Moral restraints on wealth accumulation on papal estates in the long sixth century: revisiting Pope Gregory’s policies on alienating and ceding church property

Abstract

Alienation of church property was in most cases forbidden under both imperial and ecclesiastical legislation. Nevertheless, between 592 and 599 Pope Gregory the Great dealt with ten cases in which property was either relinquished by churches or in which he deliberated whether to compel churches to relinquish property. His justification for disposing of it was always moral and it allows us an important insight into the limits of holding church property. It allows us also to define more sharply what alienation meant in practice, beyond the contemporary legal definitions. In a period in which the church was growing ever richer, Gregory’s policies show how the accumulation of wealth could be subject to moral curbs.