Title XXVII: On Intestate Successions

Latin source headnote: A cleric can give his own goods to whomever he wishes; but if he dies intestate and has no relatives, the church succeeds. This it says when joined with the gloss.

From a council held at Alten.

But [also] this was established there concerning bishops, priests, and clerics: if by inheritance or in another manner they have acquired something by reason of their person, it is lawful for them, while they live, to donate these things to whomever they wish, for the remedy of their soul, to whatever church they choose, or to their relatives or friends. But if they die before they have done this, let all things be perpetually consecrated to the altar that they serve and be delivered into its right. [That the same was established concerning priests who serve laymen, etc.]

Latin source headnote: If one formerly a slave, having been made a priest, dies intestate, his goods are divided according to the form contained here. This it says according to the singular understanding, which also holds today.

From the Council of Tribur.

It was brought before the holy council that certain laymen act wickedly against their priests, so that they vindicate shares for themselves from the substance of dying priests as from their own slaves. We therefore forbid by canonical authority that this be done hereafter; but, just as they were made free to receive the grade and perform the divine office, so let nothing be exacted from them apart from the divine office. Their peculium, however, is to be divided into four parts, of which one is to be assigned to the bishop, another to the church, a third to the poor, and a fourth to the relatives. And if there are no suitable relatives, let the bishop receive it and diligently distribute it for the use of the church. And if anyone presumes to act contrary to this, let him be anathematized.

Latin source headnote: Touching upon two notable and singular understandings of this chapter, it is summarized according to each understanding, and first thus: A testament made for pious causes by declarative words, even words uttered on account of another matter, is valid, although the succession or testament comes to the exclusion of another church. Or otherwise, according to the other understanding, thus: An offering is proved by one witness to the truth and also by a confession made incidentally, even with respect to the effect of obtaining the goods offered.

Innocent III, to the Bishop of Maurienne.

When our beloved son the abbot of Brusia had [recently] come to our presence and had waited there for a long time on account of the cause he had against our venerable brother the Bishop of Autun, finally a messenger of the same bishop arrived. When they wished to litigate with one another, we appointed as auditor our venerable brother I., Bishop of Viterbo and cardinal of Saint Clement. Therefore, when they were constituted in his presence, the aforesaid abbot proposed that, when the archpriest of Alerio offered himself and his goods to the monastery of Brusia for participation in its prayers with a view to piety, certain of his goods being reserved for his simple use, he received from the hand of a certain brother of the same coenobium an enlargement of the crown as a sign of that offering; and that he had often declared in the common chapter that he had made this grant in this manner, and that he possessed not in his own name but [in the name] of the monastery, and acquired for the monastery whatever he acquired. The same archpriest also continued publicly in this for almost twenty years, with no one contradicting or protesting, in such a way that through public fame it had become known to all. For the abbot of Buxeria who was in office at the time, and the monks themselves, with the knowledge of the Bishop of Autun who was in office at the time and with him making no protest at all, publicly used his goods no otherwise than the other goods belonging to the monastery. Moreover, what the said archpriest, in possession of his mind, had done between the living, he confirmed in his last will, sound in mind although sick in body. And when the same abbot and monks wished to bring back to their monastery the things thus lawfully given and other things that they had granted to the archpriest himself for use, the aforesaid bishop, bringing violence upon them, occupied not only the things of the archpriest but also the things of the monastery itself. When they sought these back in good peace, he, so that fuller matter for raging over those things might be granted to him, appealed to the Apostolic See, fixing the octaves of blessed Martin most recently past as the term for his appeal.

On the contrary, the aforesaid messenger of the bishop alleged that, when that donation was made, the archpriest was out of his mind to such an extent that, when he had been asked by the monks, “Do you wish to receive the monastic habit?” and had answered, “I do,” immediately, when asked by another, “Do you wish to be an ass?” he answered likewise, “I do.” And thus the aforesaid monks carried him off to their monastery, which the same messenger offered to prove. [Indeed, when the aforesaid abbot immediately produced certain witnesses for the assertion of his party, we caused them to be received and diligently heard. When we had interlocutorily decreed that their attestations ought to be published, because the bishop's party did not wish to produce witnesses concerning those articles concerning which the same abbot had produced witnesses, and when those attestations had been publicly recited and diligent disputation had been held concerning them, many things were alleged against the statements of the witnesses. And when the parties had renounced further pleading, the said cardinal faithfully recited to us and our brothers whatever had been proposed on each side.] Having heard and learned these things, we sufficiently understood it to have been proved that the said archpriest, acting at the end of life as though expressing his last will, asserted that he had conferred himself and his goods upon the monastery of Buxeria. Hence, when he was asked to make a testament, he answered that he could not make a testament because he had conferred himself and his goods upon the aforesaid monastery. And although only one witness said that he had seen when the aforesaid archpriest offered himself and his goods to the monastery, nevertheless, because other witnesses said that they had heard the archpriest himself, in the presence of the abbot, confessing and attesting what has been aforesaid, they greatly assisted the assertion of the abbot, not as proving sufficiently but as giving it powerful support.

But because the bishop's party asserted that it wished to prove that the said archpriest, laboring at the end of life as though delirious, had been alienated from his mind, whence what he expressed was not valid, we, after diligent prior deliberation with our brothers concerning these and the other things proposed on each side, thought that cause should be committed to you under this form: unless the aforesaid bishop lawfully proves that the often-mentioned archpriest was not in possession of his mind when he expressed his last will, perpetual silence is to be imposed upon him concerning his impleading of the monastery, and he is to be compelled to restore to the monastery whatever he occupied from the goods of the archpriest himself or even of the monastery. But if he lawfully proves that the aforesaid archpriest said with an alienated mind the things premised concerning his last will, the monastery is to be condemned to make restitution to him, in the name of the parish church whose administration the archpriest had conducted while he lived, of the goods that had belonged to that archpriest, since the same archpriest died intestate; and silence is to be imposed upon the monastery concerning its impleading of the bishop. [No letters, etc. Given at Rome, on the fourth day before the Nones of June. 1198.]