Pope Gregory II /

Pope Saint Gregory II was pope from May 19, 715 to his death on February 11, 731, succeeding Pope Constantine. Having, it is said, bought off the Lombards for thirty pounds of gold, he used the tranquillity thus obtained for vigorous missionary efforts among the Germanic tribes, and for strengthening the papal authority in the churches of Britain and Ireland. By excommunicating the Byzantine emperor Leo III the Isaurian, he prepared the way for a long series of revolts and civil wars, which tended greatly to the establishment of the temporal power of the popes. He died in 731, and subsequently attained the honour of canonization. The day that Gregory is remembered in the "Martyrology" seems to be any one of February 11, February 13, and February 28. Gregory II was an alleged collateral ancestor to the Roman Savelli family, according to a 15th century chronicler, but this is undocumented and very likely unreliable. The same was said of the Seventh Century Pope, Benedict II, but nothing certain is known about a kinship between the two of them.