Źródła i rozwój instytucji domniemanej śmierci współmałżonka w prawie kanonicznym do XV wieku
The sources and development of the institution of the presumed death of a spouse in canon law until 15th century

Summary/Abstract: It is the objective of this paper to investigate the origins, and the subsequent evolution, of the institution of the presumed death of a spouse in canon law, which, in the currently-existing legal framework of the Church, is regulated in Canon 1707 of the Code of John Paul II. The very reason why the regulations in question were adopted at all was the challenges of real life, addressed first by Roman law, and next by (being at that time in statu nascendi) doctrine, expressed in the texts written by the Fathers of the Church, in synodal decrees, and in the pastoral letters of Leo I, and also of Innocent I. The method of addressing these challenges (by Christianity) was adjusting the output of ancient lawyers to the teaching on marriage. The first thousand years of the Church was the period when the attention of ecclesiastical authorities was attracted by the problem in question, and also when, gradually, the doctrinal foundations, and that means precise regulations, which determined the permanent differences between the ecclesiastical and secular perception of the presumption of death, were developed. The Middle Ages, in turn, were the time when a plenitudeof the decretals of the Bishops of Rome relevant to the matter in question were issued; in particular, these included Perlatum est of Alexander III, Dominus of Lucius III and In praesentia of Clemens III, all of which finally ensured this discipline in de morte praesumpta cases. It is impossible to fail to take under consideration an important role played by the canon lawyers of the Middle Ages because their comments sig- nificantly contributed to determining the procedural rules and methods of proving applied so that a judge could stay assured that no reasonable doubts (about the fate of a person being presumed death) had remained unaddressed.

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