Stephen was the son of a Roman presbyter John and prior to ascending to the papal throne he was ordained – as he later claimed, against his will – as the bishop of Anagni, by the then pope, Formosus. He became pope in April of 896, immediately after the death of the aforementioned pontiff. He was placed upon the papal throne by the lords of the Duchy of Spoleto, at the head of which stood the dethroned in the meantime (by Formosus) ex-emperor and ex-king of Italy, Lambert of Spoleto (Lambert II). Their bitter enemy, was the ailing and absent from the Apennine Peninsula, king of the Eastern Franks, Arnulf of Carinthia, who had received the imperial crown from Formosus. As long as Arnulf remained in Italy, Stephen did not question his status and rank. However, as soon as he left, the new pope began implementing his truly diabolical plan. In January of 897 he called all the Church and lay dignitaries to the Lateran Palace, then had the body of Formosus taken out of his tomb, dressed in pontifical robes and seated on the throne. His trial lasted three days. After the verdict was read, three fingers were cut off from the corpse, it was stripped of its robes and thrown into an unmarked grave, only to be taken out after several days and cast into the Tiber. The dethroned Emperor Lambert, who was at that time seventeen years old and who   had come to the city with his mother Ageltrude also took part in this macabre act of barbarism. We do not know who was the initiator of this exhibition, nevertheless it served the interests of only three people. Undoubtedly it was Pope Stephen who played first fiddle. He accused Formosus of usurping the post of pope, since as the bishop of Porto he had no right to St. Peter’s throne. Well – it must be said that the punishment handed out by Stephen VI was much more terrible than the deed, it did however carry with it a certain significant consequence. Stephen himself also – just as Formosus had done – abandoned his original bishopric, becoming the bishop of Rome. However, when the sentence of the Cadaver Synod withheld all rights from Formosus, while all his decrees and resolutions were deemed invalid, including the nomination of Stephen as the bishop of Anagni, the selection of the latter to the post of pope became completely lawful and could not arouse any doubts. In this way, Stephen not only got revenge upon his enemy, but also gained something much more important – the unquestionable right to sit upon St. Peter’s throne – in the process shutting the  mouths of all those, who would call him usurper. As it seems, the dethroned Lambert could also have a reason to celebrate, since the decree concerning his dethronement was also deemed invalid. Both Pope Stephen VI, as well as the newly appointed emperor did not foresee the fact, that their deed – confirming respect for the law, however in a perverse form, born in the minds of people bereft of basic ethical norms, not to mention Christian values – would quickly turn against them. In the summer of the very same year, due to an earthquake the dome of the Lateran Basilica (San Giovanni in Laterano), collapsed. Rome erupted. The pious, although overly superstitious inhabitants of the city, saw in this event an expression of the wrath of God, while the clergymen, ordained by Formosus, and returned to the layman status by Stephen, began to speak loudly, about what the Roman populace had wanted to hear all along – the collapse of the most important papal basilica was a response to the unprecedented barbarism of the pope. That summer things happened rapidly. In August, the pope was captured, imprisoned and then strangled. He was buried however – as tradition necessitated – in the Vatican Basilica (San Pietro in Vaticano). We can only imagine, the cheering Roman populace, which at the same time – as was the habit – began   looting the papal chambers of all the items left behind. However, not everybody was celebrating. The ex-emperor and probably the collaborator of Stephen VI , Lambert of Spoleto did not despair for long, since he died a year later, some claim that it was not so much due to an accident during a hunt but because of his enemies. Another, who grieved at the pope’s death was a man named Sergius, who was later to play a significant role in the history of the papacy (Sergius III). He and the murdered Pope Stephen VI were friends but most importantly shared a common hatred for Formosus, which Sergius was able to display several years later.