Under pressure from Prince Jordan I of Capua, to whom he had also rendered important service, he was elected on 24 May 1086, taking the throne name of Victor III, but his consecration did not take place until 9 May 1087 owing to the presence of the Antipope Clement III in Rome. After celebrating Easter of 1087 in his monastery, Victor proceeded to Rome, and when the Normans had driven the soldiers of the Antipope Clement III (Guibert of Ravenna) out of St. Peter's, he was consecrated and enthroned on 9 May 1087. He only remained eight days in Rome and then returned to Monte Cassino, though with the help of Matilda and Jordan, he took back the Vatican Hill. Before May was out he was once more in Rome in answer to a summons for the countess Matilda of Tuscany, whose troops held the Leonine City and Trastevere, but when at the end of June the antipope once more gained possession of St. Peter's, Victor again withdrew at once to his Monte Cassino abbey. In August a council or synod of some importance was held at Benevento, which renewed the excommunication of the Antipope Clement III and the condemnation of lay investiture, proclaimed a kind of crusade against the Saracens in northern Africa and anathematised Hugh of Lyons and Richard, Abbot of Marseilles.