Sabinian (Latin Sabinianus) was a Tuscan from Volterra who succeeded Gregory the Great (see Gregory's entry already in the catalogue) as Bishop of Rome on September 13, 604 — six months after Gregory's death. His brief 17-month pontificate was substantially overshadowed by the catastrophic context of post-Gregory Rome: the great famine of 605 (which Sabinian's policy of opening the papal granaries with a fixed-price grain sale, rather than free distribution, made him substantially unpopular at Rome — a striking contrast with Gregory's free-distribution policy of the famine of 590), the continuing Lombard pressure on the city, and the foundational political-ecclesiastical readjustment after Gregory's pontificate.
Sabinian is principally remembered in the Roman ecclesiastical-canonical tradition for two innovations: he formally instituted the use of bells in Roman Catholic worship (the Roman parish-bell tradition that became standard medieval Western Catholic practice); and he formally instituted the use of oil lamps perpetually burning at the tombs of the Roman martyrs (the tradition that would become the medieval Catholic sanctuary-lamp).
He died at Rome on February 22, 606, of natural causes during the continuing famine — substantially unpopular at his death because of the grain-policy controversy. The Liber Pontificalis records that his funeral procession had to be re-routed to avoid the substantial popular hostility at the Lateran route. He is buried at St. Peter's.