[303] Thus Charles, in a capitulary added to a revised edition of the Lombard law issued in A.D. 801, says, 'Anno consulatus nostri primo.' So Otto III calls himself 'Consul Senatus populique Romani.'
[304] Francis II, the last Emperor, was one hundred and twentieth from Augustus. Some chroniclers call Otto the Great Otto II, counting in Salvius Otho, the successor of Galba.
[305] See [p. 45] and [note to p. 143].
[306] Nürnberg herself was not of Roman foundation. But this makes the imitation all the more curious. The fashion even passed from the cities to rural communities like some of the Swiss cantons. Thus we find 'Senatus populusque Uronensis.'
[307] See Palgrave, Normandy and England, i. p. 379.
[308] Æneas Sylvius, De Ortu et Authoritate Imperii Romani.
[309] Thus some civilians held Constantine's Donation null; but the canonists, we are told, were clear as to its legality.
[310] 'Et idem dico de istis aliis regibus et principibus, qui negant se esse subditos regi Romanorum, ut rex Franciæ, Angliæ, et similes. Si enim fatentur ipsum esse Dominum universalem, licet ab illo universali domino se subtrahant ex privilegio vel ex præscriptione vel consimili, non ergo desunt esse cives Romani, per ea quæ dicta sunt. Et per hoc omnes gentes quæ obediunt S. matri ecclesiæ sunt de populo Romano. Et forte si quis diceret dominum Imperatorem non esse dominum et monarcham totius orbis, esset hæreticus, quia diceret contra determinationem ecclesiæ et textum S. evangelii, dum dicit, "Exivit edictum a Cæsare Augusto ut describeretur universus orbis." Ita et recognovit Christus Imperatorem ut dominum.'—Bartolus, Commentary on the Pandects, xlviii. i. 24; De Captivis et postliminio reversis.
[311] Peter de Andlo, multis locis (see esp. cap. viii.), and other writings of the time. Cf. Dante's letter to Henry VII: 'Romanorum potestas nec metis Italiæ nec tricornis Siciliæ margine coarctatur. Nam etsi vim passa in angustum gubernacula sua contraxit undique, tamen de inviolabili iure fluctus Amphitritis attingens vix ab inutili unda Oceani se circumcingi dignatur. Scriptum est enim
"Nascetur pulchra Troianus origine Cæsar,