These are not Photos by BIRON

REGARDING THE PAPAL BALLS:

"Variously known as the sedia stercoraria – which translates as the 'dung chair'– or rather more understandably, as the 'pierced chair', this then was the object used to test the sex of newly installed popes... Any candidate chosen by his peers to occupy the papal throne was required, before his election could be verified, to sit on this elaborate seat while a young cardinal took advantage of the design to touch his testicles."

An illustration that accompanied an account by the Swedish traveller Lawrence Banck, of the coronation in 1644 of Pope Innocent X shows Innocent seated in the sedia stercoraria and having his testicles felt by a young cardinal as a way of ensuring that he is a man. The man appears to be exclaiming in Latin, "The pontiff has them," much to the relief of everyone.
Medieval eyewitness accounts give no doubt that at one time, this chair and others like it were indeed an important part of the papal coronation ritual. But why should the cardinals be so concerned that they would go through the embarrassment of publicly probing their new boss to demonstrate that the pope is indeed a male?

(It wasn't done quietly, either. If all was as expected, the examining cardinal was supposed to call out, "He has two balls, and they are well hung."). An odd tradition even for such a woman-hating church as that of Rome – unless, of course, they had good reason to worry. Unless, that it, there once was a pope who wasn't a member of the boys' club.

Interestingly enough, there are ancient and persistent legends, vigorously denied to this day by the Church, about such a feminine papacy. "Pope Joan," she is called, and her story is recorded by some 500 medieval chronicles. She is said to have been an English woman posing as a man who entered the Church and became a great teacher, bishop and was ultimately elected pope, as John VIII in 855.

She supposedly reigned for two years, secretly taking a lover. Her secret was finally revealed when she gave birth to a child in the street during a papal procession, whereupon she and her lover were either stoned or hung upon the spot. The popes, it is said, have superstitiously avoided taking that same route ever since. Monuments were made, but later destroyed or altered, especially after the Reformation, when her tale was used to further embarrass Rome. Pope Joan, if she existed, still exerts a certain fascination. The Tarot card known as The Popess may well be a reference to her. There have been many books and plays about her story, but apparently no films.

It is not known when – or even if – this strange custom was discontinued. It could go on, for all we know, as one of the secret rituals of the electoral conclave.

 

source: http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/vatican/esp_vatican39.html