Papal election reform in the Renaissance and Tridentine periods: dynamization of procedural form, official legitimacy, and semantics

The project is a comparative investigation of two fundamental reforms of the procedures for arriving at the most important personnel decision in the Catholic Church. In a trans-epochal perspective and with different methods, it will focus, on the one hand, on a comprehensive analysis of the new papal election procedures codified in the Caeremoniale Romanum of 1488. On the other hand, it will establish the medium- to long-term effects of the conclave reform pronounced by Gregory XV after the conclusion of the council of Trento in 1621/22.