The Correspondence of Rodolfo de Sanctis, Canon of Patras, 1386

Traditio ◽  
1961 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 285-321
Author(s):  
George T. Dennis
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Late Middle Ages

In the winter of 1384–1385 Rodolfo de Sanctis, who had recently received his doctorate in Canon Law, set sail from Venice to take up residence as a member of the cathedral chapter of Patras in Greece. Before his death four years later, Rodolfo had accomplished nothing of great importance and would be of little interest to scholars were it not for a few letters he wrote from Greece to a friend in Venice. Although these letters deal chiefly with personal matters, they contain several items of historical interest and, more important, they provide a glimpse into the life and activities of a Latin cleric in Greece during the late Middle Ages. Not only do they paint a portrait of Rodolfo himself, but they also tell us a great deal about the type of man who staffed the remote Eastern dioceses. In this lies their value, for our knowledge of the Western Church in the Levant during this period is so imperfect that any added documentation assumes an importance sometimes out of proportion to its intrinsic worth.

Later Medieval Law in Community Context

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie Kelleher
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Community Context ◽  
Medieval Women ◽  
Legal Principles ◽  
Legal Proceedings ◽  
Late Middle Ages ◽  
Major Shift ◽  
Substantive Law

During the central and late Middle Ages, European lawmakers and jurists began to make intensive use of the principles of both Roman and canon law in their legislation and court decisions. Embedded in these legal principles were ideas about gender that would have a profound effect on litigation involving women. The substantive law that emerged during this legal renaissance helped to define women's place in medieval society, but equally important were the new law's procedural rules, which allowed reputation to be taken into account in legal proceedings, thereby rendering women's self-representation critical in determining the outcomes of their court cases. An examination the interaction of learned law and community knowledge encourages us to see medieval women as active participants in their own fates, as well as in a major shift in legal culture that would shape European women's legal status more generally.

Dubius in fide fidelis est? Doubt and Assurance in Late Medieval Catholicism

2016 ◽  
Vol 52 ◽  
pp. 186-202
Author(s):  
Robert N. Swanson
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
The Other ◽  
Positive Role ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Late Middle Ages ◽  
Definitive Statement ◽  
The Church

The canon law dictum that ‘dubius in fide infidelis est’ offers a seemingly definitive statement on the place of doubt and uncertainty in medieval Catholicism. Yet where Catholic teaching was open to question, doubt was inseparable from faith, not merely as its obverse but as part of the process of achieving faithfulness – the trajectory outlined by Abelard in the twelfth century. The challenge for the Church was not that doubters lacked faith, but that having tested their doubts they might end up with the wrong faith: doubt preceded assurance, one way or the other. That problem is addressed in this essay by a broad examination of the ties between faith and doubt across the late Middle Ages (from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries), arguing that uncertainty and doubt were almost unavoidable in medieval Catholicism. As the starting points in a process which could lead to heresy and despair, they also had a positive role in developing and securing orthodox faith.

als etlich kristen lüt … mit dien Juden getantzet hant

Aschkenas ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus J. Wenninger
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Main Part ◽  
Legal Aspects ◽  
Moral Reasons ◽  
Late Middle Ages ◽  
High Middle Ages ◽  
Provincial Councils ◽  
Anti Jewish ◽  
The Church

AbstractBased on the debate about the murals in the Jewish house »Zum Brunnenhof« in Zurich this essay discusses whether or not Christian participation in Jewish festivals was unusual and prohibited or normal in the Middle Ages. Following an outline of the relevant legal aspects – there were, up to the High Middle Ages, only occasional decrees from provincial councils that banned Christians from eating and celebrating with Jews; only from the twelfth century onwards were such bans included in the general canon law, while they were never part of secular legislation – the main part of this investigation focuses on actual reports of Christians attending Jewish festivals. These were mainly weddings, but there are also reports of Christians participating in Purim or other celebrations. Most relevant descriptions come from Germany, one from England, where the Bishop of Hereford 1286 took exception to the participation of Christians in a Jewish wedding, threatening with excommunication in an attempt to stop such behaviour. In Germany it was mostly a matter of municipal authorities punishing the dancing of Christians on days of fasting or religious holidays for moral reasons. But even in the increasingly anti-Jewish late Middle Ages, and in spite of the restrictions imposed by the church, nobody really minded the participation of Christians in Jewish festivals as such. In conclusion, various questions are being discussed which arise for the historian in connection with the participation of Christians in Jewish festivals and vice versa.

The church in the West Highlands in the late middle ages

2003 ◽  
Vol 54 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-46
Author(s):  
A. D. M. Barrell
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
The West ◽  
Late Middle Ages ◽  
The Church

Alma Mater Studiorum. O genezie i początkach uniwersytetów

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 9-22
Author(s):  
Marek Maciejewski
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Education ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
New Era ◽  
Conducting Research ◽  
The 19Th Century

The origin of universities reaches the period of Ancient Greece when philosophy (sophists, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, stoics and others) – the “Queen of sciences”, and the first institutions of higher education (among others, Plato’s Academy, Cassiodorus’ Vivarium, gymnasia) came into existence. Even before the new era, schools having the nature of universities existed also beyond European borders, including those in China and India. In the early Middle Ages, those types of schools functioned in Northern Africa and in the Near East (Baghdad, Cairo, Constantinople, cities of Southern Spain). The first university in the full meaning of the word was founded at the end of the 11th century in Bologna. It was based on a two-tiered education cycle. Following its creation, soon new universities – at first – in Italy, then (in the 12th and 13th century) in other European cities – were established. The author of the article describes their modes of operation, the methods of conducting research and organizing students’ education, the existing student traditions and customs. From the very beginning of the universities’ existence the study of law was part of their curricula, based primarily on the teaching of Roman law and – with time – the canon law. The rise of universities can be dated from the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modernity. In the 17th and 18th century they underwent a crisis which was successfully overcome at the end of the 19th century and throughout the following one.

Forma Dat Esse

2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 423-446
Author(s):  
Sylvain Roudaut
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Progressive Decline ◽  
De Trinitate ◽  
Late Middle Ages ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Middle Ages

Abstract This paper offers an overview of the history of the axiom forma dat esse, which was commonly quoted during the Middle Ages to describe formal causality. The first part of the paper studies the origin of this principle, and recalls how the ambiguity of Boethius’s first formulation of it in the De Trinitate was variously interpreted by the members of the School of Chartres. Then, the paper examines the various declensions of the axiom that existed in the late Middle Ages, and shows how its evolution significantly follows the progressive decline of the Aristotelian model of formal causality.

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