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.
