in the canon law, a covenant or agreement concerning some beneficiary matter, as a resignation, permutation, promotion, or the like.

The council of Trent (sess. vi, de reform., cap. 4), speaking of concordats made without the authority and approbation of the pope, calls them concordias quae tantum suos obligant auctores, non successores. And the congregation of cardinals who have explained this decree, declare also that a concordat cannot be valid so as to bind successors, unless confirmed by the pope.

In particular, it signifies an agreement between the Holy See and a sovereign prince or state, for regulating the manner of nominating to benefices and other matters connected with religion. Such was the concordat concluded at Bologna in 1516, between Leo X. and Francis I., for the abolition of the pragmatic sanction; and, in modern times, that concluded between Napoleon and Pius VII., in 1801.

The concordat serves instead of the pragmatic sanction; or rather, it is the pragmatic sanction softened and reformed.