466 



CORPUS DELICTI. 



Christi feast. It owes its origin to the vision of a 

 nun of Liege, named ,/utianti, in li:5't. who, \vlii It- 

 looking nt the full nun in. saw a gap in its orb, and, 

 by a peculiar revelation from heaven, learned that 

 the moon represented ihe Christian chur. h, and the 

 gap, the want of a cerUiin festival that of the adora- 

 lion nt' the Inxly of Christ in the consecrated host 

 which she was to U-gin 10 celebrate and announce to 

 the world ! On this account, the archdeacon James 

 went to Liege (die same who afierwards became pope 

 under the liile of I'rbun II'.) in onler to ordain Midi 

 a festival ; and he was confirmed in his purpose by a 

 miracle. In lJiti-4, while a priest at Bologna, who 

 did not believe in the change of the bread into tin- 

 body of Christ, was going through the ceremony of 

 the benediction in his presence, drops of blood fell 

 upon his sui-jilice, anil when he endeavoured to con 

 real them in the folds of his garment, formed bloody 

 images of the host. The bloody surplice is still shown 

 as a relic at Civita Vecchia. This circumstance forms 

 the subject of one of the beautiful pictures of Kii- 

 phael, in the Stanze Ji faifaello. Urban IV. published, 

 in the same year, a bull, in which he appointed the 

 Thursday of the week after Pentecost for the cele- 

 bration of the corpus Christi festival throughout 

 Christendom, and promised absolution for a period of 

 from 40 to 100 days to the penitent who took part 

 in it. Since then, this festival has been kept as one 

 of the greatest of the Catholic church. Splendid 

 processions form an essential part of it. The children 

 belonging to the choir, with flags, and the priests 

 with lighted tapers, move through the streets in front 

 of the priest, who carries the host in a precious box, 

 where it can be seen, under a canopy held by four 

 laymen of rank. A crowd of the common people 

 closes the procession. In Spain, it is customary for 

 people of distinction to send their children dressed as 

 angels, to join the procession ; the different fraterni- 

 ties carry their patron saints, carved out of wood and 

 highly adorned, befoie the host; astonishment and 

 awe are produced, as well as feelings of devotion, by 

 the splendour and magnificence of the procession, by 

 the brilliant appearance of the streamers, by the 

 clouds of smoke from the censers, and the solemn 

 sound of the music. The festival is also a general 

 holyday, in which bull-tights, games, dances, and 

 other amusements are not wanting. In Sicily, all 

 the freedom of a masquerade is allowed, and passages 

 from Scripture history are represented in the streets. 

 The whole people are in a state of excitement. The 

 festival is kept with more simplicity and dignity by 

 the German Catholics. In Protestant countries, the 

 Catholics merely go round the churches in proces- 

 sions, and celebrate their worship with peculiar solem- 

 nities. See Sacrament. 



CORPUS DELICTI (literally the body of the 

 crime or offence). It is a figurative expression, used 

 to denote those external marks, facts, or circum- 

 stances which accompany a crime, and without the 

 proof of which the crime is not supposed to be esta- 

 blished. We have no correspondent expression in 

 English, and the preceding exposition is peculiar to 

 the civil law of continental Europe. We should say, 

 that certain proofs are indispensable to establish a 

 crime, and tliat, unless they exist, there is no legal 

 ground to convict the party ; so that corpus delicti is 

 equivalent to the proofs essential to establish a 

 crime. 



The following observations have reference to the 

 jurisprudence of Germany. The markj of guilt, 

 which constitute the Corpus delicti, are in many eases 

 perceptible in the traces remaining (facia permu,- 

 neniia) ; for instance, the wounds inflicted upon a man ; 

 a lampoon posted up; written or printed words; coun- 

 terfeit writings: in other cases, such traces exist only 



in the memor. (fncta transeuntia) ; as words merely 

 spoken, &c. A criminal trial must always rest upon 

 a corpus delicti clearly substantiated. Unless the 

 death of a man is fully proved, and shown to have 

 IM-I-II occasioned by the co-operation of another, no 

 sentence of homicide can be passed. An inspection 

 of the lx)dy, in case of murder, or the statement ol 

 the injured party, in less heinous offences, confirmed 

 with an oath, &c., is accordingly, the first condition 

 Of Criminal process. 1 mire deficiency of the cor- 

 pus delicti can be supplied by no confession ; andtiie 

 latter remains without any effect ; as, for instance, it 

 a person should accuse himself of having stolen v.nne- 

 thing from another, or of having killed some one. ami 

 no person could be found from whom such a thing 

 had been stolen, or who had been killed. In the 

 crises wiiere the corpus delicti cannot be discovered 

 by means of immediate examination, because the 

 doer has destroyed ;dl traces of it (for instance by a 

 total burning of the corpse of a murdered person), 

 other circumstances must be sought for, which can 

 afford certain proof of the crime ; and without them 

 punishment cannot be legally pronounced by the 

 court. It must further be ascertained, in a case of 

 murder, that death has ensued in consequence of Un- 

 wound : or, rather, that the wound inflicted was. in 

 itself, a sufficient cause for the death. In this re- 

 spect, the courts in Germany often go too far, by 

 seeking for the most remote possibility, by which the 

 corpus delicti may be rendered uncertain. In the fa- 

 mous trial of Fonk, in Cologne, it was one of the 

 greatest faults, that the corpus delicti (the wounds in 

 the head of the dead man, Coenen) had not been ex- 

 amined with sufficient medical accuracy, and that 

 there was a search for a murderer l>efore the murder 

 was ascertained. It has happened more than once 

 that a person has been executed as a murderer of a 

 missing person, who, after some time, has re-ap- 

 peared. No reliance ought, in most cases, to be 

 placed upon the circumstance, that several persons 

 pretend to have seen the corpse of the individual 

 believed t.o have been murdered, until the corpse has 

 actually been discovered, or until infallible evidence 

 of the murder has been adduced. In crimes which 

 leave no traces, the whole possible proof rests on 

 witnesses and confessions. Even a confession ofguilr, 

 by an accused party must be supported by other cir- 

 cumstances; e. g., actions which have been observ- 

 ed by other persons, and which have a bearing on 

 the crime, and render it probable. In the investiga- 

 tion of the corpus delicti, in a great many cases, the 

 science of medicine must assist the law. Neverthe- 

 less, great uncertainty often remains, after all the 

 aid which can be thus attained ; for instance, in 

 poisonings, and in cases where the point in question 

 is, whether an infant was* born alive or not. Fre- 

 quently, questions are proposed to the physicians, 

 which they cannot answer at all. In such cases, 

 nothing is required of them but the declaration that 

 nothing can lie said with certainty. It is a very im- 

 portant question, whether preference ought to be given 

 to the testimony of the physician who has attended 

 the deceased till his death, or to the opinion of the 

 physician of the court at the official examination.* In 

 a famous case, in Germany, the inquest found traces 

 of poisoning by arsenic, though not the arsenic itself, 

 whilst the physician attending during the last illness 

 of the deceased asserted that no symptom of poison- 

 ing had shown itself, and that the disease had taken 



* In many parts of Gi-rmany, a physician, in the employ 

 of the government, is atiaMied to each district, who *ee 

 that proper health regulations are observed, makes reports 

 re:>pecting births, deaths, &o, inquires into the causes of 

 deaths wliirh are attended with .suspicious circumstances. 

 and is, ex ojjicio, the medical adviser of the indicia! court*. 



