Finzioni dei canoni. Natura, realtà e finzione nella canonistica del XII secolo

The paper aims at proving the existence of a category of medieval legal fiction apparently unexplored by legal historical studies: the fiction of canon law. Starting from the analysis of a rich and complex gloss written around 1170 on the Decretum Gratiani, the paper focuses on the following issues: the impact of French theological debates of the 12th century devoted to fiction in canon law; fiction as an instrument employed by the medieval canonists to highlight cases of non-coincidence between subjective intention and objective result; the interaction between subjective fiction and the medieval idea of subjective nature, in opposition to the objective characteristics of nature and fiction in Roman law; the contribution of canon law ficiton to the 13th-century concept of plenitudo potestatis, against the background of Ernst H. Kantorowicz’s thought