beth (defunct)

would it be correct to describe Pope Benedict XIV, who lived in the late 1600's, as "one of the earlier Pope Benedicts"? He certainly is earlier than the Popes Benedict XV (20th century) or XVI (21st century). But despite this one must admit that he is the fourteenth of that name, of which there have been sixteen to date, meaning he is one of the later Pope Benedicts. Still, I find it useful when talking about XIV to say "one of the earlier Pope Benedicts", to be clear that I don't mean one of the latest Popes Benedict.

what do you think?

well, if we want to use math to solve this problem¹, we can look at the statistical average of pope benedicts. if we use their date of coronation (initial coronation, in the case of IX), the mean coronation year is 1124. so, i suppose every pope whose reign began after 1124 could be a later pope. we could also use the median, 1022.

if neither of these approaches is satisfactory--which they shouldn't be, given they're very silly-- you can also just make the dividing line be wherever the gap between benedicts was longest. this was the gap between XIII and XII, which was 382 years! you could also define a minimum number of years between which a new Benedict Era has begun. if we were to use 100 years, for example, you could separate them into the following (era names here are mere suggestions, of course):

PROTO-BENEDICT ERA:

• Pope Benedict I (575–579)

THE SOLE REVISION:

• Pope Benedict II (684–685)

THE FIRST BENEDICTINE AGE:

• Pope Benedict III (855–858)
• Pope Benedict IV (900–903)
• Pope Benedict V (964)
• Pope Benedict VI (972–974)
• Pope Benedict VII (974–983)
• Pope Benedict VIII (1012–1024)
• Pope Benedict IX (1032–1044, 1045–1046, 1047–1048)

THE BENEDICT RENAISSANCE:

• Pope Benedict XI (1303–1304)
• Pope Benedict XII (1334–1342)

MODERN BENEDICTION:

• Pope Benedict XIII (1724–1730)
• Pope Benedict XIV (1740–1758)

CONTEMPORARY BENEDICTION:

• Pope Benedict XV (1914–1922)
• Pope Benedict XVI (2005–2013)

feel free to select any of these methods when it comes to sorting popes. i didn't include antipopes, though, so if you need to do that i'd suggest an alternate system. thank you for your time

1. because when has using math to solve linguistic quandaries ever been a bad idea?

no one tell Dan Brown about this

Sometimes they combine to form a rare particle known as a popeon.

holy type