The Liber Belial: A European work between law and theology. Introductory notes for an ongoing research project

The Liber Belial, also known as Consolatio peccatorum, the work written in 1382 by Giacomo Palladino, alias Jacopo or Jacopo da Teramo (1349–1417), was one of the most translated and printed books between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In Liber Belial, the author imagined that the devils decided to bring legal action against the dispossession by Jesus Christ, when he descended into the lower world to free the patriarchs’ soul after the Resurrection. The Consolatio peccatorum presents interesting juridical content: Suffice it to say that out of a total 844 citations, 249 references (almost a third) relate to Canon Law sources (Decretum by Gratianus, Liber extra by Gregory IX, Liber Sextus by Boniface VIII, and the Clementinae) and Roman la