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benefice: (beneficium ecclesiae)
an ecclesiastical office connected with income earned from financial holdings,
land, or taxation.
beneficiary: (beneficiati) originally
referring to the lay holder or incumbent of church property (land and estates),
often royal vassals; after the 12th century, refers to the holder of prebends
directly connected with an office (benefices).
bona fabricae: a building fund,
whose money is solely devoted to church building and maintenance of the church
fabric.
canon: members of the cathedral chapter,
or a collegiate church's chapter. Also, a member of non-monastic religious
community living under a rule. Whereas the regular canons (canonici
regulares) took a monastic vow, the secular canons (cononici
saeculares) did not, and were therefore entitled to more personal freedom,
living in their own houses with their own posessions. Many secular canons
came from noble families. Their numbers increased significantly after the
10th century, due to growing benefices.
canon law: ecclesiastical law.
capitularies / capitularia: laws
and regulations of the Frankish kings, divided into chapters (capitulae).
cathedral chapter: an ecclesiastical
corporate body having legal status to manage the administration and services
of the cathedral. The chapter and its canons participated in the election
of a new bishop and the management of the diocese.
collation: conferment of an ecclesiastical
office with a benefice attached.
cumulation: an accumulation of ecclesiastical
prebends and offices, as in the hands of a bishop, often leading to less
attention paid to individual prebends or offices.
Curial: concerning the central administration
(Curia) of the Pope, or of a bishop (diocesan Curia).
decretal / decretal epistle: legal decision
(decree) of the Pope on ecclesiastical questions, written as a letter.
decretalist: scholar of ecclesiastical
law.
fabrica ecclesiae: 'the construction
of a church'. By the 12th century, the administrative office for the management
of the building fund (bona fabrica).
in fee / fief: (from Latin:
feudum) a piece of land, a customary right, or an office given from
a master to his vassal. A fief was originally a loan given for the lifetime
of the vassal, but later they increasingly became heritable.
incorporation: incorporation of a prebend
into an ecclesiastical institution, e.g., the transfer of a parish into the
posession of a cathedral chapter, or monastery, which could lead to insufficient
pastoral care within the parish.
indulgence: release or pardon granted
by the church from a punishment, increasingly (by the 13th c.) bought and
sold.
interdiction: prohibition of all
ecclesiastical official acts as a penalty for specific persons or a specific
church, or other ecclesiastical institutions.
magister fabricae: an official
controlling the construction funds of a church.
masons' lodge: on-site headquarters of
the Master Masons and their assistants (sculptors, stone workers, and
bricklayers) in a cathedral building project.
metropolitan / archbishop: the bishop
of the capital (metropole) of an archbishop's province, consisting of several
bishoprics. The Pope, as bishop of Rome, is the Roman metropolitan.
oblation: collected offerings of the
congregation given during the mass.
office: ecclesiastical office and its
related duties.
Ordinary: bishop or archbishop with ordinary
jurisdictional power.
pardoners / questuarii:
professional, travelling alms collectors involved in the sale
of indulgences and pardons.
prebend: (praebenda) the right
to receive income in various forms, including money, food, and housing, in
connection with an ecclesiastical office.
prebendary: the holder of a prebend.
prince bishop: a bishop who, besides
his ecclesiastical office, also had the secular status and power of a prince.
Such status and territorial power was conferred by the emperor of the Holy
Roman Empire (Germany).
questuarii / pardoners: professional
alms collectors with a papal license to sell indulgences and pardons, often
travelling around a region.
reservation: specially reserved
ecclesiastical rights.
thesaurarii: treasurers of the funds
of a church.
vassal: someone under oath to serve a
master or king, usually by military service. In return, he received land
(a fief) in fee, and certain privileges. Dukes were examples of royal vassals.
vicar: deputy of an ecclesiastical
office-bearer, such as the bishop, or a parish priest.
.
References:
Wolfgang Schöller. 1989. Die rechtliche Organisation des
Kirchenbaues in Mittelalter, vornehmlich des Kathesdralbaues.
Baulast-Bauherrenschaft-Baufinanzierung. Köln-Wien.
Pöschl, Arnold 1926. Die Enstehung des geistlichen Benefiziums.
In: Archiv für katholisches Kirchenrecht, 106 (series 4, 14), pp.3-121,
363-471.
.
[see related article on cathedral funding by Wolfgang Schöller]
This article appears on pages 48-52 of Vol.4 No.2 of Athena
Review.
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