Pope Sixtus II
Bishop of Rome from 257 to 258 · Religious Figures · Lived 215 to 258 · aged 43
Pope Sixtus II is read about 202 times a day, in 80 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 27 October 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 400 days, one point a day.
Something wrong?He held the papacy for less than a year before being executed with seven of his deacons under Emperor Valerian's crackdown on Christians in 258.
A life in dates
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About this person
Sixtus became bishop of Rome on 31 August 257, stepping into leadership during one of the empire's sharpest turns against the church. Valerian's persecution targeted clergy directly, and within twelve months it reached him. On 6 August 258, he was killed alongside seven deacons - among them Lawrence of Rome, who would become one of Christianity's most venerated martyrs. The brevity of his reign made the manner of its end the defining fact: a pope who died not in office but at the edge of imperial violence, his name carried forward by the men who fell with him.
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