OF CANON LAW
Its origin is perhaps to be seen in the so-called judgments of God (v.), which came into wide use in the West in the 9th century. At the same time, the first decisive assertions of the Church against judicial combat are found; a canon of the Third Council of Valence (855) declares the slain in judicial combat to be a suicide and orders the exclusion from communion of those who in judicial combat have killed or gravely wounded their adversary.
In the following century, traces are found of the use of judicial combat even in trials held before ecclesiastical tribunals, which, however, in compliance with orders from Rome, soon refused to admit it as a means of proof.
Judicial combat fell into disuse especially as a result of the efforts of some French monarchs, beginning with St. Louis; but from the 15th century onward, knightly judicial combat continued and was increasingly practiced, first in the form of the tournament and later in the form that, with observance of certain rules, is still practiced today (private judicial combat).
As regards prohibition and, correspondingly, penalties, it is not always easy to distinguish when what is intended is to punish a judicial combat with modern characteristics or a tournament or judicial combat in the older sense. Although prohibitions of judicial combat are found even in earlier periods, it is certain that at least in the Lateran Council of 1179 and in some decretals of Alexander III and Innocent III there are general prohibitions (cf. the relevant texts in CIC, c. 9, X, III, 50; c. 1-2, X, V, 14); subsequently, severe penalties were established by Julius II (const. Regis pacifici, 24 Feb. 1509, § 2) and by Leo X (const. Quam Deo, 23 July 1519). The bull *Ea quae a praedecessoribus* of Pius IV (13 Nov. 1559), which constitutes the discipline prior to the Council of Trent, imposed the penalty of latae sententiae excommunication, reserved to the Pope, for duellists, their fathers, those who assist at the duel or provide the ground for the encounter, and those who in any way favor the duel itself.
The Council of Trent (sess. XXV, de reform., c. 19) added to the aforementioned penalties the deprivation of ecclesiastical burial for those who die in a duel.
After various other provisions by Gregory XIII (const. *Ad tollendum*, 5 Dec. 1582), Clement VIII (const. *Illius vicus*, 17 Aug. 1592, §§ 1-7), and Benedict XIV (const. *Detestabilem*, 10 Nov. 1752), Pius IX in the constitution *Apostolicae Sedis* of 12 Oct. 1869 (§ 2, n. 3) somewhat mitigated the penalties.
Rolfo Daniel
The *Code of Canon Law* (can. 2351), substantially adopting the discipline introduced by Pius IX and implicitly abrogating (cf. can. 6 n. 5) other provisions (some of which were of doubtful validity), established the penalty of latae sententiae excommunication, reserved simply to the Holy See (v. PENALTY), for duellists who challenge to or accept a duel, for all accomplices (v. COOPERATION IN CRIME), for voluntary spectators, and for those who permit it or in any way fail to do what is in their power to prevent it; moreover, duellists and their fathers incur ipso facto the legal infamy (v. INFAMY); and those who die in a duel or as a result of injuries sustained in a duel are deprived of ecclesiastical burial (v. ECCLESIASTICAL BURIAL), unless before death they gave some sign of repentance (can. 1240 § 1 n. 4).
The penal laws of almost all states also punish dueling, but almost always with mild penalties. Thus the Italian Penal Code (arts. 394-401) provides for various offenses in this matter (some minor provisions are omitted here): a) challenging or accepting a challenge, if the duel does not take place; this is punishable by a fine currently ranging from 16,000 lire; the same penalty applies to those who carry the challenge, if the duel takes place, while in the contrary case the minimum fine may be reduced to 1,067 lire; for those who challenge or accept the challenge, the penalty is doubled if they were the unjust and determining cause of the fact; b) the use of weapons in a duel is punishable by imprisonment from 15 days to 6 months, or by a fine from 4,000 to 80,000 lire; if the act results in serious or very serious personal injury to the adversary, the penalty is imprisonment from 15 days to 2 years; if death results, the penalty is imprisonment from 1 to 5 years; in any case, the penalties are doubled for the person who was the unjust and determining cause of the fact; c) fathers or seconds, and those who facilitated the duel, are punishable by a fine from 4,000 to 80,000 lire; d) whoever publicly insults a person or brings him into public contempt because he did not challenge, accept a challenge, or fight a duel is punishable by imprisonment from 15 days to 6 months or by a fine from 4,000 to 80,000 lire; the same penalty applies to those who, by showing their contempt, incite others to duel.
It must also be noted that duellists and their fathers are punished, not with the lesser penalties provided for dueling, but with the penalties established for homicide or personal injury, if any of the following irregularities of which they were aware occur: 1) if the conditions of the combat were not previously established by fathers, or if the combat does not take place in their presence; 2) if the weapons used in the combat are not equal, or if they are not equally loaded pistols or swords or sabers, or if they are precision weapons or multi-shot weapons; 3) if fraud or violation of the established conditions is committed in the choice of weapons or in the combat; 4) if it was expressly agreed, or if it results from the nature of the duel, or from the distance between the combatants, or from other established conditions, that one of the duellists was to be killed; 5) when the provocation or challenge to a duel was made with the intent to extort money or other advantage.