Pope Pius VII

About Pope Pius VII

Pope Pius VII, born Barnaba Chiaramonti in 1742, holds the #494 rank on the Historical Popularity Index due to his significant role during a turbulent era in European history. As the head of the Catholic Church from 1800 to 1823, his pontificate was profoundly shaped by the French Revolution and the subsequent rise of Napoleon Bonaparte. A key moment of his reign was the 1801 Concordat, which re-established the Catholic Church in France, and his controversial decision to crown Napoleon as Emperor in 1804, an act that symbolized a complex political and religious reconciliation.

Pius VII is experiencing a significant historical attention gap relative to his influence, registering an Attention Gap score of -2x, meaning he receives only about half the modern internet attention warranted by his historical importance. In 2025, his Wikipedia page garnered 178K annualized views. For context, this is substantially less than that of figures with much lower HPI rankings, such as Hildegard of Bingen (#691 importance) who attracted 634K views, or even contemporary figures like David Lynch (#774 importance) who drew 6.8M views.

Despite this overall underattention, his profile showed a notable surge in interest throughout 2025, evidenced by a year-over-year view change of +61.3%. However, this momentum appears to be fading, as indicated by a -30% drop when comparing Q1 to Q3 traffic for the year.