Benedict VII

Benedict VII (born, Rome—died July 10, 983, Rome) was the pope from 974 to 983. He furthered the cause of monasticism and acted against simony, specifically in an encyclical letter in 981 forbidding the exaction of money for the conferring of any holy order. Formerly bishop of Sutri, Papal States, he was elected through the intervention of Count Sicco, representative of Otto II, Holy Roman emperor. Sicco expelled the antipope Boniface VII, who had been...