Gregory XIV

Niccolo Sfondrati was a pious and scholarly bishop of Cremona who had participated in the final session of the Council of Trent as a young man. Elected pope in 1590, he was widely regarded as holy but unprepared for political leadership. He threw papal support behind the Catholic League in the French Wars of Religion and excommunicated Henry of Navarre, the Protestant claimant to the French throne. This proved a political miscalculation; Henry would convert to Catholicism and become one of France's greatest kings. Gregory also issued a bull condemning slavery of indigenous peoples in the Philippines. He was chronically ill throughout his ten-month pontificate and died in October 1591.