Dispensations and church courts in later Medieval England

Clarke, Peter (2024) Dispensations and church courts in later Medieval England. In, Clarke, Peter and Robson, Michael (eds.) Popes, Bishops, Religious and Scholars: Studies in Medieval History Presented to Patrick N. R. Zutshi for his Seventieth Birthday. (BCEEC, 8) Turnhout, Belgium. Brepols, pp. 389-409. (doi:10.1484/M.BCEEC-EB.5.141720).

Abstract

This chapter explores the relationship between papal dispensations and cases in later medieval English church courts. It will consider the use of dispensations as evidence in such cases and how people might need dispensations to avoid or overcome legal problems in the church courts. The first part of the chapter concerns marriage cases, since many couples sought dispensations to remove impediments to existing or planned marriages, such as consanguinity, affinity, and spiritual kinship. These impediments might be and sometimes were grounds for dissolving marriages in the church courts ex officio, i.e., not at the instance of the parties but on the initiative of church authorities. Cases will be examined where couples produced marriage dispensations to prevent these ex officio annulments, and other cases where couples were required to produce them to the same end. The second part of the chapter considers the kinds of dispensations and other papal graces required by parish clergy and how these featured in church court cases and how failure to obtain them might have judicial consequences. Evidence will be drawn not only from English church court records but also the registers of the papal penitentiary, a curial office that issued various papal graces. Patrick Zutshi and I have edited entries concerning England and Wales in these registers from 1410-1503.

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