Nisi Deprehendatur a Fide Devius: The Immunity of the Pope, from Gratian to Huguccio

Abstract

 The comments of the decretists at the canon Si papa (D.40 c.6) reveals a rather ambivalent thought, shared between the need to give the Church the legal means to face an illegitimate pope, guilty of heresy or of other crimes and on the other hand the desire to preserve, by virtue of divine right, the immunity of the Roman See. Many legal distinctions were then proposed, some of which, despite their interest, were not immediately exploited. Other arguments could be taken up by the conciliarists, but it seems difficult to establish a clear genealogy between the two periods.