SOLMI, ARRIGO. — Historian of law, born in Finale Emilia on 27 January 1873, died in Rome on 5 March 1944.
A proponent of the sociological approach, with a praiseworthy and controversial youthful study on the Associations (1898), he subsequently addressed, in his work on State and Church from Charlemagne to the Concordat of Worms, the problem of the medieval religious essence and of the relations between man and the State. His mastery of legal history became evident in his Manuale di Storia del diritto italiano (1st ed. Milan 1907; 3rd ed. there 1930): one of the most complete and concise overviews of the history of law in Italy. With the rediscovery of the Honorantiæ civitatis Papiae, to which he devoted a substantial critical edition, he took up again the theme of the continuity of the ancient civil institutions in Italy. Encouraged by Mayer’s work, this led him to seek an accord with the points of disagreement in his youthful writings. To the approach of this second period belong various minor studies, the Discorsi sulla Storia d’Italia, and the posthumous work on the Roman Senate. He founded and directed the Archivio storico della Svizzera italiana; he was minister of justice and Keeper of the Seals, and senator of the Kingdom. He contributed to initiating relations with the Vatican leading to the Lateran Agreements, of which he was rapporteur in the Chamber in 1929. In his numerous political writings, despite his adherence to the orientation of the period, the nationalist idea from which he had emerged appears in their underlying structure. He worked on the drafting of the new Civil Code, completed by Minister Grandi, who was called upon to succeed him. An exalted of the historical values of the nation, a recurring theme in almost all his writings, he remained faithful to it until his final days, during which the tragedy of Rome and Italy was also drawing to its close.
As regards the soliciting confessor, absolution follows the customary norms for absolution from censures, but rehabilitation is slow and never complete. In the case of the false denouncer, absolution from the censure additionally requires the formal retraction of the calumny and reparation, insofar as possible, for the harm caused. These conditions are always required, even in danger of death. The retraction must be formal. Whenever there arises
and of the metodo della storiogr. del dir. ital., in Riv. di stor. del dir. ital., 17–20 (1944–47), pp. 171–99.; E. Besta, Commemoraz., in Rendic. Accad. Lincei, cl. Sc. morali, stor. e filol., 8th series, 3 (1948), pp. 269–73. Fulvio Crosara