This edict survives in a number of copies, two of them written very soon after it was promulgated, and in addition it is quoted verbatim in the early thirteenth-century chronicle of Burchard of Ursberg.1
Frederick by the grace of God Emperor of the Romans and always Augustus.
First, therefore, we make a general proclamation concerning arsonists; that if a free man, freedman, ministerialis, or person of any condition whatsoever that may be, commits arson, in a conflict [werra] of his own, for a friend, relation or for whatever other reason, he shall immediately be held subject to the judgement of imperial outlawry. Here shall be excluded those who capture castles openly in a declared war, and if they burn here a suburb or stable or other building lying nearby. And judges are excluded who happen to exercise the penalty of burning against malefactors owing to the requirements of justice.
If anybody should commit arson in the duchy of any person, the latter shall pronounce him outlaw and then shall render justice to him as an outlaw by his own authority. Margraves, palatine counts, landgraves and other counts shall do the same; nor shall it be permitted to any of them to absolve such a person, with the exception of the lord emperor. In addition, whosoever knowingly receives an incendiary in their home, and renders help and advice to them, shall make restitution for the injury that has been caused, according to his means. He shall pay to the judge and to the lord emperor ten pounds, in the money of the district in which the arson was committed, to recover his grace. If however anyone wishes to prove or show himself to be innocent of this crime, he shall purge himself with [the help of] two truthful men in the presence of a judge. If anyone shall have charged somebody that he has received an incendiary, and then shall wish to lodge a complaint against someone else, then this shall not be permitted to him unless he has first sworn the oath concerning calumny. In addition, the lord emperor shall not absolve any outlaw from his sentence of outlawry unless this person has first made recompense to the injured party for the damages, and unless this is done with the agreement of the judge.
An outlaw who has incurred this sentence of outlawry for arson shall be notorious to everyone. If he refuses to make satisfaction, the diocesan bishop shall cast him out from the communion of the Church of God and from the faithful of Christ; and he shall render him outcast. Nor shall he absolve him until he has made restitution for the damage [he has done]. And conversely, if a bishop shall have excommunicated someone, after citing them in the proper form and in accordance with justice, and he has informed a judge of this, the judge shall condemn him with a declaration (bannum) of outlawry, nor shall he free him from this until he makes satisfaction in the bishop’s presence for those things for which he was found guilty.
But if he shall be freed from his outlawry in the aforesaid way and wishes to be obedient to his bishop, he shall first abjure arson. Then it shall be up to the judgement of the bishop what penalty he imposes upon him, either of visiting the Lord’s Sepulchre or the abode of St James the Apostle.2 If however the outlaw shall desire to be freed [from his outlawry] in the way that has been described, he shall swear to the lord emperor to depart the bounds of his empire for a year and a day.
If anyone has not been absolved from both his outlawry and his excommunication within a year and a day, he shall be deprived of all right, honour and legal status; he shall never be admitted to give evidence or plead in court concerning another person, and he shall be deprived in perpetuity of all feudal right (omni feodali iure).
Item, if, during a military expedition (reisa) by any lord, there shall be anybody who, with this same lord whose expedition this is, commits arson, as often happens, that lord whose expedition this is shall swear, over relics, that this was not done through his knowledge, will or instruction; he shall abjure the crime and the man shall never be received by him [henceforth]. But if he then receives the man before the latter has made satisfaction, he shall be held responsible for making restitution for all the damage that his man has committed.
Item, if it shall happen that a lord takes lodgings by force in a village, and by chance it occurs that a house is burned, and he to whom the damage shall be done, accuses the lord that what took place did so on his order or wish, let him first take the oath concerning calumny. Then the lord shall purge himself, on his own recognition, that what happened was not done through his wish, order or with his knowledge, and he shall make good the damage to the injured party.
Item, if an incendiary shall be captured, and wishes to deny in the presence of a judge that he has committed arson, unless he shall be notorious throughout the province, the judge shall only sentence him to the loss of his head if he can convict him with seven suitable witnesses. But if he is notorious no further testimony is required, and he should immediately be beheaded.
Item, if the castellans of any lord coming down from the castle of their lord shall start a fire, while their lord is absent from the province, the castle of the lord shall not be burned down because of this, but the goods of the arsonists shall be burned, wherever they shall be found outside the castle. After the return of the lord, if that lord shall wish to retain the arsonist and not dismiss him, then his castle shall similarly be burned down.
Item, if somebody who has been outlawed for arson shall flee to any house from which he cannot be taken unless the house is burned down, nobody shall be deemed to be guilty of arson on account of this fire, but the perpetrator shall make restitution for the fire.
Item, if an arsonist shall flee in panic to a castle and to the lord of that castle, who shall be either his lord, his vassal or blood relation, that lord need not hand him over to those who are pursuing him, but shall help him to go from the castle into a forest or to some other place where he shall seemingly be safe. However, if he shall be neither lord, nor vassal nor relation, then he shall immediately hand him over to his pursuers, or he shall share the same guilt with him.
We also decree and we firmly sanction by this same edict that whoever intends to bring harm to somebody else, or to injure that same person, should announce this to them by a reliable messenger, giving at least three days’ warning. But if the injured party wishes to deny that he has been warned, this same messenger, if he is still alive, shall at a designated time and place make an oath to the contrary, on behalf of his lord. If the envoy is dead, the lord shall swear to the contrary, accompanied by two truthful men, to avoid being subject to the penalty for breaking faith.
We add [further] sanctions to these: that whosoever shall have given a truce to anyone, unless there is an exception and limitation, by which its observance shall be qualified or it shall not be valid, cannot ever proclaim its end before the specified date of termination. If he should do this, he shall be judged as a breaker of faith.
Item, whoever shall harm any messenger to him that is sent to proclaim defiance shall breach his faith, and he shall forfeit all the rest of his honor,3 and in future nobody shall proclaim their defiance to him.
We decree that the sons of priests, deacons and peasants shall not in any way assume the belt of knighthood, and those who have already assumed it shall be expelled from knightly rank by the judge of the province. And if any lord of these people shall have attempted to retain a person in knightly rank against the prohibition of a judge, that lord shall be condemned to a fine of 10 pounds [payable] to the judge, while the serf shall be deprived of all right to knighthood.
Item, if any count shall appoint deputy judges, he shall pay 30 pounds to the emperor and the deputy judge shall pay 10 pounds.
We also decree that, if anyone shall cut down vines or apple trees, he shall be subject to the outlawry and excommunication applicable to arsonists.
That however this so serviceable ordinance shall remain valid for all time and shall remain inviolate for the purpose for which it has been issued, we order that it be included among the laws of our predecessors the emperors and kings and be preserved [there] in perpetuity. If anyone should presume to dare to act contrary to it, their penalty shall be the wrath of Almighty God and of us in perpetuity. Fiat, fiat, Amen.
Done in Nuremberg, in the presence of our princes and by their advice and counsel, in the year from the Incarnation of the Lord 1187 [sic], sixth of the indiction, 29 December.4
1 Burchardi Praepositi Urspergensis Chronicon, ed. O. Holder-Egger and B. von Simson (MGH SRG, Hanover 1916), pp. 65–9. Also in Die Urkunden Friedrichs I (1180–90), ed. H. Appelt (MGH Diplomatum Regum et Imperatorum Germaniae, x(4), Hannover 1990), 275–7 no. 988, from which this translation has been made.
2 Santiago di Compostella, in northwest Spain.
3 This ambiguous word could have a wide range of meanings, including ‘lordship’ or ‘property’, but also ‘right’, ‘privileges’, ‘social rank’, or indeed ‘honour/reputation’, see J.F. Niermayer, Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, ed. C. Van der Kieft (Leiden 2001), pp. 495–8. Here it would seem to have the implication of rank or status, and law-worthiness, while in the History of the Pilgrims it was used, for example, as ‘mark of respect’, Quellen, p. 128 [above p. 146].
4 The date of this edict has been debated, but the indiction number would fit with 1188, and Frederick is known to have been in Nuremberg at the end of that year. Furthermore Burchard of Ursberg states that this was promulgated after Frederick had taken the Cross, which he did in March 1188.