Late 16th century Venice, where a woman can be a nun, a wife or a courtesan. For Veronica Franco, the free spirited girl scorned by because of her lack of wealth, the choice is an obvious one…
Shadow of the Sword (The Headsman)
May 21, 2015 By
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau gives us a sympathetic Headsman in Reformation Austria, in the ‘Shadow of the Sword (The Headsman)’.
How Witches Looked in Medieval Art
December 13, 2014 By
I recently visited the British Museum and enjoyed their Witches and Wicked Bodies exhibit which runs until January 11th, 2015. It displays art depicting witches from the middle ages up to the late nineteenth century. This post looks at a few late medieval interpretations of witches and the artists behind these works.
‘Forget Your People and Your Father’s House’: Teresa de Cartagena and the Converso Identity
December 3, 2014 By
Religion is a very important factor to take into consideration in discussions about the identity of the conversos [converts] or New Christians, an emerging group in 15th-century Castile.
Does a Reformation End?: Rethinking Religious Simulation in Sixteenth-Century Italy
October 21, 2014 By
A paper examining the Italian Reformation.
The Friars Preachers: The First Hundred Years of the Dominican Order
September 7, 2014 By
When Dominic of Caleruega began preaching in southern France in the early 1200s, he would have had no idea of the far reaching influence that the band of men he would attract would leave such a broad and enduring influence on medieval history.
Sodomy and the Knights Templar
January 26, 2014 By
In this article, I will analyze testimony relevant to the charges of the Inquisition that members of the order of Knights Templar throughout Christendom practiced homosexual acts of various sorts from illicit kisses to sodomy.
Between Official and Private Dispute: The Case of Christian Spain and Provence in the Late Middle Ages
January 15, 2014 By
Literary and historical evidence of religious disputes that took place between Jews and Christians during the Middle Ages exists in a varietyof sources.
A Comparison of Interrogation in Two Inquisitorial Courts of the Fourteenth Century
July 27, 2013 By
The spread of the Cathar heresy in Western Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries was perceived as a real challenge to orthodoxy. The Catholic Church soon employed all means possible in a reaction against this dualistic religion, which was especially widespread in the south of France and in central and northern Italy.
‘Cast out into the hellish night’: Pagan Virtue and Pagan Poetics in Lorenzo Valla’s De voluptate
July 19, 2013 By
Valla wrote about Epicureanism before the Renaissance rediscovery of classical Epicurean texts. Poggio Bracciolini had not yet circulated his newly-discovered manuscript of first century Epicurean philosopher Lucretius’ De rerum natura, and Valla wrote without access to Diogenes Laertius’ Lives of the Philosophers, which discussed Epicurus’ teachings in greater detail.
Converso Identities in Late Medieval Spain: Intermediacy and Indeterminacy
May 21, 2013 By
In late medieval Spain, Christian leaders and missionaries developed conversion campaigns to bring Jews into Christianity. Some converts appear to have fully assimilated with their new religion. Those who did not effectively assimilate are known as conversos, members of a group whose beliefs and actions grew increasingly suspect. Historians disagree about conversos. Did conversos want to become Christian despite continued Jewish practices, or were they ‘secret Jews’ who knowingly engaged in the practice of their former religion?
Understanding terrorism and radicalisation: a network approach
February 5, 2013 By
Our most recent work with this model has concentrated on the suppression of a network in the case of the Inquisition and the Cathar heresy in France in the 13th century; and on the spreading of a network in the case of the conversion to Protestantism of England in the mid-16th century.
Memories of Space in Thirteenth-Century France: Displaced People After the Albigensian Crusade
December 11, 2012 By
It is clear that displacement was a policy of the crusade, a measure of its effectiveness, and a highly personal experience for individuals who were forced to flee the crusading army.
Abandoned to Love: The Proceso of María de Cazalla and the Mirror of Simple Souls
December 4, 2012 By
In comparing the trial of María de Cazalla with Marguerite Porete’s Mirror of Simple Souls, one of the most notable works of medieval mysticism, the present study aims to demonstrate how the main components of alumbradismo may be discerned in a single normative example of medieval mystical theology.
Ruthless Oppressors? Unraveling the Myth About the Spanish Inquisition
October 29, 2012 By
From its inception to the present, critics of the Spanish Inquisition has characterized the institution as omnipotent and oppressive and highlighted its role in the expulsion, forced conversion, and execution of supposed heretics.
Waldensians at the turn of the fifteenth century in the Duchy of Austria: Perception of Heresy and Action against Heretics
October 1, 2012 By
The other major field of research that pertains to my current investigation is the inquisition; or the repression of heresy, as Richard Kieckhefer asserts. He notes that there was no such a thing as the Inquisition, because it existed only as mere offices, or functions of carrying out the inquisitorial justice, and did not as an institution as such, not even institutions, as was later the case in the sixteenth century.
Qui facit adulterium, frangit fidem et promissionem suam: Adultery and the Church in Medieval Sweden
August 9, 2012 By
This paper was part of a series on Canon Law and Medieval Marriage.
Martyrs on the Move: The Spread of the Cults of Thomas of Canterbury and Peter of Verona
July 22, 2012 By
No matter how one viewed Peter‟s and Thomas‟s personalities, the glaring fact of their instant and enduring cults forces the conclusion that their contemporaries all over Europe saw in them, and especially in their martyrdoms, desirable and compelling prototypes for Christian perfection. The spread and extent of these cults is the subject of this study.
Retroactive Heresy: The influence of early Christian heresies on the identification and reaction to heretical sects
February 20, 2012 By
The medieval Church viewed itself as Defender of the Faith, the destroyer of the unbelievers, the wrong believers. These heretics were to be reviled and feared as perverters of God’s word. The perverters of orthodoxy were, ultimately, not to be distinguished from one another, but rather known by catchphrases.
The Inquisition featured on a special issue of Hispanic Research Journal
January 4, 2012 By
Hispanic Research Journal has released its February 2012 issue today, with a special issue entitled Negotiating Power in the Iberian Inquisitions: Courts, Crowns, and Creeds. Five articles dealing with the Spanish and Portuguese inquisitions are published in the issue, which will be freely available until mid-February.
Herbal healers and devil dealers: a study of healers and their gendered persecution in the medieval period
September 10, 2011 By
Herbal healers and devil dealers: a study of healers and their gendered persecution in the medieval period McPhee, Meghan Thesis: M.A., (History), California State University, Sacramento (2009) Abstract Long before written record, men and women have known the healing properties of herbs and medicinal arts have been practiced even before the first civilizations emerged. This ancient […]
MUSLIM AND JEWISH “OTHERNESS” IN THE SPANISH NATION-BUILDING PROCESS
August 4, 2011 By
MUSLIM AND JEWISH “OTHERNESS” IN THE SPANISH NATION-BUILDING PROCESS THROUGHOUT THE RECONQUISTA (1212-1614) TÜRKÇELİK, EVRİM M.A. Thesis (Science), Middle East Technical University, August (2003) Abstract In 1492, the Catholic Monarchs Isabel and Ferdinand conquered Granada, the last Muslim Kingdom in Spain, issued the edict of expulsion of Jews and charged Christopher Columbus to find out […]
The Templar Trials: Did the System Work?
July 25, 2011 By
Although the trials in general were held with enormous personal expenditures and by obviously careful observation of procedural rules, the ’system did not really work’; it was undermined by the dynamics of a legal instrument (that is, torture), which in the end was based on the use of violence.
Amor vs. Roma: Cathars and the Birth of the Inquisition
June 16, 2011 By
Amor vs. Roma: Cathars and the Birth of the Inquisition From the CBC Radio series Ideas, this 2-part show examines the rise and fall of the Cathars, medieval Christians who were pacifist, ecstatic, feminist, and contrary to the Catholic Church of thirteenth century France. They were exterminated in a classic crusade and Inquisition, invented to […]
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