The Right Of Spoil Of The Popes Of Avignon 1316 1415

The popes of Avignon, beginning with the election of John XXII in 1316 & ending with the deposition of Benedict XIII in 1415, laid claim to the movable property of some 1,200 ecclesiastical persons, exercising a power that has subsequently been named "jus spolii," the "right of spoil." This term to designate the right of the pope to collect the goods of deceased clerics for his own use seems to appear for the first time at the end of the 15th cent. Chapters: Intro. Definitions; The Law of Succession to Clerics' Property; The Pope as Protector of Clerical Property & the Testamentary License; "Jus spolii" & "plenitudo potestatis"; The Admin. & Documen'n. of Spoils; The Extent & Incidence of the Right of Spoil; & Repertory of Cases of the Papal Right of Spoil.

All the popes of Avignon, from John XXII to Benedict XIII, claimed the movable goods of deceased prelates and other clerics by their "right of spoil." This power was an exercise of the popes' vastly expanded fiscal administration, justified by their claim to plenitudo potestatis, which was not successfully challenged until the Great Western Schism. The first edition was based on the cases of 1,191 despoiled clerics. The second edition is completely rewritten and updated, including 1,352 cases. The introductory study has been greatly expanded and offers a robust account of the peculiar institution of spoils in its bureaucratic and ideological setting. Conceived as both an electronic book and a print book, the new edition makes full use of modern technical tools. The introductory study includes its own index of proper names and an appendix of proving documents. In the repertory of cases, the Vatican Archives documents of each case are summarized with their dates and citations, and there is an elaborate index of all the persons named in the cases. A complete bibliography is found at the end. The data in all the separate Cases have been extracted into a downloadable statistical table.--Publisher.

With the arrival of Clement V in 1309, seven popes ruled the Western Church from Avignon until 1378. Joëlle Rollo-Koster traces the compelling story of the transplanted papacy in Avignon, the city the popes transformed into their capital. Through an engaging blend of political and social history, she argues that we should think more positively about the Avignon papacy, with its effective governance, intellectual creativity, and dynamism. It is a remarkable tale of an institution growing and defending its prerogatives, of people both high and low who produced and served its needs, and of the city they built together. As the author reconsiders the Avignon papacy (1309–1378) and the Great Western Schism (1378–1417) within the social setting of late medieval Avignon, she also recovers the city’s urban texture, the stamp of its streets, the noise of its crowds and celebrations, and its people’s joys and pains. Each chapter focuses on the popes, their rules, the crises they faced, and their administration but also on the history of the city, considering the recent historiography to link the life of the administration with that of the city and its people. The story of Avignon and its inhabitants is crucial for our understanding of the institutional history of the papacy in the later Middle Ages. The author argues that the Avignon papacy and the Schism encouraged fundamental institutional changes in the governance of early modern Europe—effective centralization linked to fiscal policy, efficient bureaucratic governance, court society (société de cour), and conciliarism. This fascinating history of a misunderstood era will bring to life what it was like to live in the fourteenth-century capital of Christianity.

The sixth volume of The New Cambridge Medieval History covers the fourteenth century, a period dominated by plague, other natural disasters and war which brought to an end three centuries of economic growth and cultural expansion in Christian Europe, but one which also saw important developments in government, religious and intellectual life, and new cultural and artistic patterns. Part I sets the scene by discussion of general themes in the theory and practice of government, religion, social and economic history, and culture. Part II deals with the individual histories of the states of western Europe; Part III with that of the Church at the time of the Avignon papacy and the Great Schism; and Part IV with eastern and northern Europe, Byzantium and the early Ottomans, giving particular attention to the social and economic relations with westerners and those of other civilisations in the Mediterranean.

As a 'biography' of the fourteenth-century illustrated Bible of Clement VII, an opposition pope in Avignon from 1378-94, this social history traces the Bible's production in Naples (c. 1330) through its changing ownership and meaning in Avignon (c. 1340-1405) to its presentation as a gift to Alfonso, King of Aragon (c. 1424). The author's novel approach, based on solid art historical and anthropological methodologies, allows her to assess the object's evolving significance and the use of such a Bible to enhance the power and prestige of its princely and papal owners. Through archival sources, the author pinpoints the physical location and privileged treatment of the Clement Bible over a century. The author considers how the Bible's contexts in the collection of a bishop, several popes, and a king demonstrate the value of the Bible as an exchange commodity. The Bible was undoubtedly valued for the aesthetic quality of its 200+ luxurious images. Additionally, the author argues that its iconography, especially Jerusalem and visionary scenes, augments its worth as a reflection of contemporary political and religious issues. Its images offered biblical precedents, its style represented associations with certain artists and regions in Italy, and its past provided links to important collections. Fleck's examination of the art production around the Bible in Naples and Avignon further illuminates the manuscript's role as a reflection of the court cultures in those cities. Adding to recent art historical scholarship focusing on the taste and signature styles in late medieval and Renaissance courts, this study provides new information about workshop practices and techniques. In these two court cities, the author analyzes styles associated with different artists, different patrons, and even with different rooms of the rulers' palaces, offering new findings relevant to current scholarship, not only in art history but also in court and collection studies.

The theme uniting the essays reprinted here is the attitude of the medieval Church, and in particular the papacy, towards the Jewish population of Western Europe. The studies in the first part of this volume focus on those issues, while those in the second part explore aspects of Jewish society and family life, shaped by the circumstances in which they found themselves.

This register presents biographical information, drawn from a wide variety of sources, concerning the origins, education, and careers of 671 Benedictine monks known to have studied or taught at the University of Paris in the late Middle Ages.

The fifteenth century was a critical juncture for the College of Cardinals. They were accused of prolonging the exile in Avignon and causing the schism. At the councils at the beginning of the period their very existence was questioned. They rebuilt their relationship with the popes by playing a fundamental part in reclaiming Rome when the papacy returned to its city in 1420. Because their careers were usually much longer than that of an individual pope, the cardinals combined to form a much more effective force for restoring Rome. In this book, shifting focus from the popes to the cardinals sheds new light on a relatively unknown period for Renaissance art history and the history of Rome. Dr. Carol M. Richardson has been awarded the Philip Leverhulme Prize (2008) in the field of History of Arts.