Bernardo Tanucci (20 February 1698 – 29 April 1783) was an Italian jurist and statesman, who brought an enlightened absolutism style of government to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies for Charles III and his son Ferdinand IV.

[1] As prime minister Tanucci was most zealous regalist in establishing the supremacy of a modernized State over the Catholic Church, and in abolishing the feudal privileges of Papacy and the nobility in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.

Governing under the principles of enlightened absolutism, he restricted the jurisdiction of the bishops, eliminated medieval privilege, and closed convents and monasteries[citation needed], and reduced the taxes to be forwarded to the pontifical Curia.

For the reform of the laws Tanucci instituted a commission of learned jurists with instructions to create a new legal code, the Codice Caroline, which was, however, not put into force.

And by the order of Charles III the Jesuits were suppressed and expelled from the Kingdom of Naples in 1767, a move in which Tanucci was in general sympathy with other ministers at the Bourbon courts, as Aranda in Spain, Choiseul in France, du Tillot in Parma, and also with Pombal in Portugal.