were five members of religious orders. Two died before the next Conclave, which was to take place on the death of Nicholas III in 1280, and the rest had to be terrorized into voting for a candidate of Charles I of Sicily. Death Pope Nicholas III was stricken ill quite unexpectedly. The Curia was residing at the time in the city of Viterbo. Pope Nicholas was at his country retreat at Castro Soriano. According to the Chronicon Parmense he was suddenly deprived of consciousness and movement (privatus subito omni sensu et motu). Bartholomeus (Ptolemy) of Lucca says, subito factus apoplecticus, sine loquela moritur ('suddenly stricken with apoplexy, he died without speaking'). Nicholas was unable to make his confession, and died at his palace at Castro Soriano, in the diocese of Viterbo, on 22 August 1280. He had been pope for two years, eight months, and twenty-eight days. His remains were taken to Rome, where he was buried in the Vatican Basilica, in the Chapel of S. Nicholas. There was an alternative story circulating, as was frequently the case in the sudden deaths of medieval and renaissance popes—that the pope had been poisoned. Portrayal in The Inferno Dante, in The Inferno (of the Divine Comedy), talks briefly to Nicholas III, who was condemned to spend eternity in the Third Bolgia of the Eighth Circle of Hell, reserved for those who committed simony, the ecclesiastical crime of paying for offices or positions in the hierarchy of a church. In Dante's story, the Simoniacs are placed head-first in holes, flames burning on the soles of their feet (Canto XIX). Nicholas was the chief sinner in these pits, which is demonstrated by the height of the flames on his feet. At first he mistakes Dante for Pope Boniface VIII. When the confusion is cleared up, Nicholas informs Dante that he foresees the damnation (for simony) not only of Boniface VIII, but also Clement V, an even more corrupt pope. See also List of popes References Bibliography Jules Gay (editor), Les registres de Nicolas III (1277–1280): Nicolaus III. Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées et analysées d'après les manuscrits originaux des archives du Vatican (1898) (Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d'Athènes et de Rome Sér. 2, Volume 14). Fr. Joannis Hyacinthi Sbarale, Bullarium Franciscanum Romanorum Pontificum constitutiones, epistolas... tribus ordinibus Minorum, Clarissarum, et Poenitentium a... Sancto Francisco institutis concessa... Tomus III (Roma: typis Sacrae congregationis