Pierre de Murat de Cros

[1] While Gregory XI was forced to borrow from the Duke of Anjou, Murat excelled at diplomacy, convincing Bologna to relent in exchange for a lifting of the interdict.

[1] De Cros drafted and persuaded his cousin Gregory XI to adopt Futuris peculis on March 19, modifying the laws of the papal conclave.

[1] He also persuaded Gregory XI to make Pierre Rostaing, the castellan of Castel Sant'Angelo to swear not to turn over the fortress to any papal claimant without the assent of the six cardinals remaining in the Comtat Venaissin.

[1] De Cros did not accept the election of Prignano as Urban VI, and sheltered in Castel Sant'Angelo a group of like-minded cardinals, which included his brother.

[1] He met the bardaresi, carrying a battleaxe and followed by a heavily armed entourage, refusing to allow him to escort the cardinals back for a papal coronation ("That fool thinks he’s pope?

[1] As Chamberlain of the Camera (Camerlengo), de Cros held a curial office which was one of the few that did not expire during a sede vacante, as established by the bull Ubi periculum (1274).

[1] Also under the judicial power of the Apostolic Camera, Murat de Cros received the cardinals on 2 August, and after hearing accounts of the conclave, declared it null and void and the church to continue in sede vacante.

[1] It was at this point that Murat de Cros appointed a new procurator and registrar for the Camera, and assisted Clement VII in turning out copious amounts of official-looking documents.

Even before there were two international obediences, or two popes, even before two legal opinions began to be argued about the validity of the April election, and before the ultramontane cardinals and Urban VI had gone to their separate summer refuges of Anagni and Tivoli, the nucleus of the Curia was split in interest and policy between two ministers, the heads of the Chancery and of the Camera, Bartolomeo Prignano and Pierre de Cros.

Pierre de Murat de Cros, was a French monk.
De Cros was the cousin of Pope Gregory XI (shown here blessing St. Catherine of Siena , who repeatedly importuned him to move the seat of the papacy back to Rome), and was the brother of cardinal-nephew Jean de Murat de Cros . Both are possibly depicted here.
Murat de Cros remained in the fortified Castel Sant'Angelo during the Papal Conclave of 1378 .