Jordan of Santa Susanna

Jordan (Italian: Giordano Bobone Orsini; died after 1154) was a Carthusian monk, created Cardinal Deacon by Pope Lucius II in December 1144 and then Cardinal Priest of Santa Susanna by Eugene III on 21 December 1145.^[1] He is often referred to as a member of the Roman family of the Orsini, but more recent research concludes that he was probably a Frenchman.^[2] He served as Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church under Eugene III (attested 8 March 1147 until 1151) and subscribed the papal bulls between 9 January 1145 and 11 June 1154.^[1]

He was described by John of Salisbury as mean and parsimonious and dressing in filthy rags as a gesture of austerity. When he was sent with Octavian of Santa Cecilia as a papal legate to summon Conrad III of Germany to Italy to be crowned Holy Roman Emperor, he quarrelled with his co-legate and, in the words of Salisbury, "made the Church a laughingstock."^[3]

He participated in the papal election of 1153^[4] and perhaps also in the papal election of 1154.^[5] The date of his death is uncertain.^[6]

Notes

[1]
J. M. Brixius, Die Mitglieder des Kardinalkollegiums von 1130–1181 (Berlin: 1912), 52 n7.
[2]
W. Maleczek, Papst und Kardinalskolleg von 1191 bis 1216 (Vienna: 1984), 243–244; B. Zenker, Die Mitglieder des Kardinalkollegiums von 1130 bis 1159 (Würzburg: 1964), 104.
[3]
Norwich, 149–150 and note.
[4]
S. Miranda: Papal election, 1153.
[5]
This is according to S. Miranda Papal election, 1154, but see also Brixius, 23 note 9.
[6]
According to the catalogue of the occupants of the titulus Santa Susanna (The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church: Titulus S. Susanna) he died in 1165. The Bulletin de la Société Académique de Laon, edd. Fleury and Chevergny (1864), 251, indicates that he died in 1159. Zenker, Mitglieder, 104, and Maleczek, Papst und Kardinalskolleg, 244–245 and 410, say that he died in 1154. Brixius, p. 23 note 9, also says that he died probably in 1154 but adds that it is not known whether before or after death of Pope Anastasius IV (3 December 1154). Looking at the date of his last subscrpition of the papal bull and the fact that he is listed as participant in a papal election in December 1154, but not in that of 1159 (S. Miranda: Papal election of September 1159), it is probable that he died at the beginning of the pontificate of Adrian IV (1154–59).

Norwich, John Julius. The Kingdom in the Sun 1130-1194. London: Longmans, 1970.