he Redefinition of Clandestine Marriage by Sixteenth-Century Lutheran Theologians and Jurists
Keywords:
clandestine betrothal, medieval Catholic Church, canon law, parental consent, marriage law, Martin Luther, clandestine marriage, public authority, JAbstract
Within the medieval Catholic Church, the term ‘clandestine betrothal’ was associated with the absence of witnesses, solemnities, and other formalities. Parental consent was not a legal requirement for betrothal or marriage, which was based on the free decision of the spouses. However, Martin Luther held that the will of the parties was not sufficient, because the couple was joined by God, and God’s will was reflected in parental consent. Luther intended the parents to be a public authority, and he therefore proposed a different definition of clandestine marriage that combined the absence of witnesses with the lack of parental approval. Medieval canonists had enumerated numerous types of clandestine betrothal. However, in their treatises, the jurists Johannes Schneidewin, Conrad Mauser, and Joachim von Beust translated Luther’s definition into legal terms, reducing the types of clandestine betrothal to only two. The first type, absence of witnesses, continued to be regulated by canon law, with some exceptions. The second, lack of parental approval, was governed by Roman law reinterpreted according to Scripture. Cardinal Bellarmine criticized this definition as confused, prompting the Lutheran theologians Paul Tarnov and Johann Gerhard to reply that ‘clandestine’ had acquired a new meaning: violation of the law imposing parental approval.
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2
Although they represented different stages of the process of marital formation, the terms “marriage” and “betrothal” were often used interchangeably. See Witte, John Jr., From Sacrament to Contract: Marriage, Religion and Law in the Western Tradition, 2nd ed. (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), 142–3Google Scholar. This probably due to the fact that Luther rejected the canon law distinction between present and future promises to marry.
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13
Marriage was the subject of great discussion among the reformers, and numerous essays were dedicated to it. However, considering the limited space available in this article, we had to make a strict selection. We focused on sources that addressed the problem of clandestine marriage in a detailed way and were relevant to the discourse because they were often cited. For example, some authors focused more on other issues (such as divorce, marital impediments, or priest marriage), and less on clandestine marriage (see for instance, Philip Melanchthon, De arbore consanguinitatis et affinitatis sive de gradibus dissertatio published in 1540, id. De coniugio sacerdotum, 1540, or Niels Hemmingsen in Libellus de coniugio, repudio, et divortio published in 1572).
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The bibliography on medieval marriage, and especially on the doctrine of consent as it was reshaped by Pope Alexander III (1159–1181), is abundant. A short selection: Brundage, James A., Law, Sex, and Christian Society in Medieval Europe (Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 1987), 331–37CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Donahue, Charles Jr., Law, Marriage, and Society in the Later Middle Ages, Arguments About Marriage in Five Courts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 16–17Google Scholar; Reynolds, Philip L., How Marriage Became One of the Sacraments: The Sacramental Theology of Marriage from Its Medieval Origins to the Council of Trent (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 155–288CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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Ozment, When Fathers Ruled, 27.
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The choice was not always free, however. For economic or political reasons, people were often forced into particular states of life. This was especially so in the case of women, who were often forced to become nuns, prostitutes, or concubines. See, for example, Strasser, Ulrike, State of Virginity: Gender, Religion and Politics in an Early Modern Catholic State (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2004)Google Scholar; Armstrong-Partida, Michelle, Defiant Priests: Domestic Unions, Violence, and Clerical Masculinity in Fourteenth-Century Catalunya (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2017)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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For the complete list, see Donahue, Law, Marriage, and Society, 18–31.
25
This requirement was encapsulated in the Liber extra, under the title dedicated to clandestine betrothal (de clandestina desponsatione, X 4.3.3).
26
As Schmugge points out, “clandestine” did not necessarily mean “secret,” but it could also simply denote the lack of procedural requirements such as the public banns. See Schmugge, Ludwig, Marriage on Trial: Late Medieval German Couples at the Papal Court, trans. Larson, A. (Washington D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2012), 92CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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29
Quod nobis, X 4.3.2.
30
Aliter, c. 30 q.5 c.1.
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Angelo de Chivasso, Summa angelica de casibus conscientialibus (Venetiis: Sansovinus, 1569), 74b. X 4.3.3.
32
Schröter, “Wo Zwei zusammenkommen”, 322. He distinguishes between episcopal synods, where the word “clandestine” was used to mean absence of the banns, church courts, where it meant the absence of witnesses, and secular courts, where it also meant the absence of parental approval. For sixteenth century court practices, see Thomas Max Safley, Let No Man Put Asunder. The Control of Marriage in the German Southwest: A Comparative Study, 1550–1660 (Kirksville, MI: The Sixteenth Century Journal Publisher, 1984), 152–53; 186–87.
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36
Thomas Aquinas, In quatuor sententiarum, d. xxviii, q. 1, art. 3 cit. in Joyce, Christian Marriage, 73.
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X 4.3.1.
38
Esmein, Le mariage, 214.
39
Esmein, Le mariage, 213, 219. On this problem, see Monique Vleeschouwers-Van Melkebeek, “Bina matrimonia: matrimonium praesumptum vs. matrimonium manifestum. Hoe passen de officialiteiten van Kamerijk en Brussel in de vijftiende eeuw canoniek recht en doctrine terzake toe?,” in Auctoritates. Xenia R.C. Van Caenegem oblata. De auteurs van de rechtsontwikkeling, eds. Serge Dauchy, Jan Monballyu and Alain Wijffels (Leuven: Peeters, 1997), 245–55; Id. “Oui, je le veux”: paroles de mariage prononcees en secret ou en public. Le Justice face au Succès de Mariages Clandestins. Le cas des Pays-Bas Méridionaux du 15e Siècle,” in Secret et justice: Le secret entre èthique et technique?, eds. Jean-Pierre Royer and Bernard Durand (Lille: Espace Juridique, 1998), 164–76.
40
Ozment, When Fathers Ruled, 27–28; Harrington, Reordering Marriage, 173–74.
41
Charles Donahue, Jr., “The Canon Law on the Formation of Marriage and Social Practice in the Later Middle Ages,” Journal of Family History (Summer 1983): 144–58 (146).
42
Donahue, Jr., “The Canon Law,” 156.
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Harrington, Reordering Marriage, 29.
45
Men who wanted to have sex with a woman outside marriage often deliberately used this tactic. See, for instance, Menchi, Silvana Seidel, “Percorsi variegati, percorsi obbligati. Elogio del matrimonio pre-tridentino,” in Matrimoni in dubbio: Unioni controverse e nozze clandestine in Italia dal XIV al XVIII secolo, eds. Silvana Seidel Menchi and Diego Quaglioni (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2002), 43–45Google Scholar.
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However, the female plaintiff could demand compensation for her loss of virginity or a sum of money for the expenses associated with the child. Helmholz, Richard, Marriage Litigation in Medieval England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 25–73CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Melkebeek, Monique Vleeschouwers—Van, “Self-Divorce in Fifteenth-Century Flanders: The Consistory Court Accounts of the Diocese of Tournai,” in Tijdschrift voor rechtsgeschiedenis 68 (2000), 83–98CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Christina Deutsch, Ehegerichtsbarkeit im Bistum Regensburg 1480–1538, 268–80; Silvana Seidel Menchi and Diego Quaglioni, eds., I Tribunali del matrimonio (secoli XV-XVIII) (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2007); Kirsi Salonen, “Marriage Disputes in the Consistorial Court of Freising in the Late Middle Ages,” in Regional Variations in Matrimonial Law and Custom in Europe, 1150–1600, ed. Mia Korpiola (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 189–209; Ludwig Schmugge, Marriage on Trial, 250–336.
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Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society, 499–500.
48
Harrington, Reordering Marriage, 179.
49
Dietrich, Das protestantische, 24–74; Witte, From Sacrament, 113–58. Bibliography on Luther and Marriage is abundant, see, for example, Hans Hattenhauer, “Luthers Bedeutung für Ehe und Familie,” in Luther und die Folgen, eds. Hartmut Löwe and Claus-Jürgen Roepke (München: Kaiser, 1983), 86–109 Georg Kretschmar, “Luthers Konzeption von der Ehe,” in Martin Luther: Reformator und Vater in Glauben, ed. Peter Manns (Stuttgart, 1985), 178–207; Jane Strohl, “Luther on Marriage, Sexuality, and the Family,” in The Oxford Handbook of Martin Luther's Theology, eds. Robert Kolb et al. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 370–82; Thomas Kaufmann, “Reformation der Lebenswelt: Luthers Ehetheologie,” in Der Anfang der Reformation: Studien zur Kontextualität der Theologie, Publizistik und Inszenierung Luthers und der reformatorischen Bewegung ed. id. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 550–64; Witt, Christian Volkmar, Martin Luthers Reformation der Ehe: Sein theologisches Eheverständnis vor dessen augustinisch-mittelalterlichem Hintergrund (Tübigen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017)Google Scholar. For a summary, see Trevor O'Reggio, “Martin Luther on Marriage and Family,” (2012). Faculty Publications. 20. https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/church-history-pubs/20.
50
Martin Luther, On Marriage Matters in LW 46, 1967, 259–320 (268). See WA 30/3, 205ff. (207).
51
The Lutheran definition was used until at least the eighteenth century. See Kirstein, Die Entwicklung, 154.
52
Luther, On Marriage, 268–70.
53
Luther, On Marriage, 276–77.
54
Martin Luther, On the Estate of Marriage in LW 45, 38. See also, Marjorie Elisabeth Plummer, “On the Estate of Marriage,” in The Annotated Luther. Christian Life in the World, eds. Hans J. Hillerbrand et al. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017), 33–77.
55
Luther, On the Estate, 18. As Roper observes, for Luther sexuality is a force impossible to be governed and only to be directed according to God's order. See Lyndal Roper, “Luther: Sex, Marriage and Motherhood,” History Today 33 (1983): 33–38.
56
On the crucial importance of this commandment in the Reformation, see Bast, Robert James, Honor Your Fathers: Catechisms and the Emergence of a Patriarchal Ideology in Germany 1400–1600 (Leiden: Brill, 1997)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For more in general on the role of the Decalogue for the Reformers, see Harold J. Berman, Law and Revolution II: The Impact of the Protestant Reformations on the Western Legal Tradition (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 2003), 71–100; Antti Raunio, “Divine Law and Natural Law in Luther and Melanchthon,” in Lutheran Reformation and the Law, ed. Virpi Mäkinen (Leiden: Brill, 2006), 21–62; Mathias Schmoeckel, Das Recht des Reformation (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 24–38; Heckel, Martin, Martin Luthers Reformation und das Recht (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016), 406–88Google Scholar.
57
M. Luther, That parents should neither compel nor hinder the marriage of their children, and that children should not become engaged without their parents’ consent in LW 45, 390. On the necessity of parental control, see Dietrich, Das protestantische, 56–60.
58
Luther, On Marriage, 268.
59
Luther, On Marriage, 283–84.
60
Luther, On Marriage, 269–70. Harrington, Reordering Marriage, 187–8 suggests that the characterization of children as property could be associated with the attempt of secular authorities to control marriages.
61
Witt, Martin Luthers, 259.
62
A problem which occurred often in the practice. See, for example, Daniela Hacke, “Non lo volevo per marito in modo alcuno: Forced Marriages, Generational Conflicts, and the Limits of Patriarchal Power in Early Modern Venice, c. 1580–1680,” in Time, Space, and Women's Lives in Early Modern Europe, eds. Anne Jacobson Schutte, Thomas Kuhen and Silvana Seidel Menchi (Kirsksville: Truman State University Press, 2005), 203–21.
63
Luther, On Marriage, 304–09.
64
Sibeth, Uwe, Eherecht und Staatsbildung: Ehegesetzgebung und Eherechtsprechung in der Landgrafschaft Hessen (-Kassel) in der frühen Neuzeit (Darmstadt and Marburg: Selbstverlag der Hessischen Historischen Kommission Darmstadt, 1994)Google Scholar; Ralf Frassek, Ehegericht und Ehegerichtsbarkeit in der Reformationszeit (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005).
65
Luther, On Marriage, 270–71.
66
Luther's attention to customary practices has been noticed by Robisheaux, Thomas, “Peasants and Pastors: Rural Youth Control and the Reformation in Hohehlohe, 1540–1680,” Social History 6, no. 3 (1981): 281–300Google Scholar (283fn 11).
67
Luther, On Marriage, 283–84.
68
Dieterich, Das protestantische, 94–97; Witte, From Sacrament, 113–58.
69
The use of Roman law became an essential feature of the Reformation after 1530. See James Q. Whitman, The Legacy of Roman Law in the German Romantic Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 3–40; An emblematic case is marriage law, as Anneliese Sprengler-Ruppenthal, “Zur Rezeption des Römischen Rechts im Eherecht der Reformatoren,” ZRG Ka 112 (1978): 363–418, has shown. For the “reception” of Roman law by the reformers, see also, Gerhard Günther, “‘Altes Recht’, ‘Göttliche Recht’ und ‘Römisches Recht’ in der Zeit der Reformation und des Bauernkrieges,” Wiss. Zeitschrift der Karl-Marx-Universität Leipzig, 14. Jahrgang (1965): 427–34; Gerald Strauss, Law, Resistance, and the State: The Opposition to Roman Law in Reformation Germany (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986); Georg Dahm, “On the Reception of Roman Law and Italian Law in Germany,” in Pre-Reformation Germany, ed. Gerald Strauss (London: Macmillan, 1972), 282–315; Isabelle Deflers, “Melanchthon und die Rezeption des römisches Rechts in Eherecht der Reformation,” in Sachsen im Spiegel des Rechts, eds. Adrian Schmidt-Recla et alia (Wien: Böhlau Verlag, 2001), 185–203. More in general, see Lorena Atzeri, “Römisches Recht und Rezeption,” in Europäische Geschichte Online, ed. Leibniz-Institut für Europäische Geschichte (Mainz, 2017). URL: http://www.ieg-ego.eu/atzeril-2017-de (March 9, 2021).
70
See Sprengler-Ruppenthal, “Zur Rezeption des Römischen Rechts,” 369–75.
71
On Brenz see Estes, James Martin, Christian Magistrate and Territorial Church: Johannes Brenz and the German Reformation (Toronto: CRRS, 2007)Google Scholar.
72
I quote from the Latin edition: Johannes Brenz, Libellus casuum quorundam matrimonialium utilissimus (Basileae: Westheimer, 1536). Dedekenn, Georg, Thesauri consiliorum et decisionum volumen tertium mixta et inprimis matrimonialia continens (Jenae: Nisius, 1671), 110–13Google Scholar. The German version: Wie yn Ehesachen, vnd jnn den fellen, so sich derhalben zu tragen, nach Göttlichen billichen Rechten, Christenlich zu handeln sey (Wittenberg: Rhaw, 1531).
73
Brenz, Libellus, 9b.
74
Brenz, Libellus, 9a: “E quibus apertissime docemur, inter coniuges non modo pactum illud connubiale contemplandum esse, sed an divinitus etiam coniuncti sint. Christus enim non simpliciter ait, qui coniuncti fuerint, sed quod Deus coniunxerit.”
75
Brenz, Libellus, 10a. This biblical passage was used many times to give moral support to legal norms. See Richard J. Ross, “Binding in Conscience: Early Modern English Protestants and Spanish Thomists on Law and the Fate of the Soul,” Law and History Review 33 (2015): 803–37.
76
Brenz, Libellus, 10a–10b.
77
Brenz, Libellus, 10b–11b.
78
Brenz, Libellus, 11b–12.
79
Brenz, Libellus, 12. Pivoting on moral dishonesty, Erasmus also argued that clandestine marriages were not a sacrament because they were contracted by sexual attraction, or else the parties were drunk when they exchanged consent, and they could be manipulated by persons who stood to profit from them. Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society, 497.
80
Brenz, Libellus, 16b.
81
Witte, From Sacrament, 157. See also, Witte, “The Reformation,” 327–8.
82
Heiner Lück, “Zur Grundlegung des evangelischen Eherechts in Wittenberg,” in Katharina von Bora. Die Lutherin: Aufsätze anlässlich ihres 500. Geburtstages, ed. Martin Treu (Stiftung Luthergedenkstätten in Sachsen-Anhalt: Wittenberg, 1999), 161–77, (167); on the Wittenberg jurists see also, Heiner Lück, “Beiträge ausgewählter Wittenberger Juristen zur europäischen Rechtsentwicklung und zur Herausbildung eines evangelischen Eherechts während des 16. Jahrhunderts,” in Reformation und Recht: Ein Beitrag zur Kontroverse um die Kulturwirkungen der Reformation, ed. Christoph Strohm (Mohr Siebeck: Tübingen, 2017), 73–109; on the Schöffenstuhl, the Hofgericht, and the Consistorium, see Heiner Lück, “Wittenberg als Zentrum kursächsischer Rechtspflege: Hofgericht-Juristenfakultät-Schöffenstuhl-Konsistorium,” in 700 Jahre Wittenberg, ed. Stefan Oehmig (Weimar, 1995), 213–48; Id., Die kursächsische Gerichtsverfassung 1423–1550 (Köln, Weimanr, Wien: Böhlau, 1997).
83
Hieronymus Schurff, Consiliorum seu responsorum iuris, centuria prima (Francofurti: Egelnoff, 1594), 150–1.
84
On Kling's approach to canon law, see Witte, From Sacrament, 72–3.
85
Enrico da Susa (Card. Hostiensis), Summa aurea, 1140; Esmein, Le mariage, II, 149.
86
Kling, Tractatus, 68b–69. See also, Dieterich, Das protestantische, 122–4.
87
Kling, Tractatus, 78a and 78b.
88
Eyk Ueberschär, “Basilius Monner (um 1500 bis 6. Januar 1566)—Ein treuer Diener seiner Herren,” Rechtsgelehrte der Universität Jena aus vier Jahrhunderten ed. Gerhard Lingelbach (Jena: Bussert und Stadeler, 2011), 5 ff.
89
C. 9.13.1.
90
Basilius Monner, Tractatus duo: I de matrimonio; II de clandestinis coniugiis, secunda editione (Jenae: Steinmann, 1604), 247–8.
91
Monner, Tractatus, 244–45. D. 2.4.4.2 and D. 50.16.51.
92
C. 9.13.2.
93
I. 1. 10, de nuptiis.
94
Monner, Tractatus, 240. See also, Dieterich, Das protestantische, 124–5. The necessity of parental consent became an opinion shared by the great majority of Lutheran jurists. See Witte, From Sacrament, 59.
95
Monner, Tractatus, 232: “Atque hoc praeceptum nullo modo contemnendum aut negligendum est: quasi dictum sit ab holitore quopiam, aut ebrio rustico: sed est vox Maiestatis divinae, de coelo sonantis ac praecipientis omnibus liberis, cuiuscunque conditionis et dignitatis, obedientiam erga parentes. Haec enim obedientia non homini praestatur: sed Deo.”
96
Monner, Tractatus, 232.
97
Monner, Tractatus, 242.
98
See Witte, Law and Protestantism, 87–118.
99
Monner, Tractatus, 233.
100
Monner, Tractatus, 234.
101
Monner, Tractatus, 234: “… ut sciamus, agi non de re puerili ac levi: sed de re omnium maxima: qua societas humana et universa politia, vel conservatur, si praecipienti obtemperavimus: vel vertitur, si parere noluerimus. Statim enim atque parentum et magistratuum autoritas fuerit labefacta.”
102
Monner, Tractatus, 234.
103
Lück, “Zur Grundlegung,” 168.
104
For the use of Canon Law in Protestant context, see Richard Helmholz, ed., Canon Law in Protestant Lands (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1992); John Witte Jr., “Canon Law in Lutheran Germany: A Surprising Case of Legal Transplantation,” in Lex et Romanitas: Essays for Alan Watson, ed. Michael Hoeflich (Berkeley: Robbins Collection, 2000), 181–224; Pennington, Kenneth, “Protestant Ecclesiastical Law and the Ius Commune,” Rivista internazionale di diritto comune 26 (2015): 9–36Google Scholar.
105
Mauser, Conrad, Tractatus juridicus de nuptiis (Jenae: Nisius, 1682), 10Google Scholar: “Primum proprie et stricte, quando prorsus clam, et nemine praesente sunt inita. Secundo large, quando quidem in praesentia testium sunt contracta, tamen sine consensu parentum.”
106
X 4.3.1,2,3.
107
Mauser, Tractatus, 10–11.
108
Mauser, Tractatus, 46.
109
Mauser, Tractatus, 47.
110
Mauser, Tractatus, 49.
111
Mauser, Tractatus, 51.
112
Mauser, Tractatus, 52.
113
Harrington, Reordering Marriage, 187–97.
114
Mauser, Tractatus, 53. N. 115. 3, Causas.
115
Lück, “Zur Grundlegung,” 169.
116
For Hostiensis, see before section “Parental Consent and Clandestine Marriage before the Reformation”. Niccoló Tedeschi (Panormitanus), Commentaria in quartum et quintum decretalium libros, tomus 7 (Venetiis: Iuntas, 1617), 17v.
117
Schneidewin, Johannes, In quatuor institutionum imperialium D. Justiniani libros, commentarii (Coloniae Agrippinae: Metternich, 1698), 100Google Scholar: “Sed secundum hodierna tempora in ecclesiis nostris duobus tantum modis dicuntur clandestina sponsalia: stricte et proprie videlicet, quae clam, remotis arbitris et nullis testibus praesentibus, contrahuntur…large quando in praesentia testium, sed sine consensu parentum…”
118
X 4.3.1,2,3, and c. 30 q.5 c.1.
119
Schneidewin, In quatuor institutionum, 101.
120
Domingo de Soto, In quartum sententiarum commentarii tomus secundum (Venetiis: Zenarium, 1584), d. 28, q. 1, a. 1, 151; Reynolds, How Marriage, 799.
121
This practice also existed in many city laws. On the new marriage ordinances, see Roper, The Holy Household, 157–62; Witte, From Sacrament, 138; Henning P. Jürgens, “Eheordnungen - Ordnungen für die Ehe als ‘weltlich Ding’,” in Gute Ordnung. Ordnungsmodelle und Ordnungsvorstellungen in der Reformationszeit, eds. Irene Dingel and Armin Kohnle (Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2014), 221–37; Lettmaier, Saskia, “Marriage Law and the Reformation,” Law and History Review 35, no. 2 (2017): 461–510 (473–89)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. With regard to parental consent and clandestineness, see also, Schwarz, Die Bedeutung der Sippe, 60–66; Gottlieb, Getting Married, 124–137. Certain ordinances established criteria according to which the parents could lawfully deny their consent, see Sibeth, Eherecht, 120–21.
122
Lück, “Zur Grundlegung,” 170–2.
123
The latter ordinance was also discussed beyond Saxony. See, for instance, the erudite work by the Schleswig jurist Paul Cypraeus (1536–1609): De connubiorum iure tractatus (Francofurti: Porssius,1605), 347. On August of Saxony see Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Kurfürst August von Sachsen: Ein nachreformatorischen “Friedensfürst” zwischen Territorium und Reich. Beiträge zur wissenschaftlichen Tagung vom 9. bis 11. Juli 2015 in Torgau und Dresden (Dresden: Sandstein, 2017).
124
Sehling, Emil, Die evangelischen Kirchenordungen des XVI: Jahrhunderts (Leipzig: Reisland, 1902)Google Scholar, vol. 1 first part, 294. The necessity of parental consent was established in another paragraph: von ehegelubden ane bewilligung der eltern. See p. 292.
125
Sehling, Die evangelischen, 386.
126
Joachim von Beust, Tractatus de sponsalibus et matrimoniis ad praxin forensem accommodatus (Witebergae: Ruhelii, 1588), 208–09; Kirstein, Die Entwicklung, 66–7.
127
Joachim von Beust, Tractatus, 202: “…tamen hodie in his terris quod ad consensum parentum attinet, servatur ius civile, l. si ut proponis C. de nupt. [C.5.4.5] et non ius canonicum, quod tollit disciplinam et obedientiam erga parentes, ac praebet liberis peccandi materiam, unde nec debet, nec potest apud bonos et pios ullam vim legum habere, cum lex debeat esse honesta.”
128
Joachim von Beust, Tractatus, 21.
129
Joachim von Beust, Tractatus, 22.
130
Joachim von Beust, Tractatus, 23.
131
Sperling, Jutta, “Marriage at the Time of the Council of Trent (1560–70): Clandestine Marriages, Kinship Prohibitions, and Dowry Exchange in European Comparison,” Journal of Early Modern History 8 (2004): 65–108CrossRefGoogle Scholar (76–77); Reynolds, How Marriage, 896–982.
132
See “Concilium Tridentinum,” Sessio XXIV (November 11, 1563), in Conciliorum oecumenicorum decreta, eds. Giuseppe Alberigo et al. (Bologna: Dehoniane, 1962), 753–59.
133
Charlotte Christensen-Nugues, “Parental Authority and Freedom of Choice: The Debate on Clandestinity,” Sixteenth Century Journal XLV/1 (2014): 51–72 (59).
134
Christensen-Nugues, “Parental Authority,” 66. For the whole discussion, see 64–70. See also, Reinhard Lettmann, Die Diskussion über die klandestinen Ehen und die Einführung einer zur Gültigkeit verpflichtenden Eheschliessung auf dem Konzil von Trent (Münster: Aschendorff, 1967).
135
Theodor Mahlmann, “Chemnitz, Martin,” RPP, vol. II, 2007, 509–10.
136
Chemnitz, Martin, Examen concilii tridentini (Francofurti ad Moenum: Sande, 1707), 610Google Scholar.
137
Martin Chemnitz, Loci theologici (Witebergae: Meisner, 1615), 251.
138
Chemnitz, Loci, 251.
139
Roberto Bellarmino, Disputationum de controversiis christianae fidei … tomus tertius (Lugduni: Pillehote, 1610), c. XIX, 1548–9: “In eadem sententiam descendit Martinus Kemnitius in 2 ar. Exa Concilii Tridentini, pa. 1272, 1273 et sequentibus, ubi tamen non recte, confundit matrimonia filiorum sine consensu parentum, cum matrimoniis clandestinis: potest enim fieri ut matimonium sit clandestinum, et tamen cum parentum consensu contractum: et contra non sit clandestinum, sed publicum et coram ecclesiam et tamen insciis et invitis parentibus celebratum.”
140
Markus Friedrich, et alii, eds., Konfession, Politik und Gelehrsamkeit: Der Jenaer Theologe Johann Gerhard (1582–1637) im Kontext seiner Zeit (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2017).
141
Tarnov, Paul, De conjugio libri tres (Rostochi: Pedani, 1614), 5–6Google Scholar.
142
Gerhard, Johann, Loci theologici (Berolini: Schlawitz, 1869)Google Scholar, tom. 7, 89.
143
Gerhard, Loci, 89: “…ideo haud immerito clandestinorum sponsaliorum censui eadem adscribuntur, ratione appellationis petita non tam a loco, quam a modo, quod contra leges et jus publicum, quod consensum parentum requirit, contrahuntur.” In a similar way, Tarnov, De conjugio, 4–5.
144
The discipline of public law was still embryonic at the time. However, Gerhard refers here to von Beust and Mauser. The former cites the new Church ordinance, while the latter cites Roman law and divine law. Therefore, we can assume that the term leges refers to Roman law and divine law, while “public law” identifies the law of magistrates. On the emergence of public law in early modern Germany, see Michael Stolleis, Geschichte des öffentlichen Rechts in Deutschland, I (München: C.H. Beck, 1988), 73–224; Bernardo Sordi, Diritto pubblico e diritto privato: Una genealogia storica (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2020), 29–36. On the words “public” and “private,” see the classic work by Peter von Moos, «Öffentlich» und «privat» im Mittelalter (Heidelberg: Winter, 2004).
145
Bellarmino, Disputationum, 1554–5.
146
Gerhard, Loci, 45.
147
Gerhard, Loci, 45.
148
Sohm, Rudolph, Das Recht der Eheschliessung aus dem deutschen und canonischen Recht geschichtlich entwickelt (Weimar: Böhlau, 1875), 241Google Scholar.
149
Benedikt Carpzov, Jurisprudentia Ecclesiastica seu Consistorialis (Hanoviae: Aubry, 1652), 379–80. On Carpzov, see Mathias Schmoeckel, “Benedict Carpzov the Younger (1595–1666),” in Great Christian Jurists in German History, eds. Mathias Schmoeckel and John Witte, Jr. (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 156–173.
150
See however, the cited works by Robisheaux, “Peasants and Pastors”; Ozment, Steven, The Bürgermeister's Daughter: Scandal in a Sixteenth-Century German Town (New York: HarperCollins, 1997)Google Scholar.
151
Witte, Law and Protestantism, 201.
152
See the classic study by Gerald Strauss, Luther's House of Learning: Indoctrination of the Young in the German Reformation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978).
153
John Witte, Jr., “Clandestine Marriage and Parental Consent in John Calvin's Geneva: The Gradual Synthesis of Theology, Statutes, and Case Law,” in Law and Marriage in Medieval and Early Modern Times, ed. Per Andersen (Copenhagen: Djǿf, 2012), 273–98. A similar situation occurred in England, where the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum (1553) would invalidate marriages contracted without parental approval. However, even though this measure enjoyed vast support, in 1597 the parliament decided to keep the traditional rule that marriage is formed by the sole consent of the spouses. See Martin Ingram, Church Courts, Sex and Marriage in England, 1570–1640 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 134–5.
154
Henry II, Édit contre les mariages clandestins in François-André Isambert, Recueil général des anciennes lois françaises, tome XIII (Paris, 1828), 469.
155
Ordonnance rendue sur les plaintes et doléances des états-généraux assemblés à Blois en novembre 1576, art. 41 and 42, in Isambert, Recueil, tome XIV/1 (Paris, 1829), 392.
156
See the classic study by Friedberg, Emil, Das Recht der Eheschliessung in seiner geschichtlichen Entwicklung (Leipzig, 1865), 480–1Google Scholar.
