Gherardelli linkage and complete intersections

Our main theorem characterizes the complete intersections of codimension 2 in a projective space of dimension 3 or more over an algebraically closed field of characteristic 0 as the subcanonical and self-linked subschemes. In order to prove this theorem, we'll prove the Gherardelli linkage theorem, which asserts that a partial intersection of two hypersurfaces is subcanonical if and only if its residual intersection is, scheme-theoretically, the intersection of the two hypersurfaces with a third.