Collections of sources about the Great Schism.

The highest Church authorities - archbishops, bishops and abbots, actively took part in the controversy about the papal schism: they produced all sorts of writings -treaties, letters, testimonies, legal advice. In Avignon, just like in other European courts, Pierre Ravat, Martin de Zalba and the Pope Benedictus XIII endeavoured to archive, then to either pass on or fight against the most influent of these writings. Today, their collection of writings are gathered in the collections of the ASV and the BAV, in Vatican, and the BNF, in Paris.

The strong involvement of Gascon prelates in the crisis.

As local actors of the Great Schism within their own province, some of the prelates in Gascony got considerably involved in order to find a way out of the crisis. Thus, Bernard Alaman, the bishop of Condom, died in 1401, after being an active advisor of the French government’s policy during the 1390s. On the other hand, other prelates deserved the esteem of adverse popes to such an extent that the latter granted them seats in Gascony in order to have such reliable intermediaries as Francesco Uguccione, Roman archbishop of Bordeaux, or Bertrand d’Agramont, bishop of Tarbes.

Writings on the Great Schism: conflicting memories and ecclesiological issues.

Since the seventeenth century, a significant number of these writings, whether they were published during the Great Schism or kept secret, have been edited, either in bulk or separately. A database aims at :

• Keeping a record of all the texts which have survived
• Clarifying the identity of their authors
• Indicating the editions available for each text.

Thanks to the making of a textual corpus, the texts by the Gascon prelates, which are here edited for the first time ever, can be compared to the other great treaties which have already been edited.