The Avignon Papacy is alternatively known by which of the following phrases?

• A. The Great Babylonian Captivity
• B. The Western Schism
• C. The Babylonian Captivity of the Papacy
• D. The Renaissance Papacy

Answer: (C)

This question is about the name historians use for the period when the papacy was based in Avignon. During 1309–1377, popes such as Clement V and his successors lived outside Rome, under political influence from the French crown. This situation is understood as a kind of captivity of the papacy, and the most common phrasing to capture that sense is “the Babylonian Captivity of the Papacy.” It signals exile and loss of papal independence in a way that lines up with the biblical exile metaphor, making it the precise way to describe this era.

The other phrases don’t fit as well. The Western Schism refers to the later split within the Church when rival popes claimed the papacy after the Avignon period, so it describes a different problem than the exile itself. The Renaissance Papacy refers to a broader cultural and political flowering in Rome during later centuries, not to the papacy’s location or captivity. And while some use a form like “Great Babylonian Captivity,” the standard, widely recognized term is the Babylonian Captivity of the Papacy, which directly names the period of exile.