Urban, the name of eight popes.—URBAN I. (222-230), an alleged martyr under Alexander Severus.—URBAN II. (1088-99), born near Châtillon-sur-Marne, was originally a monk of Clugny. He was made by Gregory VII. cardinal-bishop of Ostia, and was elected pope in a council held at Terracina in 1088, during the schismatical pontificate of the antipope Guibert, styled Clement III. He laid Henry IV. of Germany under the ban and finally drove him out of Italy, triumphed also by the same means over Philip I. of France, and aroused the crusading spirit by the fire of his eloquence at Piacenza and the Council of Clermont (1095).—URBAN III. (1185-87), Uberto Crivelli, was a Milanese by birth, and consumed his brief reign in a struggle with the Emperor Frederick I.—URBAN IV. (1261-64), Jacques Pantaléon, was a Troyes cobbler's son, the steps of whose elevation were the see of Verdun and the patriarchate of Jerusalem.—URBAN V. (1362-70), William de Grimoard, was a native of Grisac in Languedoc, and had been Abbot of St Victor at Marseilles. On the death of Innocent VI. in 1362 he was elected at Avignon, but set out for Rome in 1367, only to return a few months before his death.—URBAN VI. (1378-89), Bartolomeo Prignani, was born in Naples in 1318, and at the time of his election he was Archbishop of Bari. The French cardinals set up against him the Bishop of Cambray as Clement VII., who took up his residence at Avignon. See ANTIPOPE, and POPE.—URBAN VII.,
John Baptist Castagna, died twelve days after his election (15th September 1590).—URBAN VIII. (1623-44), Maffeo Barberini, was born at Florence in 1568, and was elected pope in September 1623. He supported Richelieu's policy against Austria and Spain, was a patron of Galileo, canonised Loyola and Philip Neri, and wrote sacred poetry.