WRITING AUTHORITY IN LATE MEDIEVAL ... - Cornell University

monarch took it upon himself to declare war against infidelity, claiming that his voice alone was
a sufficient guarantor of the legitimacy of war and of the seizing of property.
In encountering the Portuguese claims towards the Canary Islands, Eugene IV was
caught between a rock and hard place. On the one hand, he could not forsake the universal
concept of law and allow the conquest to be based on the un-Christian use of authority against
infidels. On the other, he still had to protect the Church’s position in the Islands by asserting his
authority over them. Thus, Eugene faced the tenuous position of asserting a universal right of all
humans to “libertas” while still claiming that this right was only preserved through the coming of
Christ. This crisis of the concept of sovereignty is reflected in his rhetoric which repeats the
conclusions of Vladimiri (that infidels have authority by right) but uses the premises of
Hostiensis (that sovereignty is maintained by Christ’s representation) to describe his actions.
Eugene’s balancing act did not last. With the rescinding of Creator omnium, an impasse
was resolved in his mind by the very sovereign who was most affected by his indecision—
Duarte I, the King of Portugal. 117 Despite explicit reservations (and outright challenges) by major
legal scholars of the time, the Papacy authorized the enslavement of infidels and the continuance
of Portugal’s crusade over the Islands after the Portuguese King argued for the necessity of an
outright crusade. 118 In so doing, Eugene was not only caving to the pressures of an advancing
colonial enterprise, but he was also rejecting the very legal foundations which belied the
judgment of the Council of Constance concerning infidel lands.
This is all the more visible by an anonymous legal opinion which Eugene explicitly
consulted in evaluating Duarte’s claim of crusade against infidel lands:
Ad ultimum, de Cruzata, etiam anima diuertat dominus noster: quia eius predecessor Martinus non
concessit domino regi Johanni, patri huius, nisi quoad viveret; et hoc fecit cum summa difficultate,
117 Monumenta 5.255 note 1.
118 For a summary of these views, see Muldoon Popes 124-128.
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