Gloria’s inference.
From these passages Gloria concludes that Peter entrusts his body, his children, and his property to the Commune of Padua in order to save them from the Inquisition,—his body from being burned after his death, his property from being confiscated; and that he names “two rich and powerful citizens” as his heirs in order to enlist their aid and with the secret understanding that they shall later transmit the residue of his property, after his other legacies are paid, to his children. It should, however, be realized that the confiscation of the property of a heretic was absolute. “Forfeiture occurred ipso facto as soon as the crime of heresy was committed, the heretic could convey no legal title and any assignments which he might have made were void, no matter through how many hands the property might have passed.”[2939] Whether, therefore, Peter’s sons received their inheritance directly or indirectly, it could be taken from them, if he were condemned as a heretic either before or after his death. On the other hand, there is this to be said in favor of Gloria’s interpretation of the will. If Peter’s property were confiscated as that of a heretic, it would naturally be confiscated by the Commune of Padua, the same secular power to whom he would be handed over for execution in case he were condemned to the stake. By making a generous legacy to the city, by appealing to it for protection of himself and children, and by naming leading citizens as his heirs, Peter may have hoped to enlist public opinion on his side, to prevent any Paduan from accusing him of heresy to the Inquisition or supporting such a charge, or, in case the Inquisition does condemn him and the city government of Padua does confiscate his property, to induce the Commune at least to provide for his children. And certainly the sentence in which Peter entrusts himself, his children, and his goods to the infallible defense of the Commune of Padua does not sound as if he meant to disinherit his sons in favor of other heirs.
Did Peter’s sons inherit his property?
The next question is: what evidence is there to show that the sons ever received their father’s property, if this was his intention? Gloria holds that Peter’s sons are called his heirs in documents recording legal transactions of 1318 and 1321, that consequently he meant them to be his real heirs when he drew up his will in 1315, and that the nominal heirs, true to their trust, have duly turned over the estate after the funeral expenses and other legacies have been met. If this last assumption is true and if Peter’s sons are in 1318 openly called his heirs, whereas in 1315 he did not dare to call them his heirs, it would appear probable either that there has been in the interval a trial for heresy and that Peter has been acquitted, or that there has been no trial and is not likely to be one. But I am not so sure that the documents mentioned describe Peter’s sons as his heirs.[2940]
If so, how?
If, however, they are openly called his heirs in 1318, or if, whether called his heirs or not, they are in possession of his property after his death, there are other possible explanations of this than that the heirs named in his will of 1315 have voluntarily turned over the estate to them. Either the will may have been set aside for other reasons—it will be noted that at its close Peter states, “if it is not valid by the law of testaments, let it have force and hold by the law of codicils or any other law by which it may the better and more efficaciously have force and hold good.”[2941] Or the will may have been annulled by the sons, angry at being disinherited, having themselves informed against their father as a heretic. For note the one exception to the law that the confiscation of the property of a heretic is absolute even at the expense of his innocent widow and children. “Frederick II and Innocent IV both decreed that children could inherit their father’s property, if they denounced him for heresy.”[2942] But this sensational possibility[2943] seems to be excluded by another bit of evidence which Gloria did not note but which supports his interpretation of the will. In 1325 Marsilius de Carrara, nephew of the Jacobus named as one of Peter of Abano’s heirs and almost as prominent as his uncle in the town politics, was knocked off his horse and trodden under foot in a street fight in Padua, and was in danger of his life, but was helped to his feet by “Benvenutus of Abano, son of master Peter, and others of his men.”[2944] Thus whatever disposition was made of Peter’s property, his nominal heirs and his sons seem to have remained on good terms.
Burning of Peter’s bones for heresy.
If Peter’s children were provided for, there is evidence that the men of Padua were not equally successful in protecting his corpse from the Inquisition. Thomas of Strasburg, Prior-General of the Augustinian Friars from 1345 to 1357, in his Commentary on the Sentences[2945] calls Peter a heretic, although he admits that he was a most capable physician. Thomas affirms that Peter denied the miracles by which Christ and the saints raised the dead, arguing that men who were afflicted by a certain disease often fell into a trance for three complete revolutions of the sky. And when asked if Lazarus was not in the tomb four days, he would say that it was only for three full days since the first and fourth days were incomplete. Thomas does not affirm that Peter ventured to deny the resurrection of Christ Himself, but concludes his allusion to Peter by saying, “But in this his iniquity he was deceived and received the reward of his error. For I was present when in the city of Padua his bones were burned for these and his other errors.” The inference which has been drawn from this brief statement is that at some time after Peter’s death his bones were disinterred and burned. This much may perhaps be accepted as the fact, since Thomas asserts he was an eye-witness, but such gossipy reminiscence as this by medieval monks and friars, especially when heretics or saints are the theme, is notoriously unreliable, as Salimbene and the astounding yarns in Thomas of Cantimpré’s work on bees show in the thirteenth century. At any rate Thomas of Strasburg gives no hint that the “other errors” of Peter of Abano were connected with magic or astrology. Indeed Thomas displays a considerable faith in astrology himself in other passages of this work we have cited.[2946] He asserts that the sky itself has a real action on inferior objects except for free will. Upon it the stars cannot act directly but they may affect it indirectly owing to the radical union in us of sense appetite and intellectual appetite.
The account of Michael Savonarola.
A century later Michael Savonarola supplements with further detail the general impression of trouble between Peter and at least a certain party in the church which we obtained from Abano’s own statement and from Thomas of Strasburg, and suggests that Peter’s inclination toward magic, or at least reputation for magic, led the Dominican inquisitor to denounce him as a heretic at Paris and try to bring him to prison and the flames. “But he was held in so great veneration by royal majesty and the entire university that means were not supplied the inquisitor to take him.” Savonarola goes on to say that, when Peter learned of this, he induced the king and university to call a council of doctors of Holy Scripture, whom he convinced by forty-five arguments that not he but the Dominicans were heretics. “And after sentence had been so given,” continues Savonarola, “if the story is to be believed, it was brought about that the Dominicans were driven from Paris as heretics and exiles and were unable to reside there for thirty-two years.”[2947] But of course we do not believe any such story, which is mentioned nowhere else, and therefore Savonarola’s entire account has to be suspiciously regarded as “a story.”