Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/522

 514 MARSIGLIO OF PADUA October important phrase ' ut supra dictum est de Fratribus minoribus ', a remark he would not have made had he considered Marsiglio a Franciscan. The second question is whether Marsiglio was ever archbishop of Mian. Scardeone claims to have discovered in Paduan annals that office connected with a certain Marsiglio pre- eminent in all the departments of learning, and inclines to the view that Marsiglio, the author of the Defensor Pads, was elected by the emperor and the antipope, without the confirmation of the apostolic church, in 1328. In this he is supported * by Gualvaneus de la Flamma, an historian of Milan of no great authority. Now we know from Villani 2 that Lewis held a great parliament in Pisa on 13 December 1328, which all the schismatic notables attended, to give their sentence against John XXII ; and it is in this assembly that Marsiglio would most probably receive the arch- bishopric in place of the vicariate of Rome, which he had been obliged to abandon. But the political situation in Milan was too strained for Marsiglio ever to have exercised the functions of the office. The probable explanation is that Scardeone had seen the statement, not in Paduan annals, but merely in Gualvaneus de la Flamma himself. Scardeone says that he had made repeated efforts to ascertain what fortune, good or bad, attended the archbishop of so illustrious a city, and his failure may be taken to show that the story of the archbishopric was a legend. While the emperor was still in Rome an interesting trial, 3 which we have been obliged to cite previously, took place at Avignon on 10 May 1328, Gasbert, archbishop of Aries, assisting at the inquisition. It had come to the ears of John XXII that a certain Francis of Venice had been in the service of Marsilius* de Mainardinis of Padua. Francis, so runs the accusation, had for some considerable time associated in Paris with Marsiglio of Padua and John of Jandun, after it had been known that they had written a book, and besides helping to publish the work, had translated and spread it abroad ; moreover, he had facilitated the journey of Marsiglio to Germany and had corresponded and changed money with that heretic. To these charges Francis gave a general denial. He was never, lie said, the servant of Marsiglio, nor had he stayed with him in the same lodgings, except in so far as he had served himself as he served the scholars, by preparing the table and placing the wine on it, sometimes, and not often, as was the custom among most Italian scholars. Francis also denied assisting in the composition and knowing the contents of the book. He had heard it said, two months after the flight of Marsiglio, that 'he and John of Jandun were the sole authors ; so declared the hermits in regular orders and the masters reading 1 Manipulua Florum, in Muratori, xi. 732. 2 Muratori, xiii. 672. 3 Baluze, p. 280.