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| | St Peter's - Monument to Gregory XIIII (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-20) |
 | | The funerary monument of Gregory XIV (Niccolo Sfondrati, born in Somma Lombardo, Varese,in 1535, and pope from 1590 to 1591) is one of the less elaborate in the Basilica and consists of a niche set into the wall with a simple sarcophagus below, bearing the dedicatory inscription. |
 | | The pontificate of Gregory XIV was one of the least popular and least successful in history, marred as it was by the appointment of his incompetent nephew as cardinal secretary of state and by plague, food shortages and lawlessness in Rome. |
 | | Muratori, on that subject, remarks: "This good pope, then, was surrounded either by stupid physicians or culpable ministers." The pope soon sank under the violence of his sufferings, and died on the 15th of October, 1591, at the age of fifty-six. |
| www.stpetersbasilica.org /Monuments/GregoryXIIII/GregoryXIIII.htm (812 words) |
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