Compendium Maleficarum/Book 2/Chapter 18
Chapter XVIII
Of the Trial by Single Combat.
Argument.
In former times, when an accusation was doubtful and could not be proved, no sort of trial was more common than this. For then either the accuser challenged the defendant, or else the defendant offered himself or someone else in his place to fight. It is agreed that this is a most ancient practice, and that it was used in the lands of Palestine; for Alciati[1] points out in his De singulari certamine, II, that David[2] challenged and overcame Goliath. After the invasion of Italy by the Barbarians it was chiefly practised by the Lombards, the Germans, Franks, and even Spaniards. But this sort of combat provides no proof; for it is against all law according to the unanimous opinion of the Doctors. Sufius (De iniustitia duelli) and Pedro Mexia[3] (Silva de varia leccion, IV, 9) prove that it is contrary to natural law. All the Doctors agree in proving that it is against the civil law, although that law is not very clear in detail; yet there is no Roman law by which such combats can be justified. That duels are forbidden by the law of God is proved by every argument which forbids us to tempt God, and by the Commandment that we shall do no murder. This is more clearly proved by the Ecclesiastic, or positive Divine Law, as expressed by the Council of Trent as follows: The detestable practice of duelling, introduced by the wiles of the devil that he might win the death of souls together with the bloody death of the body, should be entirely exterminated from the Christian world, etc. (Sess. XXV; De Reform. cap. XIX). And a little later the same holy Council added the following: They who engage in duels, and they who act as seconds thereto, let them be punished with excommunication and the confiscation of all their goods and perpetual disgrace, and may they for ever be deprived of ecclesiastical burial like murderers, etc. There exists that most admirable Bull of Pope Gregory XIII of blessed memory, issued in the year 1582 in the month of December, which begins with these words: Crescente hominum malitia,[4] facinorosi non desunt.
Examples.
In the year 1326, when William III was Count of Hainault, a certain Jew pretended to be baptised in all sincerity into the Holy Christian Faith, and the Count gave him the name of William at the font and appointed him as a servitor in the palace at Mons. Not long afterwards this wicked fellow entered the church at the monastery of Cambrai and in a fit of fury hurled a number of blasphemies against the image of the Mother of God, and (oh, horror!) wounded it with his spear in five several places from which streams of blood at once flowed. This was seen by a carpenter and by a lay Brother named Matthaeus Lobbius. The carpenter was about to cleave the Jew’s head with his axe, but he was prevented by the Brother. They reported the matter to the Abbot, John of Mons, and he to the Count. The Jew stubbornly withstood all torture and was therefore released, but four years later an Angel appeared to an old man named Jean Flander D’Esteney who had been bed-ridden with paralysis for seven years, and ordered him to accuse the Jew and challenge him to a duel. After he had been thus warned twice, the old man still, at the bidding of the parish priest, delayed, but the third time the Virgin Herself came and showed him her five bleeding wounds, and commanded him to fight the duel. Full of hope and faith the old man went to Cambrai, and having seen the wounds upon the image obtained an audience of the Count and thereupon accused the Jew of his crime. A day was appointed for the combat; and the weapons, rough clubs[5] and wooden shields, exist even to this day. The Jew, who although he seemed but a puny fellow was in fact muscular and vigorous, had sewn a number of little tinkling bells to his galligaskins and gambadoes in bitter mockery of the poor old man: but God helped His champion who had undertaken so unequal a fight, for the sick man beat the healthy man, the weak the strong, and the old the young. And as he was convicted terribly blaspheming and impenitent, the Count ordered him to be bound by the hair of his head to a horse’s tail and so dragged to the gibbet, and after he had been hanged by the neck with two fierce Molossian hounds rending his flanks, he was cast into the fire. This story is fully told by Robertus Hauport, who wrote a poem in two books on the subject.
Radislaus,[6] a Prince of Kreis Kaurim (Kolin) and son of Mistibogius, wrongfully invaded Bohemia, so that at last good King Wenceslaus was persuaded to raise an army against him. As they were on the point of joining battle, Wenceslaus said: “If the matter cannot be settled except by fighting, why should we two not decide it in single combat without shedding innocent blood?” And without delay he put on a cuirass over his hair shirt and girt himself with a small sword and came out into the battle field. But Radislaus armed himself to the teeth with mighty armour. Wenceslaus made the sign of the Cross on his brow, and suddenly saw Angels who spoke in human voice, saying; “Do not strike.” And suddenly Radislaus lay upon the ground and asked pardon for his boldness and yielded himself into the hands of his victor. Wenceslaus raised him up, forgave him and restored him to his dignities, bidding him to turn his contumacy to fitting humility, lest he should thereafter suffer severer punishment from the angry Godhead. Here God declared the justice of the cause by a miracle.
When God does not wish a miracle to take place, it generally happens that the matter remains in doubt, or that he who is in the right submits to the judgement of God. The first was the case in a duel between two noble Spaniards in the time of King Alfonso XI,[7] the father of King Pedro of Castile. Their names were Ruy Paez de Biedma and Pay Rodriguez de Ambia. The former accused the latter of treason, and the latter retaliated with an accusation of an even more serious crime. They met and fought for three days from sunrise to sunset, and both were sorely wounded; yet the affair remained in doubt and neither could claim the victory. Therefore the King declared them both innocent and equally virtuous, and bade them be friends. This is fully related by Pedro Mexia in his Silva de varia leccion, II, x.
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- ↑ “Alciati.” Andrea Alciati, 1492–1550, the famous Italian jurist.
- ↑ “David.” This Scriptural example was of old quoted by several writers in support of the wager of battle and the duel. But as early as 1240 S. Ramon de Pehafort (“Summa,” II, tit. 2) definitely laid down that all who engage in such combats are guilty of mortal sin. Cardinal Henry of Susa is no whit less uncompromising (“Aureae Summae, V, tit. “De Clu. pugnant”). Alexander of Hales (“Summae, III; Q. xlvi, Mem. 3) regarded the precedent of David and Goliath as altogether an exception from which no argument must be deduced. It was to him only permissible to refer to it in an allegorical manner as prefiguring the triumph Christ over the devil.
- ↑ “Pedro Mexia.” This famous Spanish author was born c. 1496 and died in 1552. His “Silva de varia leccion,” published at Seville in 1543, has been compared to the “Noctes Atticae” of Aulus Gellius. Mexia was a great favourite with Charles V and collected material for a history of that monarch. This, unfortunately, was never written.
- ↑ “Crescente hominum malitia.” Reference may also be made to the glosses of Pedro Mattei upon the Bull “Mox laudandam” of Gregory XIII. Benedict XIV decreed that duellists, even if they had not perished on the duelling-ground but had lingered and later received absolution, should without exception be denied Christian burial; Pius IX in the “Constitutio Apostolicae Sedis,” 12 October, 1869, excommunicates all who are in any way accessory to a duel, who are present at a duel, or who permit and do not prevent a duel, even though they be kings or emperors; Leo XIII in his letter “Pastoralis officii,” 12 September, 1891, emphasises the fact that the duel is an offence against the Divine Law proclaimed both by the inspired Holy Scriptures and natural reason.
- ↑ “Rough clubs.” When champions were employed on both sides, and such would be actually the case here since the old man was fighting in honour of Our Lady, the law of battle restricted the combatants to the club and buckler. See Patetta, “Le Ordalie” (Torino, 1890), for full details. Philip Augustus in 1215 directed that the club should not exceed three feet in length, but in England this baton was often rendered a formidable enough weapon through being furnished with a sharp beak or pick of iron. The wooden shield was generally covered with leather. It may be remarked that the difference of age between the old man and the Jew was altogether exceptional as the punctilio of combat required an equality.
- ↑ “Radislaus.” Guazzo’s sources for this history are: Widukind of Corvey, O.S.B., “Res gestae saxonicae siue annalium libri tres,” II, which see in the “Scriptores rerum germanicarum,” Hanover, 1882; Vincent of Beauvais, “Speculum,” xxiv, 70, and Dubravsky, “Historia Bohemorum,” v.
- ↑ “Alfonso XI.” This combat took place in 1342. See the “Cronica de Alfonso el Onceno,” cap. CCLXII.