Rubric from the start of the Liber poenitentiarius in an Austrian manuscript of c. 1400. The elongated initial belongs to Incipit liber ('the book begins') and the name Johanne de Deo is in the third line from the top.

Johannes de Deo[1] (c. 1190 – 15 March 1267) was a Portuguese priest, judge and scholar of canon law who taught for over twenty years at the University of Bologna. He was a prolific writer.

Life

Johannes was called Hispanus, meaning a native of the Iberian Peninsula.[2] He was born in Silves during the brief period when it was held by King Sancho I of Portugal between 1189 and 1191.[3] He refers to himself as a priest, and seems to have been ordained in Lisbon before studying at the University of Bologna.[4] He studied canon law and possibly civil law at Bologna from 1223 until 1229.[3][4] His main teacher was the archpriest Zoen.[5] He was a professor at Bologna from 1229 until at least 1255.[6] He appears to have been a doctor of both laws.[7] The titles he uses of himself are doctor decretorum (doctor of decrees) and utriusque juris professor (professor of both laws).[2]

In 1241, Johannes acquired a canonry in the cathedral of Lisbon.[3] In 1247, he arbitrated a dispute in Bologna.[2] He served as a judge on several occasions, including on occasion as a judge delegate of Popes Innocent IV and Alexander IV.[5] By March 1260, he had left Bologna to become archdeacon of Santarém in the diocese of Lisbon.[3][5] He continued to work as an arbitrator and judge in Portugal. One of his cases involved the monastery of Santa Cruz in Coimbra and the philosopher Pedro Julião, the future Pope John XXI. Johannes died in Lisbon on 15 March 1267.[5]

Works

Johannes wrote numerous works in Latin on canon law:[6]

In addition, some glosses on the Arbor actionum of John Bassianus are attributed to Johannes de Deo.[2] Johannes dedicated several of his works to Zoen. Although his work as a whole is not very original, it is valuable to historians for its citations of sources.[5] It was more highly regarded and circulated widely up to the end of the 15th century. There are many manuscripts that carry his work.[3] Johannes Andreae had a low opinion of the Arbor versificata, which he said was so difficult and obscure as to make known things unknown.[6] William Durantis relied heavily on Johannes.[7]

Johannes argued that the Crusades were just wars, that is, wars justified by the right of defence under natural law.[9] His Liber poenitentiarius became the new standard for penitentials.[8]

Few of Johannes' works have been printed. An exception is Principium decretalium, which has been edited by Hermann Kantorowicz.[4]

References

  1. ^ His name translates at "John of God". His given name may be spelled Iohannes or Joannes. Other Latin surnames besides de Deo include Bononiensis, Ictus and Yspanus. In other languages his name is translated João de Deus (Portuguese), Juan de Dios (Spanish), Giovanni di Dio (Italian) and Jean de Dieu (French). See Iohannes de Deo, in Rolf Schönberger (ed.), Alcuin: Infothek der Scholastik (Universität Regensburg, 2022).
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Patrick Colquhoun, A Summary of the Roman Civil Law (William Benning and Co., 1849), 175–176.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Christie's, Live Auction 6704, The Count Oswald Seilern Collection, Lot 7, Johannes de Deo (c.1190–1267), Liber poenitentiarius de cautela simplicium sacerdotum in seven books, in Latin, decorated manuscript on vellum (2003).
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Miguel Carlos Vivancos Gómez, "Juan de Dios Hispano", Diccionario biográfico español (Real Academia de la Historia, 2018).
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z A. Domingues de Sousa Costa, "Joannes de Deo", New Catholic Encyclopedia, 2nd ed. (Gale, 2002), 7:882–883.
  6. ^ a b c d Sam Worby, Law and Kinship in Thirteenth-Century England (The Boydell Press, 2010), 34–36.
  7. ^ a b Osvaldo Cavallar and Julius Kirshner, Jurists and Jurisprudence in Medieval Italy: Texts and Contexts (University of Toronto Press, 2020), 191 n42.
  8. ^ a b Rob Meens, Penance in Medieval Europe, 600–1200 (Cambridge University Press, 2014), p. 212.
  9. ^ Sohail H. Hashmi and James Turner Johnson, "Introduction", in Sohail H. Hashmi (ed.), Just Wars, Holy Wars, and Jihads: Christian, Jewish, and Muslim Encounters and Exchanges (Oxford University Press, 2012), 7.
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