  pope john xi (; 910 â december 935) was pope from march 931 (at the age of 20) to his death in 935. ==parentage== the paternity of john xi is still a matter of dispute. his mother was certainly marozia, the most powerful woman in rome. according to liutprand of cremona (antapodosis, ii. c. 48) and the "liber pontificalis," his father was pope sergius iii (904â911), ("johannes, natione romanus ex patre sergio papa," "liber pont." ed. duchesne, ii, 243). ferdinand gregorovius, ernst dÃ¼mmler, thomas greenwood (cathedra petri: a political history of the great latin patriarchate), philip schaff, and rudolf baxmann agree with liutprand that pope sergius iii fathered pope john xi. if that is true, john xi would be the only known illegitimate son of a pope to have become pope himself. (silverius was the legitimate son of pope hormisdas). on the other hand, horace kinder mann,"sergius at once declared the ordinations conferred by formosus null; but that he put his two predecessors to death, and by illicit relations with marozia had a son, who was afterwards john xi, must be regarded as highly doubtful. these assertions are only made by bitter or ill-informed adversaries, and are inconsistent with what is said of him by respectable contemporaries [such as flodoard]." {{citation | last = mann | first = horace kinder | title = sergius iii | work = the catholic encyclopedia | publisher = robert appleton com
10th-century_Italian_people 10th-century_archbishops 910_births 935_deaths Illegitimate_children_of_popes Italian_popes People_of_medieval_Rome Popes