Adeodatus II, having reigned as pope from…

Adeodatus II, having reigned as pope from April 11, 672 to June 17, 676, had been succeeded by Donus, who has paved the enclosed forecourt of St. Peter's Basilica, paved the atrium or quadrangle in front of St. Peter's with great blocks of white marble, and restored other churches of Rome, notably the church of St. Euphemia on the Appian Way, and the basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls.

During the pontificate of Donus, Reparatus, the Archbishop of Ravenna, returns to the obedience of the Holy See, thus ending the schism created by Archbishop Maurus, who had aimed at making Ravenna autocephalous.

After a colony of Nestorian monks is discovered in a Syrian monastery at Rome—the Monasterium Boetianum—Donus is reported to have dispersed them through the various religious houses of the city and to have given their monastery to Roman monks.

His successor, Agatho, a Greek born in Sicily of wealthy and devout parents, succeeds him to the papal throne in April 678.

Shortly after Agatho’s elevation, Wilfrid, Archbishop of York, arrives at Rome to invoke the authority of the Holy See in his behalf.

Wilfrid had been deposed from his see by Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, who had carved up Wilfrid's diocese, appointing three bishops to govern the new sees.

At a synod that Pope Agatho convoked in the Lateran to investigate the affair, it had been decided that Wilfrid's diocese should indeed be divided, but that Wilfrid himself should name the bishops.

Agatho is the first Bishop of Rome to stop paying tribute to the Emperor in Constantinople upon election.