La convocation à l'assemblée de 1302, instrument juridique au service de la propagande royale

SUMMARY One of the main characteristics of the reign of Philip the Fair is the holding of large-scale assemblies. The one held in 1302 was the first. The topic of this essay is neither to hark back to the context of this meeting nor to describe its course. Caroline Decoster intends to demonstrate how the king's legists justified the summons of the three orders of the realm: the nobility, the clergy and the representatives of the towns. The use of principles proceeding from Roman law is obvious. Following the example of the neighbouring countries and ecclesiastical institutions, they justified the scale of the summons by the maxim Quod omnes tangit ab omnibus tractari et approbari debet to express the king's will to assemble his subjects. But they tried to control its consequences in so far as it could become dangerous to the royal power. So as to counter the effects of the imperative mandate used by universitates, towns and communities to send their representatives, they required to a degree the use of pl...