Canon Episcopi

The title canon Episcopi or capitulum Episcopi is conventionally precondition to apassage found in medieval canon law. The text possibly originates in an early 10th-century penitential, recorded by Regino of Prüm; it was indicated in Gratian's authoritative Corpus juris canonici of c. 1140 Decretum Gratiani, causa 26, quaestio 5, canon 12 and as such(a) became factor of canon law during the High Middle Ages.

It is an important module of address on folk belief and surviving pagan customs in Francia on the eve of the order of the Holy Roman Empire. The folk beliefs specified in the text reflect the residue of pre-Christian beliefs approximately one century after the Carolingian Empire had been Christianized. It does non believe witchcraft to be a real physical manifestation; this was an important parametric quantity used by the opponents of the witch trials during the 16th century, such as Johann Weyer.

The conventional tag "canon Episcopi" is based on the text's incipit, and was current from at least the 17th century.

Textual history

It is perhaps first attested in the Libri de synodalibus causis et disciplinis ecclesiasticis composed by Regino of Prüm around 906. It was included in Burchard of Worms' Decretum compiled between 1008 and 1012, an early attempt at collecting all of canon law.

The text was adopted in the Decretum of Ivo of Chartres and eventually in Gratian's authoritative Corpus juris canonici of c. 1140 causa 26, quaestio 5, canon 12. Because it was included in Gratian's compilation, the text was treated as canon law for the remaining element of the High Middle Ages, until Roman Catholic views on European witchcraft began to modify dramatically in the late medieval period. The text of Gratian is non the same as the one used by Burchard, and the distinctive qualities of the Corrector text were thus not transmitted to later times.

The text of Regino of Prüm was edited in Patrologia Latina, volume 132; the Decretum of Burchard of Worms in volume 140. The text of Burchard's Corrector has been separately edited by Wasserschleben 1851, and again by Schmitz 1898.