The principality was created by Napoleon for his Marshal Jean Baptiste Bernadotte. It was nominally sovereign, but the prince did have to take an oath to the king.
The principality was short-lived. In 1815, after the Napoleonic Wars, the town was ceded back to the Papal States.
In 1820, the 'Republic of Pontecorvo’ seceded from the Papal States, but papal rule was restored in March 1821.
In 1860, it joined Benevento, the other southern Italian papal exclave, in being united with the new Kingdom of Italy.
Prince Napoleon Lucien Charles Murat was the son of Joachim Murat, King of Naples. Though the reign of the Murat family over Pontecorvo lasted only three years and ended in 1815, the descendants of Prince Lucien still unofficially use "Prince of Pontecorvo" as the courtesy title of the heir to the Prince Murat. It is currently used by Joachim Murat, who was born in 1973.
References
^William Francis Patrick Napier in History of the War in the Peninsula and in the South of France, Vol. V. T. & W. Boone London 1836 p. 592
^Bramstång, Gunnar (1990). Tronrätt, bördstitel och hustillhörighet (in Swedish). p. 30.
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