Gregory to Fortunatus, bishop of Naples. The cause of this matter your Fraternity knows more carefully: the bearer of the present letter came last year, compelled hither together with her mother. Since her husband, one of your clergy, is known to have removed her from his companionship because she had been challenged as being of servile condition, and they assert that you, being placed here, promised that if she were able, with the Lord's help, to prove herself free, you would restore her to her husband—let your Fraternity know that, by God's revealing, the author of liberty, she has been approved free, and no stain of servitude has been found in her.
These things therefore being known, we wish her without any delay to be restored by you to her husband, and that this same man of hers should no longer seek out for himself pretexts of occasion by which he may cast her off. For if by you—which we do not believe—this should be by no means fulfilled, and he should perhaps delay to take her back, know that we shall correct that with strict punishment.