Pseudoisidore

Characteristic of the Carolingian period was the importance allotted to bishops in instrumenting reform. Numerous episcopal capitularies from northern Europe have survived. These capitularies contained 51 the statutes of regional synods and were used in the administration of dioceses. Once the genre had become established forgers began to produce capitularies of their own. These forged capitularies were to become one of the more important sources for the forgers of the pseudoisidorian corpus. The pseudoisidorian forgers were to undertake the far more difficult task of producing a chronologically arranged collection.

The Capitula Angilramni contains 71(72) chapters all dealing with criminal accusations against bishops and other clergy. The author is said to be Angilram, bishop of Metz (768–791) and the recipient pope Hadrian I (772–795). The major sources are Roman law in its Visigothic redaction, the Dionysio-Hadriana and the Historia Tripartita of Cassiodorus. The collection is closely related to a further forgery, a Collectio capitularium attributed to a certain Benedictus Levita. Emil Seckel characterized the relationship between the two works as interwoven (verfilzt). Horst Fuhrmann and Gerhard Schmitz agree but reject the implication that they were compiled „parallel nebeneinander“. „Angilram“ used the collection attributed to Benedictus Levita in an early version; the Capitula Angilramni in an unfinished form was used for the fourth Appendix to the Capitula of Benedictus Levita. Both of these collections would be major sources for the pseudoisidorian forgers. The Capitula Angilramni often accompanied the pseudoisidorian decretals. It was edited by Paul Hinschius together with the forged decretals, and the present analysis (AO) is based on that edition.

Ansegis, abbot of Fontenelle (St. Wandrille) in northern France, had compiled a Collectio capitularium by the end of January, 827. The collection is divided into four books each with its own capitulation. They deal with ecclesiastical and mundane matters in that order and the capitula are attributed to Charlemagne and his sons Louis and Lothar. The collection survives in numerous manuscripts. The most recent edition, that of Gerhard Schmitz, is the basis for the present analysis (AN). Added to the end of the fourth book in twelve medieval copies is the Collectio capitularium in three books attributed to Benedictus Levita. This collection is a forgery and its composition has been dated circa 847–852. It has been assumed that it was completed in the diocese of Reims. These books are numbered five through seven. Each has its own capitulation. Four series of additions are found at the end of book seven. The capitula of Benedictus Levita are said to have been issued by Frankish rulers and to have been 52 found in the archives of Mainz by the archbishop Otgar of Mainz (826–847). The capitula of the first (fifth) book are said to have been authorized in synods at which saint Boniface represented pope Zacharias and at which Carloman, prince of the Franks, was present. The capitula are said to be intended for the bishops, dukes and counts in Gaul. The capitulary deals with a far broader range of subjects than the pseudoisidorian decretals. The basis of the present analysis (BL and BLAdd1–4) is the edition published by Etienne Baluze in 1677. A new edition is being prepared by Gerhard Schmitz. The collection of Ansegis was used by Regino of Prüm, that of Benedictus Levita by Isaac of Langres.

An Abbreviatio Ansegisi et Benedicti Levitae was compiled in the early 11th century in northern France. Several copies exist: Paris, BN lat. 3839 (11th century, France), fol. 86v–121v (fragment), Paris, BN lat. 3839A (late 11th century, from Saint-Aubin at Angers), fol. 34r– 76r, Paris, BN lat. 17526 (12th century, France), fol. 24r–58r (fragment), Montpellier, Bibliothèque Interuniversitaire H. 137 (late 11th century, France), fol. 172v–229v, Palermo, Archivio della Cattedrale, 14 (12th century, France), fol. 71r–112v. The Montpellier copy has a capitulation, the Paris manuscripts do not. The abbreviation was used in the first Collectio II librorum in the Ms Milan, Ambrosiana A. 46 inf., which came to Milan from Reims. It was also used for the collection of Saint-Hilaire in Poitiers; Schmitz has identified the copy in the Ms Montpellier 137 as the closest to the Poitevine collection. The abbreviation was also used for the Collectio CCCXLII capitulorum, which was probably compiled at Lyon, and for the Lothringian Collectio IV librorum in the Ms Cologne, Erzbischöfliche Diözesan- und Dombibliothek 124.

The collection attributed to Isidorus Mercator consists of separate sections of papal decretals and conciliar canons. The conciliar canons are taken from the Hispana Gallica Agustodunensis. Decretals attributed to the popes Clemens to Liberius are forged. Some of the decretals of Damasus are genuine and others forged. The remaining decretals, which reach to the papacy of Gregory I, are mostly genuine. The Pseudoisidorian corpus is, in other words, a canon law collection only in part. It contains a considerable amount of original material and takes the form of a chronologically ordered collection because such collections were considered more trustworthy than other forms of literature. The genuine conciliar canons and decretals are there to give the appearance of legitimacy to the forged decretals. 53

Paul Hinschius and Emil Seckel divided the numerous copies of the collection into three versions. A long version, which they designated as A1, has three parts. The first part contains forged decretals, the second conciliar canons from the Hispana Gallica Agustodunensis and the third decretals some genuine and others false. This, they thought was the earliest form. They designated as A2 a shorter version lacking the conciliar canons and containing forged decretals only as far as the pope Damasus. They identified a middle form A/B with corrective attempts and B and C versions which they dated in the 12th. The present analysis (IS) includes only the forged decretals from Clement to Damasus. These decretals have the original rubrics of the forgers.

Horst Fuhrmann has established that none of the above listed versions can be considered the original form, but that all of them were being copied at about the same time in northeastern France. The forgery has long been considered the product of suffragan bishops defending themselves against powerful metropolitan bishops, particularly against Hincmar of Reims. Horst Fuhrmann has points to the fact that the principal influence of Pseudo-Isidore on pre-Gratian collections was in the field of procedural law. Klaus Zechiel-Eckes has recently presented information pointing to the monastery of Corbie as the source of the collection. He discovered that three Corbie manuscripts were used by the forgers: 1.) St. Petersburg, Publičnaja biblioteka im. M. E. Saltykova-Ščhedrina lat. F. v. I. 11, 2.) Paris, BN lat. 1161 and 3.) Vat. Pal. lat. 1719. He suggests as author Paschasius Ratbertus, abbot of Corbie, and sees the explanation for the forgery in events of 834, 835 and 836. At the beginning of this period a group of reformers, including Agobard of Lyon, Ebo of Reims and Wala of Corbie, were able to turn the sons of Louis the Pious against their father. In 835 Louis brought some of the conspirators to trial at the Diedenhofer Reichssynode. Zechiel-Eckes sees the pseudoisidorian corpus as their instrument of defense. The pseudoisidorian corpus is, indeed, limited in range in comparison to Benedictus Levita, as Gerhard Schmitz has pointed out.

Gratian did not use the pseudoisidorian decretals directly but by way of the collection of Anselm of Lucca and the Collectio III librorum, and he compared the transmissions of a text in more than one collection before he introduced it into his own collection. 54

Literature

See Klaus Zechiel-Eckes, Ein Blick in Pseudoisidors Werkstatt. Studien zum Entstehungsprozeß der Falschen Dekretalen, Francia 28/1 (2001), pp. 37–61. Idem, Der „unbeugsame“ Exterminator? Isidorus und der Kampf gegen den Chorepiskopat, in: Scientia veritatis: Festschrift für Hubert Mordek zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. by Oliver Münsch and Thomas Zotz, Ostfildern 2004, pp. 173–190. See also Agostino Marchetto, Diritto di appello a Roma nelle Decretali Pseudo-Isidoriane, pp. 191–206 of the same Festschrift. Horst Fuhrmann, Stand, Aufgaben und Perspektiven der Pseudoisidorforschung, in: Fortschritt durch Fälschungen? Ursprung, Gestalt und Wirkungen der pseudoisidorischen Fälschungen, ed. by Wilfried Hartmann and Gerhard Schmitz (MGH Studien und Texte 31, Hanover 2002), pp. 227–262. Idem, The Pseudo-Isidorian Forgeries, pp. 44–169. – Kéry, Canonical Collections, pp. 100–114. The pseudoisidorian decretals and the Capitula Angilramni were edited by Paul Hinschius, Decretales Pseudo-Isidorianae et Capitula Angilramni, Leipzig 1863.. This edition of the latter was reprinted by Pio Ciprotti, I capitula Angilramni con appendice di documenti connessi (Università degli studi di Camerino, Istituto giuridico, testi per esercitazioni sez. 7. 1, 1966). See also Fuhrmann, Einfluß und Verbreitung 1, pp. 161–163, vol. 3, pp. 696–700 and Idem, The Pseudo-Isidorian Forgeries, pp. 149–151.

The Collectio capitularium of Ansegis was edited by Gerhard Schmitz, Die Kapitulariensammlung des Ansegis (MGH Capit. N. S. 1, Hanover 1996). See Schmitz, Ansegis und Regino. Die Rezeption der Kapitularien in den Libri duo de synodalibus causis, ZRG Kan. 74 (1988), pp. 95–132 and Idem, Intelligente Schreiber. Beobachtungen aus Ansegis- und Kapitularienhandschriften, in: Papsttum, Kirche und Recht im Mittelalter: Festschrift für Horst Fuhrmann zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. by Hubert Mordek, Tübingen 1991, pp. 79–93. – Kéry, Canonical Collections, pp.92–100, pp. 122–124 for the abbreviation of Ansegis and Benedictus Levita.

A first edition of the Collectio capitularium of Benedictus Levita was published by Etienne Baluze, Capitularia regum Francorum 1, Paris 1677, pp. 801–910. A further edition was made by G. H. Pertz, MGH LL 2. 2, Hanover 1837, pp. 17– 158. Both editions are presently available on internet in anticipation of a new critical edition in book and electronic form by Gerhard Schmitz. Cf. www. benedictus.mgh.de. For the Abbreviatio see G. SCHMITZ, Zur Überlieferung der sog. „Abbreviatio Ansegisi et Benedicti Levitae“, DA 40 (1984) S. 176–199. There is a separate edition of Additio I by Joseph Semmler, Collectio capitularis Benedicti Levitae monastica (Corpus Consuetudinum Monasticarum, ed. by Kassius Hallinger 1, 1963), pp. 537–554. For a translation of the preface to Benedictus Levita into English see Somerville and Brasington, Prefaces, pp. 78–82. See Emil Seckel, Studien zu Benedictus Levita VIII, NA 40 (1916), pp. 55ff., also Schmitz Die allmähliche Verfertigung der Gedanken beim Fälschen. Unausgegorenes und Widersprüchiches bei Benedictus Levita, in the same publication, in: Fortschritt durch Fälschungen? Ursprung, Gestalt und Wirkungen der pseudoisidorischen 55 Fälschungen, ed. by Wilfried Hartmann und Gerhard Schmitz (MGH Studien und Texte 31, Hanover 2002), pp. 29–31. Idem, Echtes und Falsches. Karl der Große, Ludwig der Fromme und Benedictus Levita, in: Scientia veritatis: Festschrift für Hubert Mordek zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. by Oliver Münsch and Thomas Zotz, Ostfildern 2004, pp. 153–172. See Peter Landau, Gratians unmittelbare Quellen für seine Pseudoisidortexte, pp. 169–171 in the same publication. – Kéry, Canonical Collections, pp. 117–122.

Categories

• Descriptions that need to be split
• Clavis entries based on modern edition