Pope Gregory XIV determined "quickening" at just over 16 weeks (166 days) of pregnancy. Prior to quickening "no homicide" was involved if abortion took place, he concluded. In 1588, just three years previously, Pope Sixtus V issued the Papal Bull Effraenatum which decreed that those who carried out abortions at any stage of pregnancy should be excommunicated and should also be punished by civil authorities (with the death penalty).