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Summa of Cases of Conscience

Summa de casibus conscientiae

1478·Latin·1175 pages PDF (346.3MB) Source

Astesanus of Asti's Summa de casibus conscientiae (the "Summa Astesana"), a comprehensive confessor's manual completed c. 1317 and dedicated to Cardinal Giovanni Caetani Orsini. It became one of the most widely circulated penitential handbooks of the later Middle Ages. The work is divided into eight books: the divine precepts (the Decalogue), the virtues and vices, contracts and last wills, the sacraments of baptism, confirmation, and the Eucharist, penance and extreme unction, the sacrament of orders and ecclesiastical persons and things, ecclesiastical censures, and matrimony. Simony is treated at the end of Book VI, in the titulus De simonia. This editio princeps was printed at Venice by Johannes de Colonia and Johannes Manthen on 18 March 1478, edited by Bartolomeo Bellati and Gometius of Lisbon. Each book has its own folio numbering that restarts at I. This copy is from the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich.

Author

Astesanus of Asti

Astesanus of Asti

Astesanus de Ast

–1330

Readings

On Simony

De simonia

The De simonia titulus (Book VI, Titulus 55) of Astesanus of Asti's Summa de casibus conscientiae — the last titulus of Book VI, which treats the sacramentum ordinis and ecclesiastical persons and things. After surveying the excesses of prelates against their subjects and vice versa in the preceding titulus, Astesanus turns to simony, which he treats specialiter in seven parts: what simony is and how it is named; whether it is a sin; through whom it is committed (manu, lingua, obsequio); penalties for simoniacs; restitution of things simoniacally received; dispensation in such cases; and species of simony, including the case where the mediator alone is admitted. Throughout, Astesanus weighs civil and canon law authorities — Hostiensis, Goffredus, the Decretum and Decretales, and the Glossa — making this titulus a compact handbook of the simony tradition as received in the early fourteenth century.

Astesanus of Asti Astesanus of Asti·1317·Latin·Liber VI, Titulus LV·fol. 6.98vb–6.112rb