Disfigurement, Authority and the Law
Patricia Skinner
This chapter investigates the troubled connection between many cases of disfigurement and claims to authority expressed in medieval legal sources. Framing its discussion will be a consideration Giorgio Agamben’s work on sovereign power: whilst early law codes universally condemned interpersonal violence poured particular opprobrium damage inflicted head face, rulers reserved right inflict exactly same kinds as punishment for transgressions against law, particularly repeated theft, adultery or treason. When such punishments became frequent unjustified, however, writers report them atrocities, making clear readers that behaviors were unacceptable, despite ruler’s special status constituting, rather than being bound by, law.