CLUBBED, POISONED, STRANGLED: HOW POPES HAVE MET THEIR DEATHS

Over the years, many popes have met a grisly demise - by strangulation, poisoning, crucifixion, and even by being clubbed to death.
Much of the bloodshed occurred during the Middle Ages. But as the death of John Paul I in 1978 shows - if conspiracy theories are to be believed - with great responsibility comes great danger...

St Peter (AD 64): Crucified.

John VIII (872-882): Allegedly poisoned and then clubbed to death.

Adrian III (884-885): Allegedly poisoned.

Stephen VI (896-897): Said to have been strangled.

Leo V (903): Murdered.

John X (914-928): Allegedly suffocated under a pillow.

Stephen VII (928-931): Possibly murdered.

Stephen VIII (939-942): Mutilated and died from injuries.

John XII (955-964): Murdered by cuckolded husband.

Benedict VI (973-974): Strangled by a priest.

John XIV (983-984): Starved to death or poisoned.

Gregory V (996-999): Said to have been poisoned but probably malaria.

Sergius IV (1009-1012): Possibly murdered.

Clement II (1046-1047): Rumored poisoned.

Damasus II (1048): Rumored murdered.

Boniface VIII (1294-1303): Died from abuse received while a captive of the French in Anagni.

Benedict XI (1304-1305): Allegedly poisoned.

John Paul I (1978): Allegedly poisoned.

In 1978 Pope John Paul I died after just 33 days in office and there have long been suggestions that he was poisoned by the Mafia after they discovered he was about to name senior Catholic church officials who were involved in money laundering for the Mob.

In 1981 late Pope John Paul II, who died in 2005, was the victim of an assassination attempt when Turkish hit man Mehmet Ali Agca fired at him from close range, as he greeted crowds in St Peter’s Square.

The Pope was rushed to hospital where he underwent life saving surgery and he went on to make a full recovery, putting his survival down to the intervention of the Virgin Mary and later one of the bullets removed during the operation was placed at a shrine to her in Fatima, Portugal.

In 1991 comedian Robbie Coltrane starred in a film called The Pope Must Die, in which he played a lowly priest who is mistakenly elected Pope and then has to avoid being assassinated by the Mafia.