1030-1049 German Popes Stop Bribery & Corruption

This twenty year period covers the reign of King Canute (pictured) who was a Dane and took King Ethelred's widow, Emma, as his second wife.

Canute died in 1035 and was succeeded by his son Harold Harefoot who died in 1040 and was succeeded by another son, Harthacnut.

Harthacnut died in 1042 allowing his half-brother, Edward the Confessor -- son of King Ethelred and Queen Emma -- to return power to the West Saxons.

In 1030, Conrad II was the German Holy Roman Emperor, and John XIX was the Roman pope.

John XIX was the brother of the former pope, Benedict VIII. From the wealthy Tuscalani family, both were laymen -- not bishops -- and the papacy was riddled with bribery and corruption.

Emperor Conrad II had scant respect for John XIX but the new pope did stand his ground when a delegation from the Byzantium Empire requested his recognition of Constantinople's primacy.

After John XIX's death in 1032, his layman nephew became Pope Benedict IX and caused another scandal among the bishops. The papacy was neither intended to be a hereditary position nor a position open to laymen by bribery.

In 1039 Henry III succeeded Conrad II as Holy Roman Emperor, and in 1045 Benedict IX was temporarily replaced by Silvester III only to finally abdicate in favor of his godfather who became Gregory VI. 

Another scandal erupted over bribery and in 1046 Henry III replaced Pope Gregory VI with Clement II, a fellow German.

Clement II died in 1047 and Benedict IX bribed his way back to a third papacy, but Henry III forcibly removed him. 

Another German, Damasus II became pope in 1048, shortly followed in 1049 by Leo IX -- another German -- who proved to be great reformer.