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23 - Repression and power

from PART VI - THE CHALLENGES TO A CHRISTIAN SOCIETY

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2010

By
John Arnold
Edited by
Miri Rubin  and
Walter Simons
Miri Rubin
Affiliation:
Queen Mary University of London
Walter Simons
Affiliation:
Dartmouth College, New Hampshire
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Summary

It was, the annalist of the city Worms tells us, the year of Our Lord 1231:

There came by divine permission a miserable plague and most harsh sentence. For indeed there came a certain friar called Conrad Dors, and he was completely illiterate and of the Order of Preachers, and he brought with him a certain secular man named John who was one-eyed and maimed, and in truth utterly vile. These two, beginning…firstly among the poor, said that they knew who were heretics; and they began to burn them, those who confessed their guilt and refused to leave their sect… And they condemned many who, in the hour of their death, called out with all their heart to our Lord Jesus Christ, and even in the fire strongly cried out, begging for the help of the holy Mother of God and all the saints.

Conrad Dors and John were then joined by Conrad of Marburg, a priest who had been the famously harsh confessor of St Elisabeth of Hungary (1217–31) until her recent death. Led now by this second Conrad, and backed by papal authority, the trio continued their work:

In truth, those who confessed to heresy, as many innocent people did to stay alive, had the hair shaved from their heads above the ears, and they had to go around like this for as long as it pleased [the inquisitors]. Those who, in truth, refused [to confess] were burnt. And their will prevailed everywhere, because brother Conrad was a literate man and especially eloquent.

Keywords

hierarchical mechanismChristian heresyCatholic Churchsouthern FranceThird Lateran CouncilProtestant historiansmedieval repressionlocal secular powersMainzinquisition
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge History of Christianity , pp. 353 - 371
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

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References

Bailey, M. D., Battling Demons: Witchcraft, Heresy, and Reform in the Later Middle Ages, University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003.
Duvernoy, J., ed., Le registre d’inquisition de Jacques Fournier, évêque de Pamiers (1318–1325), 3 vols., Toulouse: Privat, 1965.
Fraher, R. M., ‘IV Lateran’s Revolution in Criminal Procedure’, in Castillo, R. J., ed., Studia in honorem Eminentissimi Cardinalis Alphonsi M. Sticker, Rome: LAS, 1992.Google Scholar
Given, J. B., Inquisition and Medieval Society: Power, Discipline and Resistance in Languedoc, Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1998.
Iogna-Prat, Dominique, Order and Exclusion: Cluny and Christendom Face Heresy, Judaism, and Islam (1000–1150), trans. G. R. Edwards, Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2002.
Kieckhefer, Richard, European Witch Trials, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976.
Moore, Robert I., The Formation of a Persecuting Society: Power and Deviance in Western Europe, 950–1250, Oxford and New York: Blackwell, 1987.
Muldoon, James, Popes, Lawyers, and Infidels: The Church and the Non-Christian World, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1979.
Nederman, C. J., Worlds of Difference: European Discourses of Toleration c. 1100–1550, University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000.
Nirenberg, David, Communities of Violence: Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996.
Puff, H., Sodomy in Reformation Germany and Switzerland, 1400–1600, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.
Stacey, R. C., ‘Antisemitism and the Medieval English State’, in Maddicott, J. R. and Palliser, D. M., eds., The Medieval State, London: Hambledon, 2000.Google Scholar
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Wilson, E., ‘Institoris at Innsbruck’, in Scribner, R., ed., Popular Religion in Germany and Central Europe 1400–1800, Houndmills: Macmillan, 1996.Google Scholar

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  • Repression and power
  • Edited by Miri Rubin, Queen Mary University of London, Walter Simons, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Christianity
  • Online publication: 28 March 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521811064.025
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  • Repression and power
  • Edited by Miri Rubin, Queen Mary University of London, Walter Simons, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Christianity
  • Online publication: 28 March 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521811064.025
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Repression and power
  • Edited by Miri Rubin, Queen Mary University of London, Walter Simons, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire
  • Book: The Cambridge History of Christianity
  • Online publication: 28 March 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521811064.025
Available formats
×