Enquiry

The Inquisition was a Juridiction specialized (a court), created by the Roman Catholic church and concerning the canonical Droit, charged with or not putting forth a judgment on the orthodoxe character (compared to the Dogme religious) of the cases which were subjected to him. The Enquiry was a Juridiction of exception, established to represent the legal authority of the Pape on a given area, when the normal functioning of the ecclesiastical courts proved to be unsuited.

Historically, there were several specialized jurisdictions of this type. One can distinguish three various Enquiries, which are the subject of separate articles:

the medieval Enquiry,
the Enquiry Spanish, pledged with the crown of Spain, founded in 1478, and Portuguese Enquiry, founded in 1531,
Roman Enquiry ( Congregation of the Roman and universal Enquiry ), founded in 1542, renamed Crowned Congregation of the Holy Office in 1909, then Congregation for the doctrines of the faith in 1967.

This article treats general aspects of the Enquiry, compared to the catholic approach of the heresy, with its justification Politique, the operation of the Droit, and with the way in which the Enquiry is now presented and perceived socially. The historical aspects are limited here to the general chronology.

Roots of the Enquiry

Evolution of the legal procedure

In the beginning, the enquiry (of the Latin inquisitio , “investigation”) indicates a legal technique. It is made possible by the legal revival of the 12th century, which reintroduces in the legislations of the techniques of Roman law - even if the procedure itself is unknown Roman law.

Before the 13th century, the canonical Droit admits indeed only the accusatory procedure : the judge informs the complaints; the burden of proof returns to him. Appears then the procedure dénonciatoire , founded on a simple denunciation and either a complaint in due form. The procedure inquisitoire confers to the judge the initiative continuation. In this new form of procedure, the judge can launch office a procedure on the basis of fama publica (“notoriety”). Either it finds indicters precise by the means of an investigation, general or individual, or it gives the responsability itself to furnish the proof. The whole of the procedure makes a broad place with the written act, testimony and the consent.

The procedure inquisitoire is used initially at ends of ecclesiastical Discipline: repression of Simony, disputes of abbey elections, etc However, it is spread very quickly in the field of the fight anti-heresies. The legislation on the matter is outlined with the decrees of the II {{E}} council of Lateran (1139). The Council of Turns (1163) of 1163, chaired by Alexandre II, authorizes the Toulouse and Gascon princes, within the framework of the fight against the heretics, to resort to the procedure inquisitoire. It is codified by a series of Décrétale S of Innocent III (1198-1216), in particular Licet Heli (1213), supplemented by Per killed subparagraphs .

The fight anti-heretics draws from many traditions to be defined: parallel to the resurgence of the Roman law, the Germanic traditions are also used. Thus, being based on the very hard punishments of the Carolingian law against the Sacrilege, Frederic II chooses in 1224, in the statute granted to the town of Catane, to apply the sorrow of fire to the heretics of Lombardy. It is the first systematic decision of this kind.

Being the sorrows, papacy is limited to a work of synthesis of the civil legislations, they are what is called often the “statutes of the Holy See”: Honorius III extends the decision of Frederic II to all Italy and in 1231, Gregoire IX transforms it into canonical standard.

At the beginning of the 13th century, the bishops thus have of an important legislation to fight against the heresy, but not an specialized institution.

Evolution of the vision of the heresy

If the Church had known one period of relative calm after the 9th century, the heresies know a new development at the 11th century and 12th centuries, generally while following the roads of pilgrimage. Local studies indeed showed that the heresies are often spread by this skew, by the word of mount: the pilgrims discuss between them, and with the villagers at the time of their stages, thus propagating questions and answers apart from the regulating capacity of the parish.

With the Early middle ages, the heretic is as leprous that it is necessary to move away from the healthy body of the faithful ones, by the Excommunication then by the exile or the confiscation of the goods. With the low Middle Ages, the heresy constitutes a rupture of the social link. Régine Pernoud writes as follows:

“ Any accident spiritual seems in this context more serious than a physical accident. (…) Under many reports/ratios, the Enquiry was the defense reaction of a company for which, wrongly or rightly, the safeguarding of the faith seemed as important as nowadays that of physical health . ”

In the bubble Vergentes in senium (March 25th, 1199), Innocent III compares even the “ aberration in the faith ” to a crime of Lèse-majesté, concept Roman redécouvert at that time by the laic authorities.

After the creation of the Enquiry, the definition of the heresy (for which it will become gradually the only court of competent jurisdiction) will constantly be widened. By opportunism, one inserts in the field of the heresy of the increasingly various elements: the converted Apostasy of Jewish and Moslem S, or the sorcery, which is assigned to them formally in 1261 by Jean XXII. But one calls also schismatic heretics the at the time of the fight against Frederic II or, at the 14th century, of the Great Schism of Occident - or those which refuse to pay the Dîme S. the border also scrambles between indiscipline and heresy: Jean XXII calls the Enquiry against the Spiritual ones, dissidents about the franciscains, then the fancies.

The increasing prerogatives of the Enquiry and the constant lightening of the supervision which should be exerted on it explain the absolute power of the institution at the 13th century: the inquisiteurs take the practice to only work, and without returning accounts, thus increasing the risk of abuse.

Dispute of the social order

The heresy is not only business of doctrines: it is a total crime against God, the princes, the company - what then returns to same. Being a rupture of the social link, the fight against the heresy is a question of law and order. The princes are thus interested by his repression for several reasons, and the civil authority, to preserve the law and order, starts to fight against heresies and to sanction heretics in a potentially autonomous way: the décrétale AD abolendam (1184) of Lucius III makes repression of the heresy a component of the capacity of the Emperor, in the species Frederic Barberousse. This implication of the laic authorities enters in conflict with the authority of the Church: royal or imperial courts come to a conclusion about problems of doctrines.

This conflict of jurisdiction is sliced by the arrangement of Vérone (1148): “ the heretics must be judged by the Church before being given to the secular arm ”. Conversely, the Church " oblige" laic authorities to seek the heretics, under penalty of excommunication or of deposition. As of the beginning, the Enquiry is thus founded on the principle of collaboration between the laic Church and authorities, because it is born in a company where this distinction does not exist.

The fight against the heresy before the Enquiry

The fight against the Hérésie S was not born with the Enquiry, on the contrary. Before the institution of the latter, the research of the heretics is entrusted to the ordinary (generally, the bishop) and the punishment to the secular judge.

The fight anti-heresies is not only field of papacy: on the contrary, because of its social dimensions, the States undertake themselves them. They collaborate with papacy. The first forms of repression had appeared at the beginning of the 10th century: in Christmas 1022, Robert the Piles had made burn ten clerks of the cathedral of Orleans. It was the first to rough-hew history of the heresy in Occident. Making following the agreement of Vérone between Lucius III and Frederic Barberousse, the décrétale AD abolendam (1184) thus made repression of the heresy a component of the capacity of the Emperor.

These provisions soon are not enough any more: the capacity of the bishops remains limited to their territory whereas the area of influence of the heresies is moving, and often covers several Diocèse S. In this case, the bishop can repress only the part which is in its jurisdiction, which is not very effective. Moreover, the bishops are confronted with the local pressures: the heresy also develops in the nobility or among middle-class men of the cities, and a bishop can have a close relative heretic.

The Church and the States thus seek new more effective means of fight. Initially, the ''' IV {{E}} council of Lateran ''', in 1215, evokes the possibility of a specialized personnel, but remaining within the framework diocesan. Various devices are then tested, according to the local needs, in an effort to exceed the limitations of the ordinary jurisdiction. Thus, in a lombarde city, the bishop collaborates at the same time with the local prince and a pontifical Légat to make apply imperial constitutions, diffused by papacy. In France, the catharism is fought by a Croisade and the bishops supported by legates. In 1227, the Dominican ones supported by a pontifical police chief, Conrad de Marbourg, traverse the the Rhineland to support the episcopal commissions: they are given the responsability to denounce the heresy during the procedure.

Institutional operation

The operation of the Enquiry concerns at the same time the field of the right and that of the religion.

Inquisitor, Judge of exception

For the normal functioning of the canonical Right, the lawsuits and judgments in the Church raise of a ecclesiastical Tribunal, managed under the authority of ordinary of the place, generally the bishop. Rome intervenes only in second line, at the same time like authority of call, and guarantor of the good performance of the unit.

When this local organization proves insufficient or unsuited to defend the needs for the faith, the pope can decide to create a function of inquisitor . It is a representative to whom it pope delegates his authority, to judge all the relative questions with the faith in a given area. It is a jurisdiction " of exception" , which means that when this jurisdiction exists, it is qualified to only judge orthodoxy of a cause which is subjected to him. The inquisitor is thus primarily the representative of the pope, and inherits his authority.

They were generally selected among the Franciscain S or the Dominicain S. the regular inquisiteurs lived in margin of the conventual life, and to achieve their mission they were raised of their wishes of obedience towards their superiors.

Administrative aspects

The organization which the inquisitor sets up to carry out his mission of judgment - thus a court - is the Enquiry, with the administrative direction of the term. The court inquisitoire generally had a fixed seat (where were in particular preserved the very provided files), but not necessarily: inquisiteurs were itinerant. The inquisiteurs were assisted of a large staff: Clerk S, the such notary S, and Clerk S, geôliers, etc

At the beginning of the Enquiry, the inquisiteurs worked by two, with equal competences. Thereafter, the load of an area was entrusted to a single inquisitor.

Procedure inquisitoire

A jurisdiction of Enquiry draws its name from its capacity to have recourse to the procedure inquisitoire , procedure extraordinary (and unknown factor of the Roman law). A traditional court cannot seize cause spontaneously: it can intervene to only answer a complaint (civil law) or a denunciation (criminal law). On the contrary, a court of Enquiry can examine office (in the literal sense: from its mission even, its office) any question in its field of competence, without needing to be seized by a third. This capacity was allotted to make it possible to examine quickly and effectively all that could be suspected of heresy.

The capacity inquisitoire is a capacity exorbitant, likely to be employed wrongly, and - of this fact - usually refused with the traditional jurisdictions. It is necessary to include/understand at which point this capacity is extraordinary: Napoleon i said Examining magistrate which it was “ the most powerful man of France ”, by its liberty of action, but it could intervene only on commission. the inquisitor cumulated the capacities of a Examining magistrate, a Procureur, and had faculty car-to be seized of a business . From this point of view, the extraordinary one is not that there were abuses, but rather than there was of it finally enough little.

Penal procedure

To speak about the “penal procedure of the Enquiry” introduces a not very legitimate category: the Penal procedure employed by the jurisdictions of Enquiry was primarily that of the time, with little real specificity. The procedures which appear scandalous today were overall normal for the time: compared to what knows the modern right, the guarantees of procedure and the provisions which ensure the protection of the accused today were then extremely rudimentary, whatever the jurisdiction. However, one can stress that the jurisdictions of Enquiry were progressists overall, compared to what was practiced at the time in the equivalent procedures of the civil authority.

This procedure is resulting from the redécouverte Roman law. The procedure was codified by general documents (see the décrétales quoted in the Latin sources), and by instructions of application promulgated by the inquisiteurs for the procedures of their spring. The procedure was entirely written, a notary transcribed all the debates. The whole of the procedure proceeded under the control of the bishop of the place, which received copy of all the documents. The acts of the procedure were normally written in Latin, official language of the Church, but the interrogations were naturally made in vernacular language.

The defendant could challenge a judge, or call upon Rome. In the event of call to Rome, the whole of the documents was sent under seals, and it cause was examined and judged in Rome on the parts collected.

The procedure of the Enquiry varied in time, and according to the areas, but its broad outlines are given hereafter.

Standard procedure of the Enquiry

Decree of grace

The general investigation was proclaimed in a whole area. When the Enquiry proceeded by geographical sector, the opening of an investigation of the Enquiry in a sector heretic given generally took the form of a general preaching, where the inquisitor exposed the doctrines of the Church and refuted the theses of the heresy. It published then a decree of grace and a edict of faith , convening all the inhabitants in front of the inquisitor.

For one length of time fixed by the decree of grace (typically from 15 to 30 days), those which were presented in time and hour and confessed their faults spontaneously saw imposing a religious penitence (typically a pilgrimage), but escaped the sanctions from the civil capacity. Conversely, the edict of faith gave obligation to denounce the practices heretics. These first spontaneous consents, which were to be complete, also made it possible by their testimony to identify heretics who had not presented themselves. The time granted by the decree of grace also made it possible to carry out local surveys, and to collect denouncements if necessary.

The faithful ones suspectés of heresy which had not been presented during the grace period were the subject of an individual quotation.

Individual quotation

The individual quotation was generally done by the means of the Curé. Those which refused to appear found excommunicated.

A suspect was to swear (on the four Gospels) to reveal all that it knew about the heresy. If the suspect recognized immediately and freely its errors, he saw himself inflicting penitences like previously, and the possible sorrows were light.

The oath was a frightening weapon between the hands of the inquisitor. Many sects proscribed the oath, and the violation or the refusal of the oath was thus a serious index of heresy. In addition, the sanction against the perjuries was the life imprisonment, very dissuasive.

The serious sorrows related to only those which refused to recognize their error, even after having sworn to say the truth, and in spite of testimonys making it possible to doubt their sincerity seriously. For these, the procedure inquisitoire really began.

The death of marked did not suspend the procedure: if dead were guilty for it of heresy, this error was to be recognized by a judgment.

Even in the absence of consents, the suspect was not necessarily imprisoned. It could remain in freedom on word, guarantee, or introduce people standing as guarantors of her appearance in front of the inquisitor. The imprisonment could be used, but generally did not extend to all the duration from the procedure.

Testimonys and defense

Protections were granted to the defendants, as with the witnesses. Thus the identity of the witnesses for the prosecution was held secret, current practice of the time. In this same logic, the concepts of confrontation of witness and cross-examination were unknown. On the other hand, in the courts of the Enquiry, the defendants were authorized to provide a list of the likely people of their wanting some, which were then challenged like witnesses.

The courts of the time did not accept testimonys of doubtful origin: flight eurs, prostitutes, people of loose living, but also heretics and excommunicated. Very quickly, the courts of Enquiry dissociate this rule, with regard to the testimony of heretics, for obvious practical reasons: the heretics activities were generally hidden, corresponding testimonys could hardly come but from the heretics themselves. This practice is officialized in 1261 by Alexandre IV.

The defendant profited from a general protection some in the way in which one punished the false witness: testimonys were obtained under oath, and the crime of perjury was severely sanctioned by the reclusion with life.

The defendant is entitled generally to a defender, but this right was generally theoretical in the case of the Enquiry, for lack of volunteer. The lawyers of heretics were likely to be themselves marked of kindness with the continued heresy. For the same reason, the defendants translated in front of a court of Enquiry generally did not profit from the presence of witnesses for the defense.

Collection of testimonys by torture

The use of the Torture or “ Question” (of Latin quæstio ) to obtain information was general at the time, but posed a moral problem for the inquisiteurs, who, as clerks, did not have the right to pour blood. After an initial legal blur, this practice is officially authorized for the Enquiry in 1252 (bubble AD exstirpendam ), subject to not leading neither to the mutilation nor with death. Moreover, it was often required by the pope who it can be given only with the assent of the bishop of the place. In this bubble, the defendant profits from two protections: the question can be given only once, and the consents must be repeated freely to be admissible.

Because of this last provision, the use of torture is not easily quantifiable: the consents obtained under torture not being admissible, this part of the procedure was not the subject of a written recording, and them files of the lawsuits are generally dumb or as well as possible allusive on this subject. It is typically the short phrase found in the minutes of the interrogations, confessionem ess veram, not factam VI tormentorum , which at the same time evokes the assumption of a torture, and denies that the noted consent of it was the effect (“the consent spontaneous, is not made under the force of the pain”). What had it occurred before the noted consent? A notation clarifies postquam depositus flees of tormento (“after its return of torture”) is extremely rare, about a-for-thousand. Is reality probably stronger, but of how much?

The sources available which make it possible to have an idea about the use of torture in the lawsuits of the Enquiry are the handbooks and instructions of the inquisiteurs on the one hand, and on the other hand the traces of the protests on the violence of such or such inquisitor.

In the handbooks, prohibition to subject several times to the question seems not to be taken with the serious one: formal arguments made it possible to justify that this prohibition is formally respected, while leaving it without effect. The question for example was regarded as made of several stages, the end of a stage not implying the suspension of all the procedure. Another argument was that the discovery of new loads again justified the use of the question specifically against this load. Lastly, prohibition concerned only the defendant compared to his count of indictment, not the case of the testimonys obtained on behalf of other witnesses.

True protection against a free torture is the conscientiousness and moral inquisiteurs. For them, the clarified “state of the art” is clearly that the consents obtained under torture are not reliable ( quæstiones sunt fallaces and ineffective , written Bernard GUI), and that the use of torture is thus not justified on the practical level. The recourse to the question should not be considered that in last spring.

There were complaints and recourse against the excessive cruelty of such or such inquisitor: this cruelty is thus locally proven. However, this report must be balanced by two remarks. On the one hand, these complaints against a practice considered to be abnormal show by contrast that the “measured” practice of the question appeared normal and acceptable for the time. In addition, the relative scarcity of these complaints compared to the number of inquisiteurs shows that this cruelty of the inquisitor or his agents is an exception, and with the Enquiry itself is not intrinsic.

Opinion of a jury

In the difficult cases, the court was to hear the opinion of a college of profit viri , council trained of thirty to a hundred men of manners, faith and judgment confirmed. This council is imposed and confirmed by the instructions of the pope as from 1254. Its role will be growing in the Enquiry, and will be extended to other jurisdictions for finally being at the origin of the modern jury.

After they lent oath to be expressed in conscience, the whole of the acts of the lawsuit was transmitted to them, but in an anonymous way, censured name of the marked person. They transmitted two opinions to the inquisitor: on the nature of the noted fault, and on the nature of the convenient sanction.

The inquisitor remains sovereign and responsible for his sentence, but the opinion of this council was generally followed, and when it was not it, it was to reduce the sanctions suggested.

Pronounced judgment

The sentences of the Enquiry were marked in an official ceremony, in the presence of the civil authorities and religious. This ceremony - a Liturgy in the ancient direction of the term - had as a function symbolically to mark the restoration of social balance and monk who had been broken by the heresy. It was thus a public act of faith , which is the exact significance of the Portuguese term “car da Fe”.

One day or two before the delivery, the accused saw themselves again reading the loads retained against them (translated into vernacular language), and were convened to hear the verdict of the inquisitor, with the authorities of the place and the remainder of the population.

The ceremony opened early the morning, by a sermon of the inquisitor, from where its other name of general sermon . The civil authorities lent then oath of fidelity to the Church, and began to lend their assistance in his fight against the heresy.

The reading of the verdicts came then, while starting with the “acts of leniency”: handing-over of sorrows or commutations. Penitences of all nature (gifts, pilgrimages, mortifications, etc) followed then. Finally the sanctions themselves came, until most severe which were the imprisonment with life or the capital punishment. Condemned were then given to the secular arm by a solemn formula: Cum ecclesia ultra not habeat quod faciat pro am demeritis countered ipsum, idcirco, eundum reliquimus brachio and judicio saeculari (“Since the Church does not have now any more to achieve its role against those, for this reason, we leave them with the secular arm and his justice”). On this, the ceremony was completed. The inquisitor had completed his role, the Church had come to a conclusion about the heresy.

Each one could then return at home with its clear conscience found - except of course the culprits of crimes against the company, at which it “secular arm” was going to make undergo their sorrows. Contrary to religious penitences, these sorrows were indeed definite by the temporal power . They sanctioned the crimes committed against the faith and the Church, both officially protected by the State.

Sorrows and penitences

The court inquisitoire strictly speaking did not inflict sorrows, but “Pénitence S”. The least serious were called “arbitrary penitences”. They was the public Fustigation during the Messe, the visits with the churches, the Pèlerinage S, the maintenance of poor, the port of the cross on clothing, etc

Penitence was often thereafter reduced. The files of the Enquiry show many examples of attenuated penitences or liftings for varied reasons, sometimes on request. One the case of a son obtaining quotes thus the release of his father by simply calling upon the leniency of the inquisitor, others are released to assist their sick parents “until their cure or their death”.

The prison knew two possible modes: the “broad wall”, comparable with a supervised residence, and the “narrow wall”, solitary reclusion. The narrow wall could be worsened in carcer strictissimus , condemned put to the dungeon (commonly called a in pace ) being attached by chains, and being deprived of any contact.

The relaps or the stubborn person, which refused to acknowledge its crime, was abandoned with the secular authority, and pains it of its crime was often the imprisonment or to rough-hew it. This last sorrow was exceptional. The inquisitor Bernard GUI pronounced only 40 in his long career of them.

In any rigor, the sorrow the most severe that pronounced Church was the Excommunication. The death sentences marked according to the civil law and were carried out by the secular authorities. It should be said, however, that there was no clear separation between the civil and religious fields: the civil authorities themselves were held to bring their contest under penalty of excommunication.

Problem of the judgment of opinion

Freedom of conscience

For the catholic doctrines, following the Bible, which affirm “ God does not want the death of the sinner, but that it converts ” (Ez 33:11, 2P 3:9, prolog of the rule of St Benoit), the position of the Church is that the heresy should be killed, but not the heretics .

At the time same where the first Enquiry is founded, Bernard de Clairvaux formula that “ the faith must be persuaded, not imposed ”.

Dominique de Guzmán, on its side, founds its order of the preachers to reduce the heresy Albigensian E by the preaching and the example of a life beggar, dissociating warlike crusade led to the same time under Innocent III - the dogmatic solid formation of the Dominicains will be worth to them later on to provide good number of inquisiteurs. In its line, Thomas d' Aquin, future Doctors of the Church, clearly affirms, in the Summa Theologica, that the freedom of conscience is absolute: for him, if a Christian sees a conflict between the dogma and his conscience, it must follow its conscience and not the dogma.

To say the truth of the dogma

Even if the conscience is free, this freedom is included/understood only compared to two duties in the thought Catholique:

the moral duty of each individual to seek the truth and to live consequently;
the institutional duty of the Church to announce and defend what it perceives of the Truth, i.e. typically the Dogme.

A court of Enquiry, by itself, makes only come to a conclusion about orthodoxy case which is subjected to him. Such a judgment is an institutional duty and does not pose any moral problem. The drama of the Enquiry is not to examine the orthodoxy of a cause; it starts when the Church accepts that the consequence of its judgment is related to a penal sanction of the temporal power.

Attack with the social order

For the medieval company, Christianity belongs to the social order, and the social order is based on the religion.

In this organization, on the religious level, a heresy constitutes necessarily a rupture of the social order. Conversely, on the political plan, the only manner of disputing the established order is to enter in rupture (Schisme) with the institutional religion.
It is normal that the temporal power defends the social order in one way or another, while sanctioning with the need what endangers it (even if defense is delicate, and must be exerted with prudence, not to fall into an opposition to progress reactionary).
Insofar as the heresy endangers the company, it must be fought by the temporal power. But insofar as the heresy is expressed in the field of the faith, it must be judged by an religious authority.

Consequently, the religious courts start to consider troublemakers social. This division of the roles is act in the arrangement of Vérone (1148) between the Pope and the Emperor: the heretics must be judged by the church before being given to the secular arm, to undergo there “ the sorrow due ” ( output animadversione puniendus ).

Penal judgments pronounced by the Enquiry

The penal sanctions, when it there of has - and even when they are recognized legitimate by the Church -, are always rules enacted by the temporal power, and carried out by its “secular arm”. Typically, the Church excommunicates and delivers the culprit to the civil authorities, which apply a civil sentence.

The distinction can be subtle in a medieval world which does not separate the temporal one from the spiritual one, as the Occident of the 20th century learned how to do it. But this distinction also shows that the Enquiry becomes potentially dangerous only in one company which wants to be “officially” orthodoxe, and gives itself the average civilians to impose it.

The image of the Enquiry

Importance of the myths and representations collective

For the general public, the word “Enquiry” returns to the heretics thrown on the wet straw of the dungeons, with grésillement of the flesh under the bite of red iron, with an enlightened inquisitor sending his next to died for " the greatest glory of Dieu" , with the flames of a To rough-hew drawn up under a sky of storm, from where the innocent one condemned lance a last curse…

In fact, for an encyclopedia, the Enquiry presents a double aspect. It is on the one hand a historical phenomenon, object of academic studies and objective investigations. But in addition, passion and fascination for the topic of the Enquiry in fact also a social phenomenon, which is nourished of an image which is not necessarily faithful, and which contributes to maintain the stereotypes simplifying and striking.

When academic criticism leans on what was historical reality, its conclusions tend to being careful, and relativizing the popular image. What the result is different from the traditional image is foreseeable, but why this variation appears it often surprising, even unacceptable, necessarily contestable?

To include/understand this phenomenon, it is initially necessary to consider this mythology of the Enquiry, on its genesis, as on the facts which could found it.

This negative image of the Enquiry did not always exist. To include/understand how it was formed is a subject whose study is relatively late (end 20th century), and made debate. This article proposes a review on some benchmarks useful for the debate and likely to clarify the comprehension of the reader.

Origin of the myth

The Spanish Inquisition was established at the 15th century in Spain. The the Netherlands being then possession of king d' Espagne. In 1522, Charles Ier of Spain extends the sphere of activity of the Enquiry to the Holland. It was the principal contact point between the Enquiry and the reform, which becomes its extensive at the 16th century. This Dutch Enquiry did its work: it repressed what it regarded as a heresy, but in a particularly hard operation, consent even of the king Philippe II.

The victims of this religious repression were regarded as martyrs of the reform, and repression itself fed certainly the rejection by the Dutchmen of the Spanish mode, obtained after nearly one century of disorders (war known as of Eighty Years, 1566-1648). The independence of Holland was built thus on a bottom of fight for the religious liberty, against catholic Spain and its Enquiry. At the end of the 16th century, the topic of the Enquiry passes thus in the culture of the reformed Churches, carried by a worship of at the same time nationalist and religious heroes.

England of the 17th century is at the same time Protestant, in cultural and economic contact close with Holland, and in fight of influence against catholic Spain. In this context, the topic of the Enquiry finds a new relay in the Protestant and nationalist mediums English. Of history, the image becomes mythical then and polemist. (One can find an example early of this second reading in the history and the work of Antonio del Corro.) The reference is not then any more that of the Dutch Enquiry , but a second reading of the activity which the Enquiry in Spain at the time of its installation had had. The Enquiry becomes a symbol driving bolt of brutality and violences of Catholicism and its tortures, under the responsibility for Spain and Papacy. This symbol develops by contrast the freedom and the release brought by Protestantism, and morally justifies the fight against the Catholicism as well external (war against Spain) which interns (religious persecutions in Ireland).

The 18th century is that of the Lumières, whose philosophy is defined as dissociating last obscurantism: the natural religion is opposed to the traditional dogma. The idea to seek the truth through the free exercise of the reason lit by the debate, carried by the noble ambition to train free men “ and moralities ”, becomes the program of the Franc-maçonnerie. This program passes from the English cabins, largely in symbiosis with the Église of England, and essaime to France, in a intellectual elite which starts to be dechristianized. What is said in the cabins is a difficult to reach secrecy, but it appears natural that the myth of the Enquiry was imported on this occasion, and was used to illustrate the debates on the obscurantism and freedom. In fact, the Enquiry becomes as from the 18th century a recurrent theme of the speech anticlerical. Voltaire takes it for constant target. Diderot takes it for target (inter alia…) in its " Encyclopedia " . The topic of this new image is not any more violence, but the reason. The Enquiry becomes the symbol of the obscurantism, the instrument by which the Église imposes a dogma by violence.

At the 19th century, the topic of the lights continuous to living in the speech anticlerical, and moreover is relayed by the vision than the Romantisme gave the Middle Ages, whose image is rebuilt at that time (see for example in another register the case of Viollet the Duke). The topic is carrying. Thus, Michelet publishes in 1841 " the Lawsuit of Templiers " , in 1862 " the Witch " ; Victor Hugo publishes in 1882 a drama in four acts entitled " Torquemada " , makes cry crowd over the fate of Esméralda in ''' " Notre Dame de Paris" '''. For the contrast of the image, the victim is “inevitably” pure and innocent. This kind of literary topic (sometimes whimsical, to see History of the Enquiry in France) maintains and develops the mythical image of a atemporelle, barbarian and oppressive Enquiry, work of rigid and perverse ecclesiastics.

To the 20th century, the Enquiry passes in the usual vocabulary, becoming a common word to indicate a certain kind of persecution, hysterical, often collective and always spectacular. The always active literary kind is prolonged in the cartoon, the video games, where it frees from any claim to any historical truth. The Enquiry ceases being present in the daily political discourse. On the other hand, the history of the Enquiry remains a social stake: as a participant in the “ myth founder ”, it contributes to the current self-justification of the movements which were anticlericals with 19th and 20th centuries. This historical kind amalgamates the topics of the speeches anticlericals and romantic of the previous century. It adds to it some more modern keys (an Enquiry with the service of a totalitarian company, a repression sometimes anti-semite) inherited the great debates of the 20th century.

Modern perception of the Enquiry

The superposition of these movements and social stakes thus formatted good number of stereotypes on the Enquiry, which perdurent nowadays: torture, dogmatism, innocent victim, Fanatisme, Antijudaïsme, etc the incursion of the Enquiry into the field of the scientific debate with the lawsuit of Galileo (1633) was at the origin of the reaction of Descartes and its Philosophie mechanist. Confusion between truths of faith and search for a scientific base posed a problem of method which remains current.

But the negative image of the enquiry today is not explained solely by historical combat. It is also due today to a very comprehensible reaction of the modern public, against an institution which seems to have for principal characteristic to attack freedom to think, and moreover, by methods obviously condemned today (the recourse to torture).

The topic of the Enquiry remains delicate to approach. It is the subject nowadays of speech to strong emotional load, which exposes a possible contradictor to attacks imprécatoires. The ground was historically mined by old stakes, which built such or such representation of the Enquiry which served the interests of the time. On the semantic plan, the words of the family “Enquiry”, “inquisitorial”, etc passed in the language running with a very negative connotation, and lidée general somebody who makes undergo a interrogation regulates some without having the moral right of it. It is to say if the image conveyed by the Enquiry is strong today in popular imagination, and is firmly enracinée.

However, if this reaction against torture and for freedom of thought is obviously healthy, it results in making with the enquiry a lawsuit which is likely to be founded on a double mistake: an image historically very deformed not to say caricatural, and modern ethical problems largely anachronistic. The Enquiry is at the same time a historical reality, an extremely alive topic of imaginary modern, and a traditional topic of the speeches in favor of the tolerance. However the historical Enquiry is a thing, the modern representation is another, and there is a certain relationship between the two. To treat today Enquiry objectively thus requires a greatest caution, cold blood, and a critical examination of sources often partisanes.

Chronology of the Enquiry

Repression of the heresy in the Roman Empire

1st century: Paul de Tarse mentions what is the first Christian Excommunication (Tit 3: 10, 1Tim 1: 20) in rupture with the command of setting with died of the Heretics (Dt 13: 6-16, 17: 2-7).
IIème century: Irenee of Lyon writes " Against the hérésies" which is at the same time a handbook of Christian life and informs on principal the " déviances" from this time which does not name yet the heresies, this name that everyone employs without in knowing the exact definition.
287 : The emperor Dioclétien issues the setting with dead heretics Manichéen S, the chiefs will be burned alives. This precedent in the imperial right will justify thereafter that the heretics are burned.
313 : Constantin promulgates the edict of Milan authorizing the Christianity in the Roman empire.
385 : The bishop Priscillien, whose theses are condemned by the Church for heresy, is the first with being “ delivered to the secular arm ” and being carried out. This “murder” causes at the time the scandal and the protest of many bishops.
407 : Against the Donatisme, the Roman law compares the heresy to a crime of lese-majesty. To the same time, Augustin d' Hippone and Jean Chrysostome are opposed for the use of violence in the fight against the heresy.
556 : Execution of Manicheans with Ravenne by the justice of the empire.

Heresies of the year thousand

1000 : Expansion of the heresy Manichean.
1022 : In France, Robert the Piles makes condemn 13 heretics to be burned alives.
1139 : Council of Lateran II. Anathema against the enemies of the Faith . The heretics must be punished.
1148 : Arrangement of Vérone enters the Pope and the Emperor: the heretics must be judged by the church before being given to the secular arm.
1150 to 1200: Strong expansion of the heresy cathare. Repression of the heresy by the collaboration of the civil authority and the bishop of place (Flandres, France, etc). The heretics are burned and their confiscated goods. About thirty heretics are burned in England by Henri II (1166). At that time, Bernard de Clairvaux recalls that the faith should not be imposed. In Cologne and Liege, at the same time, crowd wants to burn imprisoned heretics cathares, against the opinion of the bishop who interposes.
1179 : III {{E}} council of Lateran; anathema against the Cathares. Acceptance of principle of the crusade against the Albigensian, which will be actually launched only 30 years later.
1199 : The pope Innocent III defines the inquisitorial procedure against the Albigensians in the bubble Vergentes in senium .
1200 : About this time: promulgation of laws punishing of dead the heretics by the emperor Frederic II (1220), by Louis VIII in France (1226), by Raymond V of Toulouse (1229), Pierre II of Aragon (1226), etc to rough-hew It becomes the usual sanction against the heretics.
1205 : The pope Innocent III, in its bubble If adversus your , condemns those which come to defense from the heretics, prohibiting to them in fact the help of a lawyer, even of witnesses for the defense. This excessive provision will not remain of use.
1207 : The pope Innocent III makes preach the crusade against the Albigensian. It will end by the Traité of Paris (1229)
1213: The décrétale Licet Heli makes it possible to apply the procedure inquisitoire against the heresies. It will be supplemented by the décrétale Per killed subparagraphs .

Medieval enquiry

1215 : IV {{E}} council of the Lateran, which takes again and puts in order all the relative tendencies at the inquisitorial procedure.
1231 : Constitution Excommunicamus condemning the heresy, excommunicates the heretics, and officializing the ordinances of the temporal power: the life imprisonment for repenting, to rough-hew it for the recalcitrant heretics.
From 1231 : The first inquisiteurs are appointed and missionnés by the Holy See, which makes at the very least unhappy choices. The first of the inquisiteurs Conrad de Marbourg, named in 1231, will be assassinated in 1233. In 1235, Robert the Guy is named inquisitor of France. The Enquiry is entrusted to the Dominicain S, but this foundation takes place after the death of their founder, opposed to any form of action other than preaching and verbal persuasion.
1232 : According to the opinion of its confessor Raymond de Peñafort, Jacques I {{er}} of Aragon request introduction of an Enquiry in Aragon.
April 1233: Bubble Ille humani generis : competence against the heresies is withdrawn with the ecclesiastical courts when a court of Enquiry exists.
1234 : The courts of Enquiry are installed in Toulouse and Carcassonne. They are entrusted to the Dominican ones.
1237 : Raymond VII of Toulouse obtains the suspension of the Enquiry in its States.
1237 : With Carcassonne, particularly muscular repression by Ferrier, called the hammer of the heretics . This nickname will be given later to Torquemada and Antoine de Padoue.
1239 : Out of Champagne, Robert the Guy makes burn 180 people with the Mount-Aime, judged in hardly a week.
1242 : First handbook of the Enquiry, worked out by Raymond de Peñafort.
1242 : Two inquisiteurs, Guillaume Arnaud and Etienne de Saint-Thibéry, are assassinated in Avignonet.
1244 : End of the heresy in Montpellier, the court of the Enquiry is removed there.
1246 : Innocent IV wants to follow closely and intervenes in the operation of the courts of Enquiry, which causes frictions (see medieval Inquisition).
1249 : Without passing by the court of the Enquiry, Raymond VII of Toulouse makes burn eighty heretics his involved, without enabling them to retract.
1250 : The Enquiry ( inquisitio hereticæ pravitatis ) is in place and functions in all Western Europe.
1252 : Pierre de Vérone, which will be called “Pierre Martyr”, is assassinated in Italy. It is later canonized one year.
1252 : Innocent IV promulgates the bubble AD extirpanda authorizing the use of the Question in the investigations of the Enquiry. This authorization is confirmed in 1259 (Alexandre IV) and 1262 (Clément IV), date on which the inquisiteurs are finally authorized to attend the question.
1254 : Innocent IV renews the prohibition made with the civil authorities imprison or burn the heretics without the opinion of the bishop of the place, prohibition often pointed out thereafter.
1255 : Innocent IV prescribes the use of the profit viri .
1255 : The Dominicain S are established in Toulouse.
1261 : The testimony of the heretics and apostates is officially allowed in front of the courts of the Enquiry.
1273 : Thomas d' Aquin in the Summa Theologica considers that the capital punishment can be legitimately employed to ensure the maintenance of law and order, including against the heresies.
1278 : Two hundred cathares are burned in Vérone.
1286 : Complaint of the consul of Carcassonne to king de France on the cruelty of the inquisiteurs of the place.
1301 : Philippe IV Beautiful the takes pretext of excesses of the Enquiry to take again the hand on the operation of these courts.
1306 : Clément V orders an investigation into the operation of the Enquiry in the south of France.
1308 : Bernard GUI is named inquisitor of Toulouse.
1312 : Constitutions Multorum quarreled and Nolentes is promulgated at the time of the council of Vienna, requiring the control of the bishop of the place for all the important acts of the procedure of the Enquiry.
1321 : The last dignitary cathare, Guillaume Bélibaste, are burned in Villerouge-Termenès, by the Enquiry of Carcassonne.
1324 : Jean of Beaune, inquisitor of Carcassonne.
1326 : The archbishop of Cologne brings a lawsuit in Enquiry against the Dominican theologist Jean Eckhart.
1328 : Last heretic flaring in Carcassonne.
1400 : The function of inquisitor becomes gradually an additional or honorary title.
1403 : The Enquiry continues the heresy Vaudois E
1415: Jean Hus is burned for heresy.

15th century and Spanish Enquiry

1478 : Isabelle the Catholic obtains from the pope Sixte IV the bubble creating the Spanish Inquisition. It is installation and starts to function in 1480, the inquisiteurs being named by the sovereigns.
1481 : Organization of the first Car da Fe
1482: In a brief of January 29th, Sixte IV condemns excesses of the Spanish Enquiry.
1483 : Torquemada is named by the pope large inquisitor of Spain. He publishes his code of the inquisitor in 1484. Its rigor causes many protests and the intervention of Sixte IV.
1484 : Innocent VIII promulgates the bubble Summis desiderantes affectibus authorizing the Enquiry to be acted as regards Sorcellerie.
1492 : Decree of expulsion of the Jews of Spain (Decree of Alhambra, remained officially into force until 1967).

16th century, Reform and Rebirth

1512 - 1517: {{Ve}} council of Lateran. The printed books must be subjected to the opinion of the Church (see 1559).
1520 : Organization of the Spanish Enquiry to the Spanish Netherlands.
1523 : First Martyr S of the Reform to the Spanish Netherlands.
1525 : The Spanish Enquiry starts to continue the illuminists and defies mystics. The Spanish mystics will be often worried by the Enquiry: it is the case of Therese d' Avila and Jean of the Crosses, future Doctorss of the Church.
1531 : The Enquiry is established in Portugal by authorization of the pope Clément VII.
1542 : Creation of the the Holy Office in Rome, Court of Appeal for the judgments concerning the heresies and the faith, and court of the causes reserved to the pope. He is at the origin of the Roman Enquiry.
1550 : The reforming theologist Heinrich Bullinger declares in Geneva that the heresy can be punished capital punishment, like the murder or treason.
1559 : Creation of the Index by the the Holy Office of Rome]. The first index Spanish, known as of Valdès, is published a few months later: it incorporates new works, in particular in Romance language: on 670 prohibited works, 170 are in language " vulgaire".
1559 : The Spanish Enquiry brutally destroys the Protestant cores of Spain by a series of Autodafé (1559-1563).
1568 : Beginning of the War Eighty Year old with the Spanish Netherlands.
1600 : The Roman Enquiry condemns Dominican the Giordano Bruno to being burned alive.
1601 : Raymond de Peñafort is canonized.
1605 : In its famous novel, Miguel de Cervantes puts in scene a Don Quichotte continued by the Enquiry (and the Spanish Enquiry does not worry it particularly).
1616 : The ideas of Copernic are condemned by the the Holy Office, Galileo must cease teaching its theses.
1633 : Judgment of the theses of Galileo, who sees himself assigned with residence.

18th century and +, Lights

1717 : Foundation of the Big room of England, beginning of the modern Freemasonry.
1759 : Voltaire denounces excesses of the Enquiry in Candide.
1808 : The king of Spain Joseph Bonaparte abolishes the Enquiry of Spain.
1814 : The Enquiry is restored in Spain by Ferdinand VII.
1815 : Publication of the " Letters with a Russian gentleman on the Enquiry espagnole" by the count Joseph de Maistre.
1817 : Llorente publishes the " History criticizes Enquiry in Espagne" .
1820 : The Spanish Enquiry is removed in fact by the Spanish revolution, but remains registered in the texts.
1823 : To the restoration, Ferdinand VII does not give the Enquiry into force.
1829 : Publication of " History of the Enquiry in France " , which will prove to be a purely whimsical document.
1831 : Victor Hugo publishes " Notre Dame de Paris ".
1834 : The Spanish Enquiry is definitively abolished.
1841 : Jules Michelet publishes " the lawsuit of Templiers " .
1862 : Michelet publishes " the Witch " .
1880 : Dostoïevski presents " large the inquisiteur" in The Brothers Karamazov.
1882 : Victor Hugo publishes " Torquemada " , drama in four acts.
1981 : The cardinal Ratzinger is named with the head of the congregation for the doctrines of the Faith, heiress of the Roman Enquiry, and there gains an image of “large inquisitor” in the press and the progressists mediums.
1992 : Under the presidency of the Ratzinger cardinal, repentance of the Catholic church which recognizes its errors in the business Galileo.
2000 : Under the presidency of the Ratzinger cardinal, repentance official of the Catholic church against excesses of the Enquiry.

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