworth, on the friendship between Consalvi and Elizabeth, Duchess of Devonshire, during her widowhood in Rome.
In the evening there was a concert in San Lorenzo in Damaso, given by Peter Leech and the Cappella Fede of late Roman baroque and classical music commissioned by Cardinal York (who was a strong upholder of the Stuart tradition of cultural patronage) and Consalvi. It included work by Cimarosa, Zinghalli, Tesarini, and four of the five sublime Assoluzzione by Sebastiano Bolis, maestro di cappella to Cardinal York at San Lorenzo, which were performed for the first time since the eighteenth century in the fine acoustics of the church for which they were composed. They made a moving climax to the celebrations.
After the conference I stayed on in Rome for a few days and saw wonders. By kind permission of the director of the Vatican Museums, Dr Barbara Jatta, I had the enormous privilege of being allowed to see the Raphael Loggia in the Apostolic Palace, a major inspiration for English neo classical architecture. With the conservation architect Alessandro Mascherucci, who is also currently restoring Santa Maria del Populo as part of a huge current programme in preparation for the 2025 Year of Jubilee, I was able to climb the scaffolding into the vaults there for a close-up of the Bernini-designed stucco angels, carved oak leaves and huge – especially up there, close up – acorns from the Chigi arms of Alexander VII. Not an everyday experience!
John Martin Robinson is Librarian to the Duke of Norfolk and Maltravers Herald Extraordinary.
Photo: Aerial view of the Vatican and Rome. (Photo credit: Caleb Miller; Unsplash.)
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