Étienne Aufréri

Étienne Aufréri (Stephanus Auffrerius) (1458 – 11 September 1511) was a French legal scholar, whom Pierre de Leon, Archbishop of Toulouse, appointed to an office in the archiepiscopal court in 1483.

Arriving in Toulouse at a very young age, Étienne Aufréri became an official advisor in 1481, then an official of the Archbishop of Toulouse. In 1486, he was appointed professor of canon law at the University of Toulouse. Aufréri mentions, in his Decisions of the Chapel of Toulouse, that Pierre de Leon, Archbishop of Toulouse, appointed him as an official in the archiepiscopal court, in 1483.

In the edition of the Stilus supremæ curiæ Parlamenti Parisiensis atque Tolosani, published at Paris in 1530, he is spoken of as the distinguished Étienne Aufréri, an eminent professor of civil and canon law, and during his lifetime president of the inquest in the Parliament of Toulouse."

A form of citation issued by the Parlement of Toulouse in 1497 begins "Estienne, le premier arrêtiste toulousain" Aufréri is considered the first Toulouse arrêtist: to him can be attributed the “Traité des arrêts”, commenting on the judgments of the Toulouse parliament from 1444 to 1472, published in 1542 by Celse-Hugues Descousu.

His most widely distributed work is the annotated edition of the Decisiones Capellæ Tholosanæ (Decisions of the Chapel of Toulouse).