I will be writing about Pope Boniface VIII's Unam Sanctam and the medieval expansion of papal power. What literature should I consult before I begin?

by DullUser
y_sengaku

I'm afraid that Anglophone historiography in the late 13th century is a kind of gap between the recent surge of research of the early 13th century and the Avignon Papacy (best represented by Joëlle Rollo-Koster, Avignon and Its Papacy, 1309–1417: Popes, Institutions, and Society, Lanham: Rowan & Littlefield, 2015). Some linguistic competence of Italian and/or German is perhaps really useful to catch up with the latest trend of research.

If you can read German, I'd strongly recommend to check Peter Herde, Bonifaz VIII. (1294-1303), Stuttgart: Anton Hiesemann, 2015 as a latest reliable academic biography of Benedetto Caetani/ Boniface VIII. Alternatively, Agostino Paravicini Bagliani, Boniface VIII - Un pape hérétique?, Paris: Payot, 2003, is also authored by the reputed specialist of medieval papal history (in Italian, Paravicini Bagliani also edits Il papato nel secolo XIII : cent'anni di bibliografia (1875-2009), Firenze: SISMEL, 2010 as a bibliography collection of the 13th century Papacy).

In English, what hit upon my mind for overview works are really classic ones (I certain know the recent works of similar standpoint, such as those by Yun Bee and Shogimen Takashi, but they mainly deal with the 14th century author like William Ockham):

While Ullmann and Tierney primarily focus on the aspect of political thought, Pennington is specialized in Canon Law. [Perron 2009] is the standard, concise and recent introduction of the high medieval Papacy.