Innocent III., who has been called the founder of the States of the Church, was the first Pope who came into direct personal contact with the Perugians. He accepted from them an offer to be their _Padrone_, and to exercise temporal power among them. Half playfully, though with what deep and powerful designs we may divine, he called the citizens his "vassals," and to a certain extent they were willing to submit to his authority; but in so doing they were careful to wring from their "_Padrone_" a promise that their rights and privileges should be respected. Thus for the time they steered clear of the danger of subjection, continued to govern themselves, and preserved that free and independent spirit which hitherto, and in spite of every obstacle, had marked them as a race. Innocent was beloved by the citizens. He came amongst them at a time of much civil discord, when the nobles and the people were preparing for open strife. "He was a peace-maker," says Bartoli, "and he kept his eye on all things; and on this city he looked with a peculiar partiality." The Pope was anxious to promote the Crusades, and was on his way to Pisa to try to make a peace between the Genoese and the Venetians, whose quarrels interfered with his schemes, when he fell ill at Perugia, and died there in 1216.[10]
No sooner had he breathed his last than all his Cardinals hurried into the Canonica to elect his successor, and such was the impatience of the citizens that they even set a guard over these princes of the Church, and kept them short of food in order to hurry their decision. We are not therefore surprised to read that the Papal Throne remained vacant for the space of one day only, and that in consequence of this event the Perugians claim the privilege of having invented the Conclave.
Honorius III. succeeded Innocent, and he attempted, but without success, to heal the ever-widening breach between the nobles and the people. We have described something of the wars outside, but Perugia herself within her walls was a veritable wasp's nest during this period of her steady rise. Her inhabitants became more restless and unmanageable every year. In their perpetual broils the nobles fought beneath their emblem of the Falcon, and the _popolo minuto_ (common folk), who sided with them, received the unamiable title of _Beccherini_.[11] The two extremes in the social scale joined hands in a perpetual opposition to the _popolo grasso_ (well-to-do burghers), who were called _Raspanti_ (_raspare_, to claw), a name probably suggested by their emblem of the Cat.