The Le Mans Forgeries

A Chapter from the History of Church Property in the Ninth Century
On the basis of extensive manuscript study, Goffart disentangles the order of composition and authoritatively pronounces on the authenticity of the eighty-four Le Mans charters. Most of all, he insists that the forgeries are an essay on church property and its law.
The “Le Mans Forgeries,” relating the history of the bishops of Le Mans from apostolic times to 840, have long been acknowledged to be tendentious, and many historians have sought to determine their date, authorship, and purpose. Walter Goffart has assembled these widely scattered and unevenly edited texts and has established their unity of composition, date, and the legal circumstances the forger hoped to exploit to serve the interests of his bishopric. He also provides a critical analysis of the Le Mans charters. His study is a notable contribution to source criticism and to the history of church property and its law in the Carolingian period.

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