Ecclesiastical Letter - Letters of The Medieval Popes

Letters of The Medieval Popes

With the development of the papal primacy in the Middle Ages the papal letters grew enormously in number. The popes, following the earlier custom, insisted that their rescripts, issued for individual cases, should be observed in all analogous ones. According to the teaching of the canonists, above all of Gratian, every papal letter of general character was authoritative for the entire Church without further notification.

The names of the letters of general authority were very varied: constitutio(n); edict(um); statutum; decretum; decretalis; sanctio. Decrees (decreta) was the name given especially to general ordinances issued with the advice of the cardinals. On the other hand ordinances issued for individual cases were called rescripta, responsa, mandata. Thus a (papal) constitution was always understood to be a papal ordinance which regulated ecclesiastical conditions of a general character judicially, in a durable manner and form, for all time; but by a rescript was understood a papal ordinance issued at the petition of an individual that decided a lawsuit or granted a favour. Compare the Bulls of promulgation prefixed to the "Decretals" of Gregory IX, the "Liber Sextus" of Boniface VIII and the "Clementinæ"; also the titles, "De constitutionibus" and "De rescriptis" in the "Corpus Juris Canonici". Notwithstanding all this, usage remained uncertain.

The above-mentioned distinctions between papal documents were based on the extent of their authority. Other names again had their origin in the form of the papal documents. It is true they all had more or less evidently the form of letters. But essential differences appeared, especially in regard to the literary form (stylus) of the document and the method of sealing, these depending in each case on the importance of the contents of the respective document. It was merely the difference in the manner of sealing that led to the distinction between Bulls and Briefs. For Papal Bulls, legal instruments almost entirely for important matters, the seal was stamped in wax or lead, seldom in gold, enclosed in a case, and fastened to the document by a cord. For Briefs, instruments used as a rule in matters of less importance, the seal was stamped upon the document in wax. Curial letters (litterae curiales or litterae de curia) denoted particularly letters of the popes in political affairs.

During the Middle Ages, just as in the early Church, the letters of the popes were deposited in the papal archives either in the original or by copy. They are still in existence, and almost complete in number, from the time of Innocent III (1198–1216). Many papal letters were also incorporated, as their legal nature required, in the "Corpus Juris Canonici". Others are to be found in the formularies, many of which appeared unofficially in the Middle Ages, similar in kind to the ancient official Liber Diurnus of the papal chancery in use as late as the time of Gregory VII. The papal letters were forwarded by the papal officials, above all by the Apostolic Chancery, for whose use the chancery rules, regulae cancellariae Apostolicae, were drawn up with regard to the execution and dispatch of the papal letters, dating back to the twelfth century. Nevertheless, the forging of papal letters was even more frequent in the Middle Ages than in the early Church. Innocent III refers to no less than nine methods of falsification. From the thirteenth century on to January, 1909 it sufficed, in order to give a papal document legal force, to post it up at Rome on the doors of St. Peter's, of the Lateran, the Apostolic Chancery and in the Piazza del Campo di Fiori, but since they acquired force only by publication in the "Acta Apostolicæ Sedis".