The Medieval Clergy and Violence: An Historiographical Introduction

THE MEDIEVJ\L CLERGY 1\ND VIOLENCE:
AN HISTORJOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION
Peter Clarke
It is a conunonplace that the l’vliddle Ages we:e violent. Life then was demonsrrably
’nasty, brutish and short‘. In medieval society war was a frequent event, and
violence, or the threat of it, was often used to resolve disputes. The period was allegedly
violent from its inception. Violence accompanied the transition from ancient to medieval
sociery, as barbanans invaded the declining Western Roman Empire. Violence also
arguably played a key roJe in rhe social and political fonnation of the medieval West. In
the cenual Middle Ages weak central power and untrammeled violence arguably forced
the vulnerable to seek protection from and accept subjection to an ernerging military
aristocracy. The social dominance of this warrior elite was bolstered, according to Mare
Bloch, by the violence of external aggressors, the Arab, Magyar and Viking raiders who
began attacking Europe in the ninth century. In the triparrite model of medieval society
this noble dass or ordo were indeed the ‚bellatores‘, those who made war.1 Accordingly
secular authority in medieval society depended on violence. Kings dcmonstrated their
power by limiting and comroling violence among their subjects, a responsibility irnplicit
in the idea of the king’s peace. One of their main functions was war-leader, a roJe depicted
on medieval coins and seals showillg killgs as mounted fighting-men. Successful
medieval rulers were expected to extend their realms by conquest and reward their
military followers with the spoils of war: booty and land.
Hence lay violence was normal in medieval society and virtually illsritutionalised
at its upper Ievels. Bur what of clerical violence, the theme of this volume? In principle
this might seem a contradiction in terms. If clergy were supposed to be teachers
and models of Christian living, surely they were to avoid and oppose violence? The Ten
Conunandments condcmned killillg. And Christ taught his followers to Iove their ene-
Mare Bloch, Feudal SodefY, tran􀁄. L. A. Manyon, 2 vols. (London: Routledge & Kegan 1962), I, 39-42; cf.
Fran􀁴ois-Loui$ Ganshof, FeudaliJm (3″‚ edition; London: Longmans, 1964), esp. eh. 1. On the medieval
tripartite model sce Georges Duby, The Thm Ordm: Feudal SodrfY Jmagined, tran􀁵. A. Goldhammer (Chicago:
Chicago Univcrsity Press, I 980).
4 PETER CLARKE
rmes and shun violence even 1D self-defence, turning ‚the other cheek‘ to attackers.
Certainly early Christians had observed these pacifistic principles often accepting martyrdom
at the hands of their Roman and other persecutors. This non-resistance to the
Roman state was also consistent with Christ’s and St Paul’s teachings to obey earthly
authority. But things were to change in the fourth century when Christianity was officially
tolerated and even became the state religion of the Roman Empire.
How then could its Christian subjects reconcile obedience with non-violence
when emperors fought wars and called on them to serve in these? Clergy, notably bishops
as state ‚officials‘, responded to this dilemma by justifying warfare in certain situations.
They could cite biblical authorities in support of this. Despite its injunctions
against violence, the Bible was actually ambivalent on the issue of war. The Gospels
included Christ’s ambiguous Statements that he came to bring not peace but the sword
and to turn brother against brother. More explicidy the Old Testament contained numerous
examplcs of the ancient Israelites waging war with God’s approval and even at
His express command against His enernies, especially the stories of the Jewish military
heroes Joshua and Judas Maccabeus.2 St Ambrose (d. 397), bishop of Milan, quoted
such examples to justify Christian warfare upon enernies of the faith. This legitirnised
both fighting pagans and persecution of heretics, as the Roman Church and State increasingly
sought to enforce religious orthodoxy. Patristic thought combined this Christian
idea of ‚holy war‘ with the pre-Christian concept of ‚just war‘. The ancient Greek
philospher Aristotle had ‚coined‘ the latter term; the ane1ent Roman writer Cicero subsequently
defined it as a war to correct an injustice clone by the enemy. This idea expressly
influenced St Augustine (d. 430), bishop of Hippo, who likewise argued that a
just war avcnged injuries. For him this included redressing grievances, and thus warfare
was justified by the enemy’s guilt. lndeed Augustine distinguished that war rnight be a
consequence of and a remedy for sin. In the latter case war was justified since it punished
sin, but when it arose from sheer Iove of violence, it was evil. Hence for
_-\ugustine right intention justified war, and like Ambrose he cited Old Testament examples
as illustrations. 11Us viewpoint legitirnised not only defensive wars, retaliating for
unprovoked attacks, but also offensive ones, notably against the Church’s enernies. He
also argued that only a legitimate authority rnight wage a just war, which meant that only
God or the princeps (emperor) might order it. Effectively he gave the state a mo􀄝opoly
on Iegitimare violence, which rnight be exercised on.ly by soldiers in its service. Social
reasons explain his thinking, for Augustine was born into the Roman upper classes, but
there were also religious grounds. His doctrine implied that ‚private‘ violence was wrong
even if it were carried out in self-defence, which was essentially Christ’s teaching. ‚Pub-
See Frederick H. Russell, The juJI lf/ar in the Middle Agn (Cambridge: Cambridge Univcrsicy Press, 1975),
esp. eh. 1. Cf. Carl Erdmann, The Ori!}n of the Tdta of Cn.Jadt, trans. M. W. Baldwin and W. Goffart
(Princeton: Princeton Universicy Press , 1977).
THE MEDIEV AL CLERGY AND VIOLEN CE 5
lic‘ warfare also entailed Christian obedience to the public authority waging it; Augustine
argued that soldiers had a duty to fight for the state even in unjust wars rather than
disobey orders however sinful.
Later writers, notably the twelfth-century canonist Gratian, would develop
upon Augustine’s views, but he established the core of the Church’s just war theory.
Though it thereby excused lay participation in war, the Church remained opposed to
clerical involvemenr in violence. It forbade clergy to bear arms and fight in wars. Some
rulings of the Early Church even banned ordination of former soldiers. The Roman
state refl.ected this position, for emperors exempted clergy from military service. Ecclesiastical
authorities confirmed this ban in the early Middle Ages. Pope Nicholas I (858-
67) held that clergy who killed in war were suspended from their orders and could not
be promoted further, even if acting in self-defence against infidel attack. Hence clerical
participation in war, even if fought in a just cause, was completely prohibited. One of
the few exceptions, sanctioned at the synod of Ratisbon (743), was that clergy might
accompany armies for spiritual support, praying before battle to invoke saintly protection
and hearing the confessions of troops, like military chaplains.3
However many clergy, especially prelates, violared such restrictions in the early
Middle Ages and thereby occasioned their frequent repetition. Eady medieval bishops
and abbots normally came from the military aristocracy and were often obligated to
raise troops from their Iands to serve their feudal superiors. Some prelates even led such
retinues into battle and fought with them. German bishops were particularly noted for
such belligerence by the twelfth century.4 As Timothy Reuter has pointed out, they
could often summon !arger military contingents than lay magnatcs and a few even had
successful military careers, notably Archbishop Christian of Mainz (d. 1183) who commanded
imperial troops in ltaly for twenty years. Nevertheless such warlike prelates
often incurted the criticism of colleagues for setring a bad example to other clergy and
society.
Indeed clerical hostility to warfare had been growing since the ninth century as
the clergy had increasingly become its victims. Initially they were targeted by external
attackers, notably the Vikings who raided monasteries and churches. Admittedly local
See Ferminio Poggiaspalla, „La chiesa e Ia partecipazione dei chierici alla guerra nella legislazione conciliare
fin o alla Decrctali di Gregorio IX,“ Ephemeridts iHris canonici 1 5 (1959): 140-53;James A. Brundage,
„Crusades, clerics and violence: reflections on a canonical theme,“ The E:xpen’ena of Cnuading, l: Western
ApproacheJ, ed. Marcus Bull and Norman Houslcy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 147-
56.
See Timothy Reuter, „Episcopi C’llm sua militia: The Prelate as Warrior in thc Early Staufer Era,“ in Waniors
and Churrhmen in the High Midd/e Ages. Emrys Pmented lo Kar/ L.eyser, ed. Timothy Reuter (London: Hambledon
Press, 1992), 79-94; cf. notably Friedrich Prinz, K/mu und Krieg imfriihen Mille/alter: Untersuchungen -;;ur
Rolle dtr Kirche beim Aufbau der Koiiigshemchaft (Stuttgart: Anton 1-Iiersemann, 1971); Benjamin Arnold,
„German Bishops and thei.r Military Retinues in the Medieval Empire,“ German 1-Jistory 7 (1 989): 161-83.
6 l’ETER CLARKE
lay aristocrats were meant to defend them against such incursions, but as this threat
from outside waned, increasingly these nobles turned their martial violence inwards
against each other as they competed for territory. Clergy were often ‚caught in the crossfire‘
and even became subjected to the violence of their supposed lay ‚protectors‘. Royal
authority was too weak in France and Germany by the tenth centuty to restrain such
violence, so power fragmented into the hands of these local warlords, who marked their
regional dominance by building castles.
The situation was particularly bad in France, and clergy reacted against this
‚private‘ warfare above all there. Benedictine monks in northern France, Lester Little
argued, fought back with spiritual weapons, proclaiming ritual curses against their attackers.
5 The insecurity of French clergy also famously gave rise to the ‚Peace of God‘
movement. French bishops held the fust ‚peace councils‘ in the last quarter of the tenth
century.6 In 975 Bisbop Guy of Le Puy called such a meeting to deal with those pillaging
churches in his diocese. Guy told the anned men assembled there to swear an oath
to keep the peace or face excommunication, a threat backed by the presence of his
nephew’s troops. He and other bishops continued to hold such councils but depended
less on such secular support and more on popular pressure to extract oaths from fighting
men to observe the Peace of God. Relics of saints were used to draw !arger crowds
to these later councils, which declared curses in the names of these saints against peacebreakers,
paralleling Benedictine practice. The peace councils particularly sought to
proteer vulnerable groups, including the ‚poor‘ but above all the clergy themselves. They
issued decrees against sacrilegious plunder of churches and assaults on clergy as weil as
theft of peasant property.
Few councils met immediately after A.D. 1000, but the peace movement revived
and changed in the 1020s. lt expanded beyond its original heartlands of Aquitaine
and Burgundy into other French regions and even northern Spain. The populace played
a lesser role in it; secular rulers became its most prominent supporters as the power of
kings and higher nobility rose again. In 1024, for example, King Robert of France and
German Emperor Hemy III met on the borders of their Iands to declare a universal
peace. Most significantly of all, councils now proclaimed the ‚Truce of God‘ rather than
the Peace. TI1e Peace had aimed to proteer certain groups at all times but the Truce
sought to ban all violence at certain times, notably Lent and other periods of religious
significance. It also went further than the Peace in suggesting that the shedding of any
Christian blood, not just clerical, was sinful, as the council of Narbonne decreed in
Lester K. Linle, Benedictine MakdictirJns.· litu’l,ical curJing in Romantsque Fmnct (lthaca: Comell Univcrsity
Press, 1 993).
See The Ptact oj God: Social Viokm􀂄 and &ligious &sponse in Fronte around the Year 1000, ed. Thomas Head
and Richard Landes (lthaca: Comell University Press, 1 992); Thomas Head, „The Development of the
Peace of God in Aquitaine (970-1 005),“ Spmdum 74 (1999): 65(>-86.
THE MEDlEY AL CLERGY AND VTOLENCE 7
1054: ‚No Christian should kill another Christian, for whoever kills a Chr:istian doubtless
sheds the blood of Christ‘.
Such proh:ibitions applied to clerical as weil as lay violence, since the peace
councils renewed the traditional ban on clergy conunitting bloodshed, even prelates.
Bishop Fulbert of Chartres (d. 1028) echoed this sentiment in a Ietter berating so-called
‚bishops‘ who were more skilled in warfare than lay princes and were not ashamed to
disturb the peace of churches or shed the blood of Christians.7 Some conciliar canons
had even declared that such clergy bearing arms forfeited their protection under the
Peace of God. Such views acquired greater significance in the context of the eleventhcentury
Church reform movement. It aimed to remove clergy from involvement in
secular affairs (in keeping with St Paul’s advice to Tirnothy) and release them from lay
subjection, including feudal obligations. lt also sought to direct lay violence towards
ends approved by ecclesiastical authority. Tius had long been understood to mean
fighting the Church’s enernies, and indeed those promoting the Truce of God considered
warfare justifted in the defence of Christendom. This thinking achieved its highest
expression in the cn1sading movement.
At the council of Clermont in 1095 Pope Urban II called on Christians to help
their brethren in the east resist Muslim attack and probably proclairned the Truce of
God in the West. This ‚First Crusade‘ exported the violence of the milites away from
Europe towards a ‚holy‘ goal. Declarations of universal peace indeed accompanied subsequent
papal calls for crusades. But, in line with traditional doctrine, clergy were not
meant to fight in these ‚holy‘ wars. /\ canon of the council of Clermont confumed the
prohibition on clergy bearing arms. Urban’s sermon at Clermont apparently sought to
restrain them from joining the crusader army. Certainly in a Ietter of 1096 to Vallombrosa
he forbade priests and monks to go on crusade without the perrnission of their
ecclesiast:ical superiors. Even with this consent they rnight only take part ‚in accordance
with the discipline of the holy canons‘, i.e. they rnight not fight but only provide spiritual
support.
Nevertheless crusaders almost became ‚honorary clergy‘, receiving certain
clerical privileges and adopting some aspects of monast:ic asceticism. More significantly
the military orders emerged in the twelfth century to defend the crusader states. As
Brundage has observed, their members were like monks in that they were professed,
took vows and enjoyed papal irnmunities, and closely resembled lay brethren in other
orders, but they differed from other religious since most bore arms and used them in
their religious vocation.s Canonists, therefore, had to use considerable ingenuity to get
around the canonical ban on clergy carrying weapons and ftghting with them. They did
See Poggiaspalla, „La chiesa c Ia partecipazione dei chicrici alla guerra,“ 145; Brundagc, „Crusades, clerics
and violcnce,“ 149.
lbidem 152-6.
8 PETER CLARKE
so by devising a new legal category of ‚ecclesiastical persons‘ to accommodate both
clergy and military orders. Canonists also excused clerical participation in warfare in
certain circumstances by the late twelfth century.9 Rufmus (c. 1164) held that clergy
migbt use anns in extreme necessiry defensively or against infidels on a superior’s order.
Huguccio (c. 1188) agreed but specified that clergy might use only defensive arms in
these instances, i.e. armour, not offensive weapons. Thirteenth-century canonists
accepted this qualified position, limiting clergy to their traditional role of encouraging
those fighting ‚just‘ and ‚holy‘ wars, except that they might wield offensive weapons in
unavoidable personal self-defence, not military action. Pope Clement V (1305-14) subsequently
conflimed this exception in canon law declaring that clergy committing such
defensive bloodshed no Ionger incurred ‚irregularity‘, an impediment to receiving and
exercising holy orders.to
So far we have focussed on clerical attitudes to and the legitimacy of clerical
involvement in ‚public‘ violence, or warfare. Admittedly historians have termed wars
among local magnates ‚private‘, and even public authorities, i.e. pri.nces, might wage
wars for ‚private‘ ends, rather than to serve the ‚common good‘, which the theologian
Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274) saw as the proper end of a just war. Indeed Guy Halsall has
remarked on the difficulry in differentiating between ‚public‘ and ‚private‘ violence in
the early Middle Ages and the equally problematic and related distinction of ‚legiti.mate‘
and ‚illegitimate‘ violence.1′ ‚Illegitimate‘ or criminal violence has been defmed as ‚private‘
violence, and we also need to explore violent crime in relation to medieval clergy
since the historiography is extensive.
Firstly clergy were often victims of ‚private‘ violence in this sense. There are
many medieval accounts of clergy being murdered; consequently some were even canonised
as marryrs, most notably Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1170).12
1l1e papacy sought to protect clergy from such personal violence. Pope Innocent II
made the best-known attempt by issuing the canon ‚Si quis suadente‘ at the Second
Lateran Council (1139).13 It ruled that anyone who laid violent hands on clergy or
monks incurred automatic excommunication and might obtain absolution only in person
at the papal curia. This ruling entered Gratian’s Decretum (c. 1140) and so became
10
II
12
11
Poggiaspalla, „La chiesa e Ia partecipazione dei chierici alla guerra,“ 149-52; Russell,j“s‘ War, 135.
He revoked a ruling of Pope lnnocent I!! (1198-1216) that rccognised the Roman law pnnciplc of sdfdefence
but still insisted that such clergy incurred irregularity.
Guy Halsall, „Violence and socicty in the early medicval west: an introductory survey,“ in Vioftnct und
sociery in lht tarly mulitml West, ed. Guy Halsall (Woodbridge: Boydeli Press, 1998), 1-45, at 7-16.
For a recent fine biography of the archbishop sec Anne Duggan, ThomaJ Bukt/ (London: Arnold, 2004).
More generally on thc murder of bishops see Biseboßmord in: Milltlalitr, ed. Natalie Fryde and Dirk Reitz
(Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2003).
R. H. Helmholz, ‚“Si quis suadente‘ (C.17 q.4 c.29): Theory and practice,“ in Prm:wlingr of tht .fmnth
lnltmational Congrm of Mtditml Canon Liw, ed. Peter Linehan, Menumenta 1uris Canonici, Senes C, B (Vatican
City: Biblioteca Apo$tolica Vaticana, 1988), 425-38.
THE MEDIEV AL CLERGY AND VIOLEN CE 9
part of the common law of the Western Church. It emphasized that assaults on clergy
were serious crimes by reserving them to papal absolution; this requi.red the assailants to
make penitential pilgrimages to Rome. Adrnittedly in practice local bishops might absolve
them for rninor assaults and in other circumstances, at least in English church
courts, but the principle remained. It retlected the idea of the reform movement that
clergy were a separate, privileged caste within society, and hence worthy of special respect;
their cloth was meant to protect them, even if it seldom did. Numerous petitions
from lay assailants of clergy, seeking papal absolution, were recorded in the medieval
registers of the Apostolic Penitentiary.t4
The protection which the canon ‚Si quis suadente‘ afforded became known as
the privilegium canonis. And by the twelfth century clergy claimed another privilege, privilegium
fori.15 This also concerned crime, including murder and assau.lt, but in cases where
clergy were allegedly perpetrators rather than victims. It meant immunity from lay justice,
so that clergy accused of crimes might not be tried or pu.nished by secular courts. It
was related to privilegzum canonis in that the latter technically forbade officials of secular
justice from laying hands on clergy to arrest them, and certainly from inflicting physical
penalties on them, including execution and mutilation. In the context of the reform
movement privilegium fori also reinforced the notion of ecclesiastical liberty from lay
comrol and the clergy’s special social starus. Nevertheless it inconveniently suggested
that some clergy feil short of the reformers‘ ideals, committing not only canonical
crimes, notably simony, but also serious felonies like laymen, notably murder. ldeally
clergy were not supposed to participate in lay affairs or any violence (until Clement V
excused this in self-defence). Canon law even forbade their involvement in adrninistering
lay justice, for this implicated them in bloodshed as secular courts imposed physical
penalties for many crimes. Likewise church courts might not hand down ’sentences of
blood‘. Admittedly clerks continued to serve secular authorities, even acting as justices,
and ecclesiastical judges condemning heretics often handed them over to the ’secular
arm‘ for execution. Nevertheless in theory lay and ecclesiastical ju.risdictions were meant
to be separate, but the line separating them was unclear and disputed at many points.
And one of the jurisdictional issues that would provoke controversy between the medieval
Church and ‚Stare‘ was indeed privilegium fori.
Under the irnperus of the reform movement, the Western Church, and particularly
the papacy, had extended and assened its jurisdiction over many issues by the
rwelfth century, including all cases regarding the clergy. lts juridical authority was de-
“ See Kirsi. Salonen, Tht Pmitentiory 01 a WeU of Grace in tht Lote Midd/e Agu: Tbe Exampk of tbe Province of
Uppsola 1448-1527 (Helsinlci: Academia Scientarum Fennica, 2001), 128-38, 288-310.
•s The two main studics of this privilege are Robert Genestal, u privilcgium fori en France du Dimt de
Gratien a lajin du XIV• .rieck, 2 vols. (Paris: Emest Leroux, 1921-24), and Leona C. Gabel, Bwejit qf Clergy lir
England in tbe Loter Middk Age.r (Northampton, Mass., !929; repr. New York: Octagon, 1969).
10 PETER CLARKE
ftned in new canonical collections, notably Gratian’s Decretum, and articulated through
an international system of church courts extending from diocesan Ievel up to the papal
curia as the highest ecclesiastical tribunal in the \X’est. Many secular rulers were wary of
such developments and perceived them as a threat to their own growing power, especially
their control over churches and clergy in their domains. This is not to say that
privilegzum fori was an innovation of the reform papacy. It had already emerged under the
Emperor Constantine (d. 337) and it was also respected under the Frankish monarchy
from the seventh century.16 By the ninth century many legal authorities (not aU of them
authentic) supported pn·vilegium fori, and many of these were subsequently included in
Gratian’s Decretum. However it was not systematically enforced nor widely contested
before the growth of ecclesiastical power and canon law in the twelfth century.
The first major clash over privilegium fori was in England, maybe because royal
government was more advanced there and so more defensive of its claims. It was the
most heated issue in the famous conflict between King Henry II (1154-89) and Thomas
Becket, culminating in the latter’s death in 1170. The story is weil known to historians,
at least in England, and has been the subject of considerable debate in Anglophone
historiography, 17 so it will only be outlined in brief here. The issue of ‚criminous clerks‘
was ftrst raised by Henry at a council of English prelates in December 1163. He proposcd
that clergy convicted of crimes in the church courts should be handed over ro
royal justices for secular punishment. Becket and his feUow bishops opposed this, insisting
on clerical i.nununity from lay justice. But Hemy was determined, and i.n January
1164 he laid before a council of nobles and bishops a statement of the ‚cusroms of the
realm‘. The king thereby sought ro restore ‚ancient‘ royal rights over the English
Church, including ‚cri.mi.nous clerks‘. The latter were the subject of clause 3 of this
docurnent, which became known as the ‚Constitutions of Clarendon‘. The clause was
worded ambiguously, but since Maitland historians have agreed that it meant that clergy
accused of serious crimes were to be summoned before sccular justices to face charges
and then handed over, without trial, to be judged in the church cou.rts as clergy. If convicted,
they were to be ‚degraded‘ and brought back to the secular cou.rt to receive punishment
as laymen; ‚degradation‘ was an ecclesiastical penalty depriving them of clerical
status, thus reducing them to laymen. Royal officials were to artend the ecclesiastical
1• Genesral, u privilegium fori en Fnmct, 1. ii-iii; 2. iü-xx. See also Anton Niss!, Dtr GuidJI.rsland du Clmu im
friinki.uhtn Reich (lnnsbruck: Wagner, 1886).
17 The mam contnbunons are r:rederick W. Maitland, „Henry 11 and the Criminous Clerks,“ EngliJh Hislati'““‚
Rezitw7 (1892): 224-34, repr. in his Roman Camm Liw in lht Cbun·h ofEngland (London: Methuen, 1898),
132-47; Charle􀃱 Duggan, „The Bccket Dispute and thc Cnminous Clerks,“ Bulktin of lbt lnrtilult of Hirtori.-
al Rmorrb 35 ( 1 962): 1-28, repr. in h1s Canon L:zw in Mditw! England: lht Btdul Dispult anti Demtal Collulioll.r
(London: Variorum, 1982), art. X; Richard M. Fraher, ‚The Bccket Dispute and Two Decrctist Traditions,“
jo11rnal of Muiitt’fJI HiJtory 4 {1978): 347-68. See also Genestal, u priv1legium fori m Frana, 2. 95-
1 14, and Duggan, Thomas BecKü, 39-58.
THE MEDIEVAL CLERGY AND VIOLENCE 11
proceedings, apparently to prevent convicted clerks from escaping. Becket persuaded
his fellow bishops to approve these royal ‚customs‘, perhaps to spare them Heruy’s
likely retaliation,18 but refused to do so hin1self, eventually preferring exile.
Clause 3 was the main sticking-point for him and Charles Duggan summarised
Becket’s three principal objections to it: the lay jurisdiction asserted over clerks in the
initial hearing; secular courts might not punish degraded clerks except for subsequent
felonies committed as laymen; degradation was sufficient penalty for clerical crin1es
without additional lay punishment since God does not judge (and punish) twice for the
same offence.19 Maitland, Genestal, Fraher and other historians have considered
Becket’s views innovatory, notably in extending privilegium fori to degraded derks for
felonies they conunitted as clergy.20 Henry II certainly alleged that the proposed double
punishment of convicted clerks was ‚customary‘, going back to the time of his grandfather
Henry I (1100-35). But this is debatable as English legal practice is unclear on this
point before 1164. Some sources even indicate that English clergy were not normally
subject to secular punishment but tried and semenced by their bishops, notably following
the separation of ecclesiasrical and royal jurisdictions under King William I (1 066-
87)21 Henry’s predecessor Stephen had recognised episcopal jurisdiction over all clerks
in a charter of 1136. This, however, reflected how far church reform had advanced
under Stephen’s weak rule, and arguably Henry sought to strengthen royal government
by limiting the extent of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, especially papal, in England. In this
respect some historians have seen Henry as the real innovator not Becket.
But Henry and Becket both claimed support for their positions from canon
law, and historians have also intensely debated this.22 Maitland famously argued that the
king had a better case in canon law than his archbishop. He noted in Gratian’s treatment
of privilegium fori (Decretum C.11 q.1) that several texts used the phrase ‚curiae tradere‘
in relation to crin1inous clerks. He argued that this was understood to mean delivcry
to the secular court for punishment, so these legal texts set precedents for Heruy’s
proposed procedure. Genestal also claimed that this was a standard interpretation of
‚curiae tradere‘ by the twelfth century, and traced the phrase back to Roman law.
Justinian (d. 565), he argued, had established this procedure of secular powers punishing
degraded clerks, and Frankish laws subsequently adopted it. These legal authorities
entered canonical collections, including Gratian’s Decretum, which apparently considered
“ As suggested by Duggan, ThomaJ Be&kel, 45.
t9 Duggan, „Becket Dispute,“ 4.
2ll Maitland, Roman Canon Law, 146; Gcncstal, L.e privilegium fori en Franc., 2. 100; Fraher, „Becket Dispute,“
354b, 356, 362a. Cf. Christopher R. Cheney, „The punishmcnt of felonous clerks,“ EngliJh 1-liJtmira/ Retirw51
(1936): 215-36, at 215.
21 See Duggan, ThomaJ Beckel, 48-9.
22 See n. 17 above.
1 2 PETER Cl.ARKE
the procedure standard. Genestal hence concluded that canon law backed Henry not
Becket.2􀂾
However Charles Duggan challenged these interpretations and argued that
‚Becket’s case was canonically better grounded‘. Gratian broadly defended clerical immwüty
from lay justice, he observed, and only conceded secular punishment of clergy
with episcopal consent, restricting ‚curiae tradere‘ to exceptional cases involving offences
against bishops. Duggan also pointed out that delivery to lay justice was one
meaning of ‚curiae tradere‘ in Gratian’s Decretum but not the only one. In some texts it
implied reduction to ‚curial‘ Status, a Roman law idea which suggested that clerks were
sent to serve perperually in a curia or household.24 Some canonists also interpreted the
curia where clerks were sent as a bishop’s prison. Finally Duggan argued that contemporary
decretists (commentators on the Decretum) held views more favourable to Becket’s
position than the king’s. Notably Rufmus taught that clergy might be handed over to lay
justice at the Church’s initiative, not the State’s as Hemy intended; and Stephen of
Tournai concluded that lay judges might only punish degraded clerks who reoffended.
Admittedly this was the closest that a contemporary decretist came to opposing double
punishment, but Beryl Smalley has shown that Becket’s views here owed more to theological
than canonistic debate. Richard Fraher, however, has disagreed with Duggan’s
reading of the canonistic sources. He argued that Bolognese decretists indeed supported
clerical immunity from secular justice, but not beyond degradation, as Becket held, till
after his death in 1 1 70. Anglo-Norman canonists, according to Fraher, were even slower
to change their views in response to the Becket dispure and only followed this
Bolognese Iead after 1 1 90, even though Henry II had revoked clause 3 of the Clarendon
Constitutions by 1 1 76 and Pope Alexander III had issued the decretal ‚At si clerici‘ (c.
1 178) forbidding lay jurisdiction over criminous clerks and secular punishment of them.
Nonetheless, as Anne Duggan has noted, such canonistic commentaries are notoriously
hard to date and interpret, so Fraher has doubtless not had the last word.25 In any case
evcn if privilegium fori, or ‚benefit of clergy‘ as English historians call it, was not f1rmly
cstablished in England before the Becket conflict, much ev
i
dence suggests that it was
rcspected thereaftcr both in practice and principlc not only there but increasingly also
on the continent. By 1 1 90 it had been extended to Normandy, for example.
Even though this appeared a posthumaus victory for Becket, royal government
subsequently incrcased its jurisdiction over criminous clcrks in England, as Leona
Gabel has demonstrated, and to a lesser extent in France, according to Genesta!.26 With
23 Maüland, Roman Canon L11v, 141-6; Genestal, Le privilegium fori m France, 2. iü-xxxix, 3-13, 98, 102-4.
Duggan, ‚Becket Dispute‘, 3 (quotation), 8-10; cf. also Duggan, Thomas Bedeel, 50-53.
Duggan, Thomas Bukt/, 50. See n. 17 above for Fraher. See also Genestal, Le privilcgium fori w France, 2.
20-26, on „At si clcrici“.
Genestal, u privilegium fori en Franre, 2, esp. chs. 6-10; Gabel, Benejil ofC!ergy (as n. 15), esp. chs. 2-3. Cf.
also Cheney, „Felonous clerks“; Austin L. Poole, „Outlawry as a punishment of criminous clerks,“ in
THE MEDIEVAL CLERGY ANDV!OLENCE 13
regard to the English Crown its judicial records make this clear by the mid-thirteenth
cenrury. Firscly clerks accused of crimes in England were normally arrested by the lay
authorities, but not immediately delivered to the church courts for trial. Instead they
were formally charged before royal justices, who required a jury to give a verdict on a
clerk’s guilt usually before handllg him over. This resembled the ftrst srage of Henry
II’s proposed procedure. Nonetheless the English lawyer Bracton, though a trained
canonist, recognised it as Standard practice under Henry III (1216-72), and English
episcopal records refer to clergy already found guilty in the county courts as cferici convicti.
Admittedly clergy were not judged and sentenced in the royal courts at this stage. However
a guilty verdict enticled royal justices to seize a clerk’s property in the king’s name.
There were clear political and fiscal motives bellind this, for if an ecclesiastical trial
confmned the clerk’s guilt subsequendy, his goods were forfeit to the Crown. Even if a
church court acqu:itted hi.m, restitution of his property was not automatic; his bishop
had to request this formally by an act of royal ’special grace‘. And English bishops often
complained that the Crown did not always release such property even then. Another
grievance was that clergy often langu:ished in royal jails for some time awaiting their
hearing before itinerant justices and delivery to the Curch’s custody.
Secondly if a clerk sought the transfer of his case to a church coun, he had to plead
‚benefit of clergy‘ and his bishop bad to clai.m him from the royal authorities. Since lay
judges might inflict capital punishment and often did but ecclesiastical judges might not,
‚benefit of clergy‘ meant the difference berween li.fe and death to a convicted criminal so
it had to be established whether he was genuinely entitled to it. Canonists regarded the
tonsure as the outward sign of clerical status and basis for clerical priv:ilege 27 Some
canonical rulings suggested that clerical dress was also an important test of privilege,
notably for minor clergy who were married or in lay occupations since secular authorities
were cspecially inclined to doubt their clerical status in thirteenth-century France
and England. Indeed royal courts in both kingdoms accepted the clerical tonsure and
dress as proof of stan1s in that century. But by the fourteenth century thc English courts
had introduced a Latin reading-test as the chief means to prove clerical status since
literacy was seen as the preserve of clergy. In fact it was an i.nadequate method because
some clergy were barely literate, while literacy was spreadi.ng among the later medieval
laity thereby allowi.ng spur:ious clai.ms to ‚benefit of clergy‘. In theory the bishop’s representacive
who came to claim the alleged clerk admi.nistered the test, but in practice royal
judges had the fmal say and might even reject his assessment. Hence secular jurisdiccion
Hislorical esrays in honour of james Tail, ed. John G. Edwards, Vivian H. Galbrai th and Ernest F. Jacob
(Manchester: printed for the subscribers, 1933), 239-46.
27 See Gabel, Benejil of Ckrgy, eh. 3 ; Genestal, Lt pri,􀅖legium fori en France, 1, esp. chs. 1 (on ehe tonsure) and
4 (on married clergy).
14 PETER CLARKE
denied some clergy access to ecclesiastical justice.28 In add.ition canon law deprived
certain clergy of privilegium Jori. Degraded clergy rnight no Ionger claim it if they reoffended.
Canonists doubted whether apostates retained it, especially if they comrnitted
violence. And notably from 1274 bigamous clergy automatically lost their status and
privileges since such minor clerks had married a widow or more than once. A canon of
the Second Council of Lyon abandoned them to lay justice for crimes comrnitted after
their bigamy, but English royal law even understood this to apply retrospectively. In
France lay jurisdiction also strictly enforced this ruling with papal support, even if bishops
still sought to protect such clergy.29
However if a clerk secured the transfer of his case ro ecclesiastical jurisd.iction,
his chances of conviction were apparently low. Cerrainly most cases involving criminous
clerks that reached English church courts ended in acquittal, even if this overturned a
guilty verd.ict in the county court. Two reasons accoum for this. One was that the
church courts required higher Standards of proof than lay judges, and the other was
canonical purgation.30 Clerks rnight seek to prove their innocence by this procedure,
which involved them assembling a set number of w-itnesses who were willing to testify
that they were telling tl1e truth when they denied their guilt. These were not necessarily
witnesses to the alleged crimes but more like character-witnesses. Other parties rnight
object to a clerk availing hirnself of purgation or to the compurgators he called to testify,
but in practice it rarely happened, sometimes since supporters of the accused
bribed opponenrs to buy their silence. Unsurprisingly secular authorities d.istrusted
purgation, and in England they sought to Iimit its use by the later thirteenth century,
delivering certain clerks to bishops provided that purgation was denied or deferred at
the king’s pleasure. Nevertheless it could fail to clear the accused, and some clergy confessed
their guilt before the church courts. Moreover bishops usually initiated the canonical
trial by ordering an inquil:y into the life and reputation of the accused; if it reported
unfavourably, purgation was forbidden and conviction the usual outcome. When
the church courts found clerks guilty of felonies, the normal penalty they imposed was
degradation. Accord.ing to Gabel, English bishops increasingly imprisoned such degraded
clerks to perform life-long penance too and kept jails for this purpose.
But did any crirninous clerks also suffer secular punishment? Poole found that
some degraded by their bishops were also exiled by the English Crown, and Genestal
noted a sinlliar practice in Normandy by 1205. As outlaws they lost all legal rights, effeccively
includ.ing their clerical privileges, since outlaws who returned from exile rnight
be licitly hunted down and hanged. If clergy suspected of felonies failed to appear be-
>8 Gabel, Benefil ofC!ugy, 71-2, 87-91; Genesral, Le privilegiu:n fori en Frantt, 1, esp. chs. 3 (btgamy) and 5
(apostasy).
‚“ Cheney, „Fdonous clerks,“ 216-18; Genestal, Le pnvtlegiur.� fori en Fruna, I. 66-72
JO Gabel, Benejil n[C!trgy, eh. 4.
TI-IE MEDIEVAL CLERGY AND VTOLE:-JCE 15
fore English royal judges for an initial hearing, they also risked outlawry. Indeed Cheney
argued that outlawed English clerks were generaUy fugitives rather than suffering double
punishment. Nevertheless the Crown’s sequestration of property from clergy degraded
by their bishops was a financial penalty, and English prelates certainly protested at this
double punishment.31 However historians agree that in England the Crown generally
respected the reservation of clerical crimes to ecclesiastical judgement and punishment
(despite its atrempts to restriet this to its advantage). Genestal concluded that the same
was true in France by the later rhirteeoth century, except where canon law surrendered
clergy to secular punishment for certain crimes, notably heresy.32 Further research is
needed on privilegium fori in other parts of Europe, and maoy essays in this volume make
a valuable contribution in this direction D
In conclusion the existing hisroriography has largely discussed medieval clergy
and violence in two contexts: war and crime. In theory clerks were not meant to participate
in either, but in practice some did. The ecclesiastical authorities had to ftnd ways of
coping with this situation even if they had to co-operate with secular powers in discipli.ning
violent clergy. Likewise the clergy were often victims of warfare ancl violent
crime, and the Church also cleveloped means to cope with these problems, notably the
pcace movement, crusades, and privilegium canonsi . However certain questions need further
research. How successfu.l was the medieval Church in restrai.ning violence against
and by clergy? How common was clerical violence in the Middle Ages, especially compared
with lay violence:> Why were some clergy violent? What were lay attitucles toward
clerical violence? One could go on, but arguably such gaps in our knowleclge exist since
past historiography has not addressed the topic of medieval clergy and violence in general,
but only dealt with certain aspects of it. Adrnittedly recent historians have attempted
general approaches to the place of violence in medieval society and to medieval
warfare as a phenomenon,34 but these have rarely included much special and separate
consideration of the clergy. This volume is, therefore, an irnportant corrective to such
“ Poole, „Oudawry,“ 243-6; Genestal, L.e privileg!Um fori en FrtJ!I(t, 2. 1 1 0-14; Cheney, „Felonous clerks,“
234-6. On episcopal grievanccs see William R. Jenes, „Relations of the Two Jurisdictions: Confiict and
Co-operation in England during ehe Thirteenth and Fourteenth Cenruries,“ Sllldit.r in Mtdiet•al and RtnuÜ·
Jan<􀂣 History 7 (1970): 77-210, esp. 178-92.
JZ Genestal, L.e priv•leg.um fori w Frum􀟬. 2, esp. chs. 7 -I 0.
JJ The nch juclicial rccords for late med•eval ltaly md•catc one promising avcnue for such research; see
Trevor Dean, Crime and }11stice ni Late Medwi al lta!J (Cambridge Cambridge University Press, 2007), and
Prof. Andrea Zorzi’s work on Tuscany notably his L’amminsi lra 1984); Helen J. Nicholson, Mtditw/ Wmfan (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macrrullan, 2003); La guem, Ia vinltnce et
lts gens a11 Mqytn Agt, ed. Philippe Centamine and Olivier Guyotjeannin, 2 vols. (Paris: CTHS, 1996); in
ibidem 2. 89-126, clergy are considcred but largely as victims of warfarc.
1 6 PETER CLARKE
neglect. The case studies it contains indicate the wealth of sources on the subject, not
least the Apostolic Penitentiary records, and will hopefully Iead the way for further
research. The subject is an importam one, since it has so much to tell us about clerical
relations with the laity and the Church’s relationship with the ‚State‘ in medieval
Europe, inter alia. Indeed one significant way forward will be to study medieval ecclesiastical
and secular records together; this requires more collaboration between scholars in
the all too separate fields of church history and political history,35 and the study of
medieval history can only be richer for that.
lS A project designed to encourage such collaboration intcrnationally 1S ‚Law and Violence in the Middle
ll.ges‘ led by Prof. Anne Curry and Dr Peter Clarke of the History Departmcnt at the University of
Southampton (UK); ); for further details sec http:/ /www.wun.ac.uk/ extemal/lvma/index.html.
VIOLENCE AND THE MEDIEVAL CLERGY
CEU MEDIEVALIA 16
MEDIUM AEVUM QUOTIDIANUM
Sonderband 26 (201 0)
Series Editor: J6zsef Laszlovszky
Series Teclmical Editor: Annabella Pal
Violence and the Medieval Clergy
Edited by
Gerhard J aritz
and
Ana Marinkovic
Medium Aevum Quotidianum
Krems/Donau
&
Centtal European University
Department of Medieval Studies
&
Centtal European University Press
Budapest · New York
Budapest, 2011
© Editors and Contributors 2011
Ist edition
Technical Editor: Gerlurd Ja ritz
Copy Editor: Judith Rasson
Cover design for the series by Peter T6th
Cover Illustration:
Trec of Vices (detail), th.ird quartcr 13″‚ cenrury, Austria.
Vicnna, Austrian National Library, cod. 12538, fol. 13r
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Papers from the workshop „Coping with violencc, and the mcdicval clcrgy (from thc local settlement of
dispure to approach.ing the Papal Penitentiary),“ held at Dubrovnik in 2008.
I ncludes bibliographical refcrcnces and index.
ISBN 978-6155053269 (pbk.)
1. Violencee–Religious aspects–Catholic Church–History–To 1500–Congresscs. 2. Catholic ChurchEuropc–
Cicrgy–History–To 1500–Congresses. 3. Church history–Middle Ages, 600-1500–Congresses.
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Printed in Hungary by Akaprint Kft., Budapcst
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ………………… . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Peter Clarke, The Meclieval Clergy and Violence: An Historiographical Introduction . . . . 3
Kirsi Salonen, The Apostolic Penitentiary and Violence in the Roman Curia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Torstein jorgemen, „Killings, Unfortunately, Take Place More Often Here than
Anywhere Else:“ Civil and Clerical Homicide in Late Meclieval Norway . . . . . . . 29
Etleva Lo/a, Violence and the Clergy in Late Meclieval Albania:
with and without the Penitenriary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Gerhard Jmitt The Bread-Knife . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Gordan Ravanfif, Sacred Space, Violence and Public Law 111 the Cloisters
of the Franciscan and Dominican Hauses ofDubrovnik . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Ne/la Lonza, The Priest Barbius and His Crime before the State and Church
Authorities of Meclieval Dubrovnik . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
List of Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
PREFACE
Studies of the Apostolic Penitentiary and its role and function for all strata of
late medieval society have become an important field of research at tbe international
Ievel. The requests of Christians for grace to be granred by the papal curia offer information
about a variety of problems and needs that confronred both clerics and laypeople
and made petitions to rhe pope necessary or, at least, advisable.
Since 2001, the Department of Medieval Studies of Central European University
has been concentrating on comparative researcb in the East Central European dara
of the Penitentiary Registers. This has led to intensive cooperation with other scholars
in the field, to a number of international meetings and the publication of their results.1
The most recent of these workshops was held in Dubrovnik in 2008 and dealt with a
research question for which rhe Penitentiary registers contain rich material: „Coping
wirb Violence, and the Medieval Clergy (from the Local Settlement of Dispute to Approaching
the 1\postolic Penitentiary).“
In recent decades research into violence in the Middle Ages has seen a particular
boom. In a !arge number of studies historians discovered that violence was omnipresent
in medieval society and affected all areas of life and the members of all social
strata. Although one has to be careful with such generalizations, it can be stated that the
survivi.ng sources deal regularly with issues of violent actions, signs and results of violence,
violent people and coping with violence. Members of the clergy played an important
role in recordi.ng such evidence – as weiters about violence and critics of violence,
but also as perpetrators, victims, and witnesses. However, systematic analyses of
the patterns of behaviour and the different functions and actions of clerics on these
issues have not yet been realized often in a context-bound and comparative way. The
Dubrovnik workshop aimed to contribute towards changing this situation and offer a
forum to discuss questions about the various roles of medieval clerics in the attempts
The results of meetings at Bergen (2003) and Budapest (2004) were published in Gerhard Jaritz,
Torstern J0rgensen and Kirsi Salonen (ed.), The Lang Arm of Papal Authority. Late Medieva/
Chnsllan Peripheriesand Their Commumcation wllh the Holy See, CEU Medievalia 8 (Budapest and
New York: Central European University Press, 2005); selected papers of a workshop at Rome (2005)
may be found in iidem (ed.), … et usque ad ultimum terrac The Apostolic Penitentiary in Local
Contexts, CEU Medievalia 10 (Budapest and New York: Central European University Press, 2007).
2 PREFACE
and processes designed to cope with violence. Particular emphasis was put on the function
of the Apostolic Penitentiary and its decisions in th.is context. This volume contains
selected contributions from the meeting.
In his introductory paper, Peter Clarke offers an overview of the state of the
art of research into the connection of the clergy and violence in the :Middle J\ges. Kirsi
Salonen concentrates on violence at the Roman curia and its reflection in the Perutentiary
records. Torstein ]0rgensen and Etleva Lala deal with violence and the clergy in
two peripheral areas of medieval Western Christianity, namely, Norway and Albania,
and also include Penitentiary evidence in their analysis. Gerhard Ja ritz sn1dies the role of
one important object in the violence-bound argumentation of the supplicants to rhe
Penitentiary: the short bread-knife that was allowed to be carried by everyone and did
not count as a weapon, but seems to have been used regularly as such. Gordan Ravancic
and Nella Lonza offer analyses of problems of violence occurring in the clerical space of
medieval Dubrovnik.
November, 2011 Gerhard Jaritz (Budapest and Kl:ems)
Ana Marinkovic (Budapest and Zagreb)