<i>Per la storia del foro privilegiato dei deboli nell’esperienza giuridica altomedioevale dal tardo antico a Carlo Magno</i> (review)
2010; The Catholic University of America Press; Volume: 96; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/cat.0.0806
ISSN1534-0708
Autores Tópico(s)Classical Studies and Legal History
ResumoReviewed by: Per la storia del foro privilegiato dei deboli nell’esperienza giuridica altomedioevale dal tardo antico a Carlo Magno James A. Brundage Per la storia del foro privilegiato dei deboli nell’esperienza giuridica altomedioevale dal tardo antico a Carlo Magno. By Cecilia Natalini. [Archivio per la storia del diritto medioevale e moderno, Studi e Testi, Vol. 14.] (Bologna: Monduzzi Editore. 2008. Pp. xii, 213. ISBN 978-8-832-36142-1.) The belief that all decent people are morally obliged to protect disadvantaged persons—widows, orphans, strangers, the poor, and the helpless—from oppression by the rich and powerful runs deep into the history of the Judeo-Christian tradition as Exodus 22:21–25, for example, plainly shows. In this book, based on her doctoral thesis at the University of Trent, Cecilia Natalini examines the ways in which ecclesiastical and civil authorities from Constantine I to Charlesmagne attempted, with variable success, to enforce this obligation. The process, as Natalini tells it, began with the imperial constitution Si contra pupillos promulgated by Constantine in 334. In this constitution the emperor commanded imperial judges to protect widows, young persons, those disabled by long illness, and “others made wretched by the wrongs of fortune” from oppression by opponents who sought to take advantage of their disabilities. Should judges fail to do so, the emperor ordered provincial authorities to compel culprits to appear in person before him to answer for their misdeeds. This constitution was subsequently incorporated into official collections of Roman law, including the Theodosian Code and the Code of [End Page 509] Justinian, and provided a basis for later attempts to protect the disadvantaged (commonly described as miserabiles personae). A disadvantaged person could also seek protection from another source. The year before Si contra pupillos Constantine had issued the first of what came to be called the Sirmondian Constitutions. In it, he authorized Christian bishops to adjudicate complaints from “wretched persons” against those who attempted to exploit them. The emperor provided that episcopal decisions in such cases should have the force of law and required civil authorities to enforce them. Disadvantaged persons in the late Roman Empire thus enjoyed two sources of protection (at least in principle): the imperial judicial system and the bishops’ courts. The neat visions that legal texts prescribe are lamentably liable to fall short of their authors’ intentions. Certainly attempts to take advantage of the less well off persisted despite imperial constitutions. Natalini details the efforts of patristic writers, notably Ss. Ambrose and Augustine, to persuade their contemporaries to protect the vulnerable from the vicious. Doing so effectively became increasingly complicated and problematical with the gradual breakdown of Roman government in the face of the so-called barbarian invasions during the fifth and sixth centuries. Popes (especially Gregory the Great) and bishops attempted, occasionally with some success, to protect their flocks. The Council of Mâcon (585) insisted that bishops must be present at any court hearings that involved a disadvantaged person. Its canon on this matter and similar ones from other church councils were incorporated as authoritative rulings on the matter in numerous canon law collections (particularly the Dionysiana and Hispana) that circulated widely throughout the Latin church, which strengthened the hand of bishops who attempted to alleviate the lot of the poor and disadvantaged. Carolingian rulers, particularly Pippen III and Charlesmagne, brought effective civil courts once again into what are now France, Italy and parts of the German lands during the latter part of the eighth and the beginning of the ninth century. They specifically instructed royal agents (missi dominici) and judges, many of whom were also bishops, to use their authority to intervene to prevent exploitation of their vulnerable subjects. Natalini’s treatment of the tangled chain of events covered in this book is admirably lucid. Historians of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages will find her contribution to the social and legal history of the period well informed and even-handed. James A. Brundage University of Kansas (Emeritus) Copyright © 2010 The Catholic University of America Press
Referência(s)