Ecclesiastical State

English Proper noun Ecclesiastical State s 1 en archaic historical The Papal States. 97 43 And although in March, Captaine George Fransperg was taken with a fit of an Apoplexie, which caused his death, yet because the army was entred into the Ecclesiasticall State, and still marched forward, the Pope in the end of the moneth, resolued to come to an accord en 1789–92 (date written) 1814 w:Edward Gibbon Antiquities of the House of Brunswick 26–27 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=LGVSAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA26 They solicited the aid of the miscreant Saracens, invaded the ecclesiastical State, entered the city, profaned the churches, extorted an oath of fidelity from the Romans, and dared to imprison the successor of St. Peter. en 1883 George Palmer Putnam George P. Putnam; Frederic Beecher Perkins Frederick B. Perkins; Lynds E. Jones Ecclesiastical State or States of the Church The World’s Progress 1 360 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=3DYzAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA360 In the same year a conclave was permitted to be held at Venice; and in 1800, cardinal Chiaramonti, who was elected to the papal chair, took the title of Pius VII., and resumed the dominion of the Ecclesiastical State.