Can anyone give me a breakdown of the nationalities of the Popes. The nearest I can find is the following:

Italian: 217 French: 17 German: 6 Spanish: 3 English, Dutch, Portuguese, Swiss, Polish: 1 each

However, this makes only 248. The total should be 261, omitting St Peter, which most lists of popes do. (I wonder if that is because he was Jewish!!)

Thanks

-- Frank O'Shea (donnelly@interact.net.au), May 29, 1998

Answers

DEAR FRANK: you will find the data you are lookin for: enter to ALTAVISTA and ask for the CATHOLIC ALMANAC and in no time you'll hve the complete list of Popes with their correspondig nationalities.

ENRIQUE

-- ENRIQUE ORTIZ (eaortiz@yahoo.com), February 18, 1999.

Your list notably omits the considerable number of "non-white" Popes from the Middle East and Africa. And the large number of "Italian" popes quoted even in reputable sources is misleading. For 14 centuries, "Italy" was merely the name of a peninsula divided into a number of different countries. Only a minority of the "Italian" popes were citizens of Rome or even of the Papal States.

-- P Gilfedder (gilfedd@curie.dialix.com.au), January 28, 2003.