Au prisme des faux. Clergé, compétition pour les ressources et falsification en Italie du Nord et du Centre (XIe-XIIe siècles)

Résumé En

It is commonly supposed that most of the early medieval forged charters preserved in ecclesiastical archives are related to patrimonial or territorial issues and were often composed in the context of a tension or dispute about the possession of certain resources or the delimitation of two jurisdictions. Forged charters, as soon as they deal with the possession of res ecclesiae in all its guises, from land to ecclesiastical revenues, can therefore constitute a good vantage point from which to view competition for resources. Centred on four collections of false documents produced within the sphere of cathedral chapters in northern Italy during the eleventh and twelfth centuries AD., this paper intends to show what those forgeries reveal about competition for ecclesiastical resources itself, while at the same time shedding light on the strategies developed in this context by canons as a group. This set of documents reveals the frequency of the recourse to forgery during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, in the context of competition between two opposing ecclesiastical protagonists, and when substantial resources were at stake. Competition for ecclesiastical resources was also deeply intertwined with political competition, and forgery could be part of long-term strategy intended not only to provide proof to be produced under legal challenge, but also to serve as a means of applying pressure or an argument of authority during competition.