In 1767 appeared at Brescia a _De Concini vita_, by D. Sandellius. On
the role of Concini see the _Histoire de France_, published under the
direction of E. Lavisse, vol. vi. (1905), by Mariejol.

CONCLAVE (Lat. _conclave_, from _cum_, together, and _clavis_, a key),
strictly a room, or set of rooms, locked with a key; in this sense the
word is now obsolete in English, though the _New English Dictionary_
gives an example of its use so late as 1753. Its present loose
application to any private or close assembly, especially ecclesiastical,
is derived from its technical application to the assembly of cardinals
met for the election of the pope, with which this article is concerned.

Conclave is the name applied to that system of strict seclusion to which
the electors of the pope have been and are submitted, formerly as a
matter of necessity, and subsequently as the result of a legislative
enactment; hence the word has come to be used of the electoral assembly
of the cardinals. This system goes back only as far as the 12th century.

_Election of the Popes in Antiquity._--The very earliest episcopal
nominations, at Rome as elsewhere, seem without doubt to have been made
by the direct choice of the founders of the apostolic Christian
communities. But this exceptional method was replaced at an early date
by that of election. At Rome the method of election was the same as in
other towns: the Roman clergy and people and the neighbouring bishops
each took part in it in their several capacities. The people would
signify their approbation or disapprobation of the candidates more or
less tumultuously, while the clergy were, strictly speaking, the
electoral body, met to elect for themselves a new head, and the bishops
acted as presidents of the assembly and judges of the election. The
choice had to meet with general consent; but we can well imagine that in
an assembly of such size, in which the candidates were acclaimed rather
than elected by counting votes, the various functions were not very
distinct, and that persons of importance, whether clerical or lay, were
bound to influence the elections, and sometimes decisively. Moreover,
this form of election lent itself to cabals; and these frequently gave
rise to quarrels, sometimes involving bloodshed and schisms, i.e. the
election of antipopes, as they were later called. Such was the case at
the elections of Cornelius (251), Damasus (366), Boniface (418),
Symmachus (498), Bo