DEUSDEDIT I (ADEODATUS), POPE, ST.

Pontificate: Oct. 19, 615 to Nov. 8, 618; b. Rome. The successor of boniface iv, Deusdedit had been a priest in Rome for 40 years when he began his three-year pontificate. At the time Italy was a battleground for the lombards, despite the attempts of the exarchs in Ravenna to control the peninsula in the name of the Byzantine Emperor. (see ravenna.) Following an uprising in which the exarch John and his officials were killed, the emperor heraclius sent Eleutherius as exarch to Ravenna to restore order. The exarch put to death the murderers of John and marched to Naples to subdue other revolutionists. The pope remained loyal to the emperor and the exarch in these dim conflicts. Deusdedit also had to contend with an earthquake and a plague in Rome itself. Legend records that the pope restored a sufferer to instant health with a kiss. He was esteemed for his love of the diocesan clergy as contrasted with Gregory the Great's favoring of monks. He was buried in St. Peter's.

Feast: Nov. 8.

Bibliography: Liber pontificalis, ed. l. duchesne (Paris 1886–1958) 1:319–320. p. jaffÉ, Regesta pontificum romanorum ab condita ecclesia ad annum post Christum natum 1198 (Graz 1956) 1:222; 2:698,739. h. k. mann, The Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle Ages from 590 to 1304 (London 1902–32) 1:280–293. o. bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio e ai Longobardi (Bologna 1941). b. botte, Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie ecclésiastiques, ed. a. baudrillart et al. (Paris 1912) 14:356–357. j.n. d. kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes (New York 1986) 69.

[c. e. sheedy]