The treatise of Lorenzo Valla on the Donation of ConstantineValla, Lorenzo
History
The treatise of Lorenzo Valla on the Donation of Constantine
Valla, Lorenzo
Church and state -- Holy Roman Empire; Constitutum Constantini; Popes -- Temporal power -- Early works to 1800
But why do I ask for any intelligence in you, any learning, you who are
not endowed with any ability, with any knowledge of letters, who say
“lights” for lamps, and “be transferred in the regions of the east”
instead of “be transferred to the regions of the east,” as it should be?
And what next? Are these “quarters” of yours really the four quarters of
the world? What do you count as eastern? Thrace? It lies to the north,
as I have said. Judea? It looks rather toward the south, for it is next
to Egypt. And what do you count as western? Italy? But these events
occurred in Italy and no one living there calls it western; for we say
the Spains are in the west; and Italy extends, on one hand to the south
and on the other to the north, rather than to the west. What do you
count as north? Thrace? You yourself choose to put it in the east. Asia?
This alone includes the whole east, but it includes the north also, like
Europe. What do you count as southern? Africa, of course. But why do you
not specify some province? Perhaps you think even the Ethiopians were
subject to the Roman Empire! And anyway Asia and Africa do not come into
consideration when we divide the earth into four parts and enumerate
the countries of each, but when we divide it into three, Asia, Africa,
Europe; that is, unless you say Asia for the province of Asia, and Africa
for that province which is next to the Gaetuli, and I do not see why
they, especially, should be mentioned.
Would Constantine have spoken thus when he was describing the four
quarters of the earth? Would he have mentioned these countries, and not
others? Would he have begun with Judea, which is counted as a part of
Syria and was no longer “Judea” after the destruction of Jerusalem (for
the Jews were driven away and almost exterminated, so that, I suppose,
scarcely one then remained in his own country, but they lived among other
nations)? Where then was Judea? It was no longer called Judea, and we
know that now that name has perished from the earth. Just as after the
driving out of the Canaanites the region ceased to be called Canaan and
was renamed Judea by its new inhabitants, so when the Jews were driven
out and mixed tribes inhabited it, it ceased to be called Judea.
You mention Judea, Thrace, and the islands, but you do not think of
mentioning the Spains, the Gauls, the Germans, and while you speak of
peoples of other tongues, Hebrew, Greek, barbarian, you do not speak
of any of the provinces where Latin is used. I see: you have omitted
these for the purpose of including them afterwards in the Donation.
And why were not these many great provinces of the East sufficient to
bear the expense of providing the lights without the rest of the world
contributing!
I pass over the fact that you say these are granted as a gift, and
therefore not, as our friends say, in payment for the cure of the
leprosy. Otherwise,—well, any one who classes a gift as a payment is
ill-bred.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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