Glossa ordinaria (Accursius)

The Glossa ordinaria is a very old and important set of notes about laws. It was written by a man named Accursius, who lived a long time ago in Italy, between about 1181 and 1263. He wrote almost 97,000 notes in Latin on the edges of pages. These pages were part of a big book called the Corpus Iuris Civilis, which is a collection of laws made by the emperor Justinian I of the Roman Empire many years before.

Accursius's notes are special because they were used for a very long time as the main way to understand the laws in the Corpus Iuris Civilis. People in Europe used them as the best explanation of the laws until around the 17th century. There is even an old saying that goes, "Quidquid non agnoscit Glossa, non agnoscit curia", which means "Whatever the Gloss does not recognize, the court does not recognize." This shows how important these notes were for understanding the laws back then.

Author, development and usage

Accursius (c. 1181/1185 – c. 1259/1263) was an Italian jurist born near Florence. He studied at the University of Bologna and later taught law there. He became well-known and wealthy, and his large home in Bologna is now part of the Palazzo d'Accursio.

Accursius worked on the Glossa ordinaria, a set of notes on an important law book called the Corpus Iuris Civilis. He began this work in the 1220s and finished around 1250. His notes helped make old Byzantine laws useful for Europe in the 13th century. He used ideas from other teachers, putting them together in his own way.

Content

Overview

The Glossa ordinaria is a very large set of notes written in the edges of books about old Roman laws. It has 96,940 notes all together, and about 2,000,000 words. These notes were made by a man named Accursius to help explain the laws.

The notes talk about different parts of the laws, like the Digesta, the Codex Iustinianus, the Authentica, the Institutiones, and the Libri Feudorum. The Glossa ordinaria also uses special signs to show which older writers were used for each note.

Example

Here is an example of a note from the Glossa ordinaria. In one law, it talks about a woman who caused an early end to a baby’s development. Accursius wrote a note explaining what this means and when a person could be held responsible for such actions.

Historical usage and modern recognition

Accursius' Glossa became very important for teaching and legal work in Italy soon after it was created. It replaced older notes and became the main guide for lawyers. Experts say its strength lies in how well it explains the Corpus Iuris Civilis and how it helps solve problems within it.

The Glossa ordinaria was used widely in Italy from the late 1200s. In Northern Italy, it was the go-to guide for many years. Though it was less popular in France, people still knew about it. In Germany, it became known by the late 1200s. Its lasting impact is shown by the saying "Quidquid non agnoscit Glossa, non agnoscit curia" ('Whatever the Gloss does not recognize, the court does not recognize'), which came about in the 1600s in Germany. In Spain, it greatly influenced the Siete Partidas, and in Portugal, it even had official legal importance under the Alfonsine Ordinances. Experts believe the Glossa ordinaria stayed important in Europe until the 1600s.

In more recent times, opinions about the Glossa ordinaria have changed. In the 1800s, a leading German expert, Friedrich Carl von Savigny, was not very positive but still saw its value. Later, others, like Otto von Gierke, praised it as the start of modern legal thinking. A German scholar in 2017 described Accursius as incredibly productive and skilled, with great knowledge and judgment.

Editions

There are about 1,200 old books, called manuscripts, that have the Glossa ordinaria written in the edges. Sometimes, older notes were removed to make space for these.

The first time the Glossa ordinaria was printed was in Mainz in 1476. Later, in Venice, it was printed in five parts between 1487 and 1489. These prints were made again in Turin in 1968 and 1969.