Title XXI: On Second Marriages

Latin source headnote: Second nuptials are not blessed, and the one blessing them is to be punished.

Alexander III.

Moreover, do not in any way postpone sending to the Apostolic See, with the testimony of your letters and with appeal ceasing, the chaplain whom it shall be established to you to have celebrated a blessing with the second woman, suspended from office and benefice. [Given at the Lateran.]

Latin source headnote: One who doubts the death of a spouse ought not to contract unless first made certain; and, if that person has contracted, let that person render but not exact the debt. And if afterward that person knows that the first spouse is living, let that person dismiss the second. The Sicilian Abbot.

Lucius III, to all Christians placed in captivity among the Saracens.

Our Lord and Redeemer—(And below:) Indeed, concerning the marriages which certain among you contracted when certainty of the death of the deceased spouse had not yet been obtained, by apostolic authority we respond this to you: that no one among you henceforth presume to pass to second nuptials until it is established to that person with firm certainty that his or her spouse has departed from this life. But if any man or woman has not observed this hitherto and still thinks that he or she ought to doubt the death of the prior spouse, let that person not deny the debt to the one who married that person when it is sought, yet let that person know that it is in no way to be exacted by him or her. But if after this it is established that the prior spouse is alive, having left the adulterous and unlawful embraces, let that person return without doubt to the prior spouse.

Latin source headnote: If one of the spouses was blessed on another occasion, the spouses ought not to be blessed anew.

Urban III, to the Bishop of Vigevano.

But a man or woman passing to bigamy ought not to be blessed by a priest, because, since they were blessed on another occasion, their blessing ought not to be repeated.

Latin source headnote: A woman marrying within the year of mourning does not incur infamy. This is what it says together with the following chapter. The Sicilian Abbot.

The same, to the Bishop of Exeter.

But concerning that question by which it was asked whether namely a woman can marry without infamy within the time of mourning defined according to the laws, we respond to your solicitude that, since the Apostle says, “A woman, when her husband is dead, is released from the law of her husband,” and “let her marry in the Lord whom she wishes,” through the permission and authority of the Apostle her infamy is abolished.

Latin source headnote: It is summarized as the preceding chapter.

Innocent III, to the noblewoman P.

Since according to the Apostle a woman, when her husband is dead, is released from his law and has free faculty to marry whom she wishes, only in the Lord, she ought not to sustain the loss of legal infamy when, although after the death of her husband she marries within the time of mourning, namely the space of one year, she nevertheless uses the power granted to her by the Apostle, especially since in these matters secular laws do not disdain to imitate the sacred canons. Therefore, since you dispose to pass to second vows, knowing that it is better to marry than to burn, we commend your purpose in the Lord, and by authority of the present letters we more expressly prohibit this from being imputed by anyone as loss or infamy to you or to him who shall marry you, since you have the free faculty granted to you by the Apostle to marry only in the Lord.

END OF THE FOURTH BOOK.