DIRETTO CANONICO. - Its origin is perhaps to be sought God (v.), which came into widespread use in the West in the ninth century. In the same period the Church’s first firm assertions against the duel are found; a canon of the Third Council of Valence (855) declares a person killed in a duel to be a suicide and provides for the exclusion from the communion of the faithful of anyone who, in a duel, has killed or seriously wounded his opponent.
In the following century there are traces of the use of the duel also in trials held before ecclesiastical tribunals, which, however, in defiance of the 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 certain French sovereigns, beginning with Louis the Saint; but from the fifteenth century onward the chivalric duel continued and was increasingly practised, first in the form of the tournament and later in the form which, with observance of certain rules, is still practised in our own day (private duel).
As regards prohibition and, correspondingly, penalties, it is not always easy to determine whether the intention is to proscribe a duel having its modern characteristics, or a tournament, or a judicial combat. Although prohibitions of duels are also found in earlier periods, it is certain that at least at the Fourth Lateran Council of 1179 and in certain decretals of Alexander III and Innocent III there are general prohibitions (cf. the relevant texts in CIC, c. 9, X, III, 50; cc. 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 praedecessaribus of Pius IV (13 Nov. 1559), which constituted the discipline preceding the Council of Trent, imposed excommunication latae sententiae, reserved to the Pontiff, on duelists, seconds, those who attended the duel or provided the ground for the encounter, and also those who in any way facilitated 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 died in a duel.
After various further provisions by Gregory XIII (const. Ad tollendum, 5 Dec. 1582), Clement VIII (const. Ilius vices, 17 Aug. 1592, §§ 1-7), and Benedict XIV (const. Detestabilem, 10 Nov. 1752), Pius IX, in the const. Apostolicae Sedis of 12 Oct. 1869 (§ 2, n. 3), somewhat mitigated the penalties.
The CIC (can. 2351), substantially adopting the discipline introduced by Pius IX and implicitly abrogating (cf. can. 6 n. 5) the other provisions (some of which were of doubtful continuing validity), established excommunication latae sententiae, reserved simpliciter to the Holy See (v. PENA), for duelists who issue or accept a challenge to a duel, for all accomplices (v. CONCORSO NEL DELITTO), for voluntary spectators, and for those who permit it or otherwise fail to do everything in their power to prevent it; moreover, duelists and seconds incur ipso facto infamia iuris (v. INFAMIA); and those who die in a duel or as a result of wounds sustained in a duel are deprived of ecclesiastical burial (v. SEPOLTURA ECCLESIASTICA), unless before death they have given some sign of repentance (can. 1240 § 1 n. 4).
The criminal laws of almost all States also punish duelling, but almost always with mild penalties. Thus the Italian Penal Code (arts. 394-401) provides for various offences in this matter (some detailed provisions are omitted): a) issuing or accepting a challenge, if the duel does not take place: this is punished by a fine currently ranging from 1,600 to 16,000 lire; the same penalty applies to the bearers of the challenge if the duel takes place, whereas otherwise the minimum fine may fall to 1,067 lire; for the person who issues or accepts the challenge, the penalty is doubled if he was the unjust and determining cause of the event; b) the use of weapons in a duel is punished by imprisonment from 15 days to 6 months, or by a fine from 4,000 to 80,000 lire; if the act causes the opponent serious or very serious personal injury, the penalty is imprisonment from 15 days to 2 years; if the act causes death, the penalty is imprisonment from 1 to 5 years; in every case the penalties are doubled for the person who was the unjust and determining cause of the event; c) seconds, and persons who facilitated the duel, are punished by a fine from 4,000 to 80,000 lire; d) anyone who publicly insults a person or exposes him to public contempt because he has not issued or accepted a challenge or has not fought a duel is punished by imprisonment from 15 days to 6 months or by a fine from 4,000 to 80,000 lire; the same penalty applies to anyone who, by displaying his contempt, incites others to duel.
It should also be borne in mind that duelists and seconds are punished, rather than with the lesser penalties prescribed for duelling, with the penalties established for homicide or personal injury whenever one of the following irregularities, of which they are aware, occurs: 1) if the conditions of the combat have not previously been established by seconds, or if the combat does not take place in their presence; 2) if the weapons used in the combat are not identical, or are not either pistols loaded to an equal degree or swords or sabres, 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 during the combat; 4) if it has been expressly agreed, or if it follows from the type of duel, the distance between the combatants, or the other conditions established, that one of the duelists was to be killed; 5) when the provocation or challenge to a duel was made with the intention of extorting money or some other advantage.