Decision making at the Council of Constance (1414–1418): The Case of Johannes Falkenberg at the natio gallicana

Abstract

The main objective of this text is to analyze the decision process at the Council of Constance focusing the attention on the debates about Johannes Falkberg’s theses held inside the natio gallicana. The existence of a notarial protocol describing these debates, offers a unique opportunity to understand how decisions were taken and how voting took place at the level of conciliar nations. Ideally decisions appealed to the principle of unanimitas, but when consensus could not be reached, the council fathers, after discussing certain objections, submitted the decisions to voting following the principle of maior et sanior pars, a numerical and qualified majority. At the same time, the article will try to show that doctrinal debates about Martin V's statement that he approved all the decisions taken conciliariter have not in general taken into consideration the context in which it was pronounced. In order to understand what was at stake at the natio gallicana when Johannes Falkenberg’s theses were discussed, the text will present first a brief description of the conflict between the Teutonic Knights and the Polish Crown, then it will discuss Falkenberg’s participation in this debates through the writing of his Satira and finally the attention will be centered on the notarial protocol describing the debates about this text at the French nation.