The Donation of Constantine (Constitutum Constantini)

The text presents itself as a charter of Constantine the Great. It tells the legend of his leprosy and baptism by Pope Silvester and then lists what he gives to the Roman see in thanks, ending with his decision to move his own seat to the East so that no earthly emperor should rule where the head of the Christian religion has his.

It is not a document of the fourth century. Its Latin, its titles of office and its ideas belong to a much later time. C. B. Coleman, who edited the classic exposure of it (The Treatise of Lorenzo Valla on the Donation of Constantine, 1922), judged that it was written probably not long after the middle of the eighth century and noted that it became widely known through a ninth-century collection of forged decretals. It is cited in this wiki only for what it claims, and it must be kept apart from the real grant that King Pepin made in 756 (The Donation of Pepin and the Papal States).