JESUIT HUMILITY
Pope Francis has been known for years as a humble man who denied himself the luxuries that previous Buenos Aires cardinals enjoyed.
Known previously as Jorge Bergoglio, the 76-year-old often rode the bus to work, cooked his own meals and regularly visited the slums that ring Argentina's capital. He considers social outreach, rather than doctrinal battles, to be the essential business of the church.
He has in the past accused fellow church leaders of hypocrisy and forgetting that Jesus Christ bathed lepers and ate with prostitutes.
In his first appearance in St. Peter's Square as the new pope today, Francis wore a simple white robe.
FRANCIS
Francis, the name the new pope has chosen, blends two much-loved Catholic saints.
Francis of Assisi is identified with peace, poverty and a simple lifestyle.
A rich young Italian man from Assisi, Francis renounced wealth and founded the Franciscan order of friars in 1290. The choice could foretell the pope's priorities in striving to bring a sense of serenity to the troubled church.
Choosing a name shared by one of Italy's patron saints also ties the new pope to Italy.
Francis Xavier is a noted evangelist and prominent Jesuit missionary who took Catholicism to Asia in the 16th century, especially in India, but was also a pioneering Christian missionary in Japan and Borneo. He was one of seven priests who founded the Society of Jesus in 1534, making vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
'THE END OF THE EARTH'
Pope Francis, the first pontiff from South America, shyly waved to the crowd in St Peter's Square and marvelled that the cardinals had had to look to "the end of the earth" to find a new pontiff.
The former Jorge Bergoglio asked for prayers for himself, and for retired Pope Benedict XVI, whose resignation paved the way for his election.
Bergoglio had reportedly finished second in the 2005 conclave that produced Benedict - who last month became the first pope to resign in 600 years.
AVOIDING CONFUSION
The Vatican says the new pope's official name is Pope Francis, without a Roman numeral.
The Vatican spokesman, the Reverend Federico Lombardi, sought to
clear up any possible confusion, noting that Cardinal Jean-Louis
Tauran, who announced the name to the world, said simply "Francis."
It is also listed that way in the first Vatican bulletin on the new
pope.
FIRST JESUIT POPE
Pope Francis - the first Jesuit pope - has spent nearly his entire career at home in Argentina.
The former Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 76, reportedly got the second-most votes after Joseph Ratzinger, the last pope, in the 2005 papal election. He has long specialised in the kind of pastoral work - overseeing churches and priests - that some say is an essential skill for a pope.
In a lifetime of teaching and leading priests in Latin America, which has the largest share of the world's Catholics, he has shown a keen political sensibility as well as a self-effacing humility, according to his official biographer, Sergio Rubin. His personal style is the antithesis of Vatican splendor.
Bergoglio is also known for modernising an Argentine church that had been among the most conservative in Latin America.
PAPAL DIGS
The new pope can't move into the papal apartment just yet.
He will remain with the cardinals at the Vatican's Santa Marta hotel, an impersonal modern hotel on the edge of the Vatican gardens where they have been sequestered since the beginning of the conclave.
The new pope is expected to stay there for a few weeks until the papal apartment in the Apostolic Palace can be renovated.
TWITTER HANDLE
The pope's whose profile was changed to read "Sede Vacante" when Benedict stepped down, now has been switched back to "Pontifex."
DRESSED UP
The pope's new clothes were ready before he was.
The family-owned Gammarelli tailor shop, which has dressed popes for two centuries, had three sets of vestments - in small, medium and large - prepared for the naming of the new pontiff.
The papal outfits were on display in the window of the small wood-panelled store nestled in the shadow of the Pantheon, where the family moved in 1850 from the original founded just around the corner in 1798. They were delivered to the Vatican and left in a room next to the Sistine Chapel, ready for the new pope to change into his new clothes.
QUICK DECISION
It was a fairly quick decision.
In centuries past, conclaves dragged on for weeks and months, sometimes years. During a 13th-century conclave that stretched for weeks, a leading candidate died.
These days the discussions are much quicker. The pope was chosen in five rounds over two days.
The previous conclave that chose Benedict XVI went four rounds over two days.
WHO VOTED FOR ME?
One thing is sure - the new pope will never truly know who voted for him.
Cardinals used to sign their names to ballots, but stopped doing so "due to an old history of intrigues and tensions, when people used to fear the most serious reprisals for their choices," says Michael Bruter, who teaches political science at the London School of Economics.
Even so, factions of cardinals will have made their views known during informal talks between votes.
SCOOP
WikiLeaks long ago gave the inside scoop on the US opinion of the new pope.
A report by the deputy chief of the US Embassy in Argentina on then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio was slapped onto the internet along with roughly a quarter million other classified US State Department cables.
"Observers have praised his humility: he has been reluctant to accept honors or hold high office and commutes to work on a bus," Brent Hardt says in a note before the 2005 conclave that elected Pope Benedict XVI.
But Hardt notes that Bergoglio's membership in the Jesuit order could count against him.
"Some senior prelates, especially conservatives, are suspicious of a liberal streak in the order, perhaps most pronounced in the US, but also present elsewhere," Hardt writes.
RECENT POPES:
A list of popes from the 20th and 21st centuries:
Pope Francis - March 13, 2013
Benedict XVI - April 19, 2005-Feb. 28, 2013
John Paul II - Oct. 16, 1978-April 2, 2005
John Paul I - Aug. 26-Sept. 28, 1978
Paul VI - June 21, 1963-Aug. 6, 1978
John XXIII - Oct. 28, 1958-June 3, 1963
Pius XII - March 2, 1939-Oct. 9, 1958
Pius XI - Feb. 6, 1922-Feb. 10, 1939
Benedict XV - Sept. 3, 1914-Jan. 22, 1922
Pius X - Aug. 4, 1903-Aug. 20, 1914
Leo XIII - Feb. 20, 1878-July 20, 1903
