Editing Inquisition (section)

==Early modern European history==
[[File:Champion des dames Vaudoises.JPG|thumb|220px|Waldensians flying on a broom,  in a manuscript by Martin Le France (1451)]]
With the sharpening of debate and of conflict between the [[Protestant Reformation]] and the Catholic [[Counter-Reformation]], Protestant societies came to see/use the Inquisition as a terrifying "[[Other (philosophy)|other]]",<ref>
Compare {{cite book|last=Haydon|first=Colin|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GR68AAAAIAAJ|title=Anti-Catholicism in eighteenth-century England, c. 1714–80: a political and social study|publisher=Manchester University Press|year=1993|isbn=0-7190-2859-0|series=Studies in imperialism|location=Manchester|page=6|quote=The popular fear of Popery focused on the persecution of heretics by the Catholics. It was generally assumed that, whenever it was in their power, Papists would extirpate heresy by force, seeing it as a religious duty. History seemed to show this all too clearly. [...] The Inquisition had suppressed, and continued to check, religious dissent in Spain. Papists, and most of all, the Pope, delighted in the slaughter of heretics. 'I most firmly believed when I was as boy', [[William Cobbett]] [born 1763], coming originally from rural Surrey, recalled, 'that the Pope was a prodigious woman, dressed in a dreadful robe, which had been made red by being dipped in the blood of Protestants'.|access-date=2010-02-28}}</ref> while staunch Catholics regarded the Holy Office as a necessary bulwark against the spread of reprehensible heresies. Since the beginning of the most serious heretic groups, like the [[Catharism|Cathars]] or the [[Waldensians]], they were soon accused of the most fantastic  behavior, like having wild sexual orgies, eating babies, copulating with demons, worshipping the Devil.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Kors|first=Alan|title=Witchcraft in Europe 400–1700: A Documentary History|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|year=2001|pages=114–116}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Gregorio IX|url=http://archive.org/details/voxinramapapagregorioix|title=Vox In Rama ( Papa Gregorio IX)|date=1232}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Deane|first=Jennifer Kolpacoff|title=A History of Medieval Heresy and Inquisition|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers|year=2011|pages=197–198}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Richards|first=Jeffrey|title=Sex, Dissidence and Damnation: Minority Groups in the Middle Ages|publisher=Barnes & Noble|year=2013|pages=58–62}}</ref>

===Spanish Inquisition===
{{Main|Spanish Inquisition|Tomás de Torquemada}}
[[File:Pedro Berruguete Saint Dominic Presiding over an Auto-da-fe 1495.jpg|thumb|[[Pedro Berruguete]], ''[[Saint Dominic|Saint Dominic Guzmán]] presiding over an Auto da fe'' (c. 1495).<ref name="Prado">[http://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/online-gallery/on-line-gallery/obra/saint-dominic-presides-over-an-auto-da-fe/?no_cache=1 ''Saint Dominic Guzmán presiding over an Auto da fe''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131106021810/http://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/online-gallery/on-line-gallery/obra/saint-dominic-presides-over-an-auto-da-fe/?no_cache=1 |date=2013-11-06 }}, [[Prado Museum]]. Retrieved 2012-08-26</ref> (Portuguese for "Act of Faith").<ref name=secrets>{{Cite web|title=Secrets of the Spanish Inquisition Revealed|url=https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/secrets-of-the-spanish-inquisition-revealed|access-date=2020-10-04|website=Catholic Answers|archive-date=2020-10-26|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201026014147/https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/secrets-of-the-spanish-inquisition-revealed|url-status=live}}</ref>]]

King [[Ferdinand II of Aragon]] and Queen [[Isabella I of Castile]] established the [[Spanish Inquisition]] in 1478 to be overseen by 14 local Tribunals. In contrast to the previous inquisitions, it operated completely under royal Christian authority, though staffed by clergy and orders, and independently of the [[Holy See]]. It operated first in Spain, then in Portugal, and eventually in most Spanish colonies and territories, which included the [[Canary Islands]], the [[Kingdom of Sicily]], and all Spanish possessions in North, Central, and South America.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Aron-Beller |first1=Katherine |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sMZKDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA234 |title=The Roman Inquisition: Centre versus Peripheries |last2=Black |first2=Christopher |date=2018-01-22 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-36108-9 |page=234 |access-date=2021-12-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407051125/https://books.google.com/books?id=sMZKDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA234 |archive-date=2022-04-07 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Zeldes |first=N. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fRYe5dCFq4YC&pg=PA128 |title=The Former Jews of This Kingdom: Sicilian Converts After the Expulsion 1492–1516 |date=2003 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-12898-9 |page=128 |access-date=2021-12-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407051130/https://books.google.com/books?id=fRYe5dCFq4YC&pg=PA128 |archive-date=2022-04-07 |url-status=live}}</ref> It primarily focused upon forced converts from Islam ([[Morisco]]s, ''[[converso]]s'', and "secret Moors") and from [[Judaism]] (''conversos'', [[Crypto-Judaism|Crypto-Jews]], and [[Marrano]]s)—both groups which continued to reside in Spain and who came under suspicion of either continuing to adhere to their old religion or of having fallen back into it.

Under the [[Alhambra Decree]] of 1492, all Jews who had not converted were [[Expulsion of Jews from Spain|expelled from Spain in 1492]]. [[Tomás de Torquemada]] was chosen to be the first [[Grand Inquisitor]], to oversee the Inquisition; and it is estimated that up to 2,000 Jews were burned at the stake during the reign of Queen Isabella.(See [https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/2155-auto-da-fe Jewish Encyclopedia]). 

All [[Forced conversions of Muslims in Spain|Muslims]] were ordered to convert in different stages starting in 1507 and culminating in 1614, when Muslims who had previously converted were now expelled .<ref>''Breve historia de Isabel la Católica.'' Nowtilus, 320 pages.</ref> Those who converted or simply remained after the relevant edict became nominally and legally Catholics, and thus subject to the Inquisition.
====Inquisition in the Spanish overseas empire====
{{see also |Mexican Inquisition|Peruvian Inquisition}}

In 1569, [[King Philip II of Spain]] set up three tribunals in the Americas (each formally titled ''Tribunal del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición''): one in [[Mexican Inquisition|Mexico]], one in [[Cartagena de Indias]] (in modern-day Colombia), and one in [[Peru]]. The Mexican office administered [[Real Audiencia of Mexico|Mexico]] (central and southeastern Mexico), [[Nueva Galicia]] (northern and western Mexico), the [[Audiencia Real|Audiencia]]s of [[Guatemala]] (Guatemala, Chiapas, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica), and the [[Spanish East Indies]]. The [[Peruvian Inquisition]], based in Lima, administered all the Spanish territories in South America and [[Panama]].<ref>{{Cite web|date=2024-02-08|title=Inquisition – Spanish, Roman & Torture|url=https://www.history.com/topics/religion/inquisition|access-date=2024-04-15|website=HISTORY}}</ref>

The Spanish Inquisition was formerly ended by proclamation on [https://www.britannica.com/question/When-did-the-Spanish-Inquisition-end July 15, 1834], by Maria Cristina de Bourbon, then queen regent of Spain, also known as [[Maria  Cristina of Naples and Sicily]]. 

===Portuguese Inquisition===
{{Main|Portuguese Inquisition}}
[[File:1685 - Inquisição Portugal.jpg|thumb|A copper engraving from 1685: "Die Inquisition in Portugall"]]

The Portuguese Inquisition formally started in Portugal in 1536 at the request of King [[João III]]. [[Manuel I of Portugal|Manuel I]] had asked [[Pope Leo X]] for the installation of the Inquisition in 1515, but only after his death in 1521 did [[Pope Paul III]] acquiesce. At its head stood a ''Grande Inquisidor'', or General Inquisitor, named by the Pope but selected by the Crown, and always from within the royal family.{{citation needed|date=October 2012}} Jews who fled Spain and the Spanish Inquisition now found themselves subject to the Inquisition in Portugal. The Portuguese Inquisition principally focused upon the Jews from Spain, [[the Sephardi Jews]], who had fled or whom the state had forced to convert to Christianity. 

The Portuguese Inquisition held its first ''[[auto-da-fé]]'' in 1540. The Portuguese inquisitors mostly focused upon the [[Jew]]ish [[New Christians]] (i.e. ''[[conversos]]'' or ''[[marranos]]''). The Portuguese Inquisition expanded its scope of operations from Portugal to its colonial possessions, including Brazil, [[Cape Verde]], and [[Goa Inquisition|Goa]]. In the colonies, it continued as a religious court, investigating and trying cases of breaches of the tenets of orthodox Catholicism until 1821. King [[John III of Portugal|João III]] (reigned 1521–57) extended the activity of the courts to cover [[censorship]], [[divination]], [[witchcraft]], and [[bigamy]]. Originally oriented for a religious action, the Inquisition exerted an influence over almost every aspect of Portuguese society: political, cultural, and social.

According to [[Henry Charles Lea]], between 1540 and 1794, tribunals in [[Lisbon]], [[Porto]], [[Coimbra]], and [[Évora]] resulted in the burning of 1,175 persons, the burning of another 633 in effigy, and the penancing of 29,590.<ref>[[Henry Charles Lea|H. C. Lea]], ''A History of the Inquisition of Spain'', vol. 3, Book 8</ref> But documentation of 15 out of 689 autos-da-fé has disappeared, so these numbers may slightly understate the activity.<ref>{{cite book|first1=António José|last1=Saraiva|first2=Herman Prins|last2=Salomon|first3=I. S. D.|last3=Sassoon|author-link3=Isaac S.D. Sassoon|title=The Marrano Factory: the Portuguese Inquisition and its New Christians 1536–1765|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eG8xUFivagkC|access-date=2010-04-13|orig-year=First published in Portuguese in 1969|year=2001|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-12080-8|page=102}}</ref>

====Inquisition in the Portuguese overseas empire====

===== Goa Inquisition =====
{{see also |Goa Inquisition}}

The [[Goa Inquisition]] began in 1560 at the order of [[John III of Portugal]]. It had originally been requested in a letter in the 1540s by [[Society of Jesus|Jesuit]] priest [[Francis Xavier]], because of the [[New Christian]]s who had arrived in Goa and then reverted to [[Judaism]]. The Goa Inquisition also focused upon Catholic converts from [[Hinduism]] or [[Islam]] who were thought to have returned to their original ways. In addition, this inquisition prosecuted non-converts who broke prohibitions against the public observance of [[Hindu]] or [[Muslim]] rites or interfered with Portuguese attempts to convert non-Christians to Catholicism.<ref name="Salomon, H. P 2001 pp. 345-7">Salomon, H. P. and Sassoon, I. S. D., in Saraiva, Antonio Jose. ''The Marrano Factory. The Portuguese Inquisition and Its New Christians, 1536–1765'' (Brill, 2001), pgs. 345-7</ref> Aleixo Dias Falcão and Francisco Marques set it up in the palace of the [[Sabaio]] Adil Khan.

===== Brazilian Inquisition =====
The [[Portuguese Inquisition|inquisition]] was active in [[colonial Brazil]]. The religious mystic and formerly enslaved prostitute, [[Rosa Egipcíaca]] was arrested, interrogated and imprisoned, both in the colony and in Lisbon. Egipcíaca was the first black woman in Brazil to write a book – this work detailed her visions and was entitled ''[[Sagrada Teologia do Amor Divino das Almas Peregrinas]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Enslaved: Peoples of the Historical Slave Trade|url=https://enslaved.org/fullStory?kid=16-23-102088|access-date=2021-08-21|website=enslaved.org|archive-date=2021-08-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210821132134/https://enslaved.org/fullStory?kid=16-23-102088|url-status=live}}</ref>''

===Roman Inquisition===
{{Main|Roman Inquisition}}

With the [[Protestant Reformation]], Catholic authorities became much more ready to suspect heresy in any new ideas,<ref>{{cite book|last=Stokes|first=Adrian Durham|author-link=Adrian Stokes (critic)|title=Michelangelo: a study in the nature of art|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_E7epqLi2CwC|access-date=2009-11-26|edition=2|series=Routledge classics|orig-year=1955|year=2002|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0-415-26765-6|page=39|quote=Ludovico is so immediately settled in heaven by the poet that some commentators have divined that Michelangelo is voicing heresy, that is to say, the denial of purgatory.|archive-date=2022-04-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407053105/https://books.google.com/books?id=_E7epqLi2CwC|url-status=live}}</ref> including those of [[Renaissance humanism]],<ref>Erasmus, the arch-Humanist of the Renaissance, came under suspicion of heresy, see
{{cite book|last=Olney|first=Warren|title=Desiderius Erasmus; Paper Read Before the Berkeley Club, March 18, 1920.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EdsdOSs6VRgC|access-date=2009-11-26|year=2009|publisher=BiblioBazaar|isbn=978-1-113-40503-6|page=15|quote=Thomas More, in an elaborate defense of his friend, written to a cleric who accused Erasmus of heresy, seems to admit that Erasmus was probably the author of ''Julius''.|archive-date=2022-04-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220407053111/https://books.google.com/books?id=EdsdOSs6VRgC|url-status=live}}</ref> previously strongly supported by many at the top of the Church hierarchy. The extirpation of heretics became a much broader and more complex enterprise, complicated by the politics of territorial Protestant powers, especially in northern Europe. The Catholic Church could no longer exercise direct influence in the politics and justice-systems of lands that officially adopted Protestantism. Thus war (the [[French Wars of Religion]], the [[Thirty Years' War]]), massacre (the [[St. Bartholomew's Day massacre]]) and the missional<ref>{{cite book|last=Vidmar|first=John C.|author-link=John Vidmar|title=The Catholic Church Through the Ages|year=2005|publisher=Paulist Press|location=New York|isbn=978-0-8091-4234-7|page=241}}</ref> and propaganda work (by the ''[[Sacra congregatio de propaganda fide]]'')<ref>{{cite book|last=Soergel|first=Philip M.|title=Wondrous in His Saints: Counter Reformation Propaganda in Bavaria|year=1993|publisher=University of California Press|location=Berkeley|isbn=0-520-08047-5|page=239}}</ref> of the catholic [[Counter-Reformation]] came to play larger roles in these circumstances, and the [[Roman law]] type of a "judicial" approach to heresy represented by the Inquisition became less important overall. In 1542 [[Pope Paul III]] established the Congregation of the Holy Office of the Inquisition as a permanent congregation staffed with [[Cardinal (Catholic Church)|cardinals]] and other officials. It had the tasks of maintaining and defending the integrity of the faith and of examining and proscribing errors and false doctrines; it thus became the supervisory body of local Inquisitions.<!--pretty much copied from:--><ref>{{Cite web|title=The Galileo Project {{!}} Christianity {{!}} The Inquisition|url=http://galileo.rice.edu/chr/inquisition.html|access-date=2024-04-30|website=galileo.rice.edu}}</ref> A famous case tried by the Roman Inquisition was that of [[Galileo affair|Galileo Galilei in 1633]].

The penances and sentences for those who confessed or were found guilty were pronounced together in a public ceremony at the end of all the processes. This was the ''sermo generalis'' or ''[[auto-da-fé]]''.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Blötzer|first=J.|encyclopedia=The Catholic Encyclopedia|title=Inquisition|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08026a.htm|access-date=2012-08-26|year=1910|publisher=Robert Appleton Company|archive-date=2007-10-26|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071026132112/http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08026a.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> [[Penance]]s (not matters for the civil authorities) might consist of pilgrimages, a public scourging, a fine, or the wearing of a cross. The wearing of two tongues of red or other brightly colored cloth, sewn onto an outer garment in an "X" pattern, marked those who were under investigation. The penalties in serious cases were confiscation of property by the Inquisition or imprisonment. This led to the possibility of false charges to enable confiscation being made against those over a certain income, particularly rich ''[[marranos]]''. Following the [[Papal States#Napoleonic era|French invasion of 1798]], the new authorities sent 3,000 chests containing over 100,000 Inquisition documents to France from Rome.{{citation needed|date=May 2024}}

===In France===
Between 1657 and 1659, twenty-two alleged witches were burned on the orders of the inquisitor Pierre Symard in the province of Franche-Comté, then part of the Empire.<ref>William E. Burns (red.): ''Witch hunts in Europe and America: an encyclopedia'', Greenwood Publishing Group 2003, s. 104.</ref>

The inquisitorial tribunal in papally-ruled Avignon, established in 1541, passed 855 death sentences, almost all of them (818) in the years 1566–1574, but the vast majority of them were pronounced in absentia.<ref>Andrea Del Col: ''Inquisizione in Italia'', p. 434, 780.</ref>

===Witch-hunts===
{{See also|Witch trials in the early modern period}}

The fierce denunciation and persecution of supposed sorceresses that characterized the cruel witchhunts of a later age were not generally found in the first thirteen hundred years of the Christian era.<ref name="Thurston">{{Cite web|title=CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Witchcraft|url=https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15674a.htm|access-date=2024-04-26|website=newadvent.org}}</ref>  While belief in [[witchcraft]], and persecutions directed at or excused by it, were widespread in pre-Christian Europe, and reflected in old [[Germanic law]], the growing influence of the Church in the early medieval era in pagan areas resulted in the revocation of these laws in many places, bringing an end to the traditional witch hunts.<ref>Hutton, Ronald. ''The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles: Their Nature and Legacy''. Oxford, UK and Cambridge, US: Blackwell, 1991. {{ISBN|978-0-631-17288-8}}. p. 257</ref> Throughout the medieval era, mainstream Christian teaching had disputed the existence of witches and denied any power to witchcraft, condemning it as pagan superstition.<ref>Behringer, ''Witches and Witch-hunts: A Global History'', p. 31 (2004). Wiley-Blackwell.</ref> 

Black magic practitioners were generally dealt with through confession, repentance, and charitable work assigned as penance.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Rio|first=Martin Antoine Del|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I2iCYDHYbycC&pg=PR7|title=Investigations Into Magic|date=2000|publisher=Manchester University Press|isbn=978-0-7190-4976-7}}</ref> In 1258, [[Pope Alexander IV]] ruled that inquisitors should limit their involvement to those cases in which there was some clear presumption of heretical belief<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bailey|first=Michael D.|url=https://archive.org/details/battlingdemonswi00bail|title=Battling demons : witchcraft, heresy, and reform in the late Middle Ages.|publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press|year=2010|isbn=978-0271022260|page=[https://archive.org/details/battlingdemonswi00bail/page/n47 35]|oclc=652466611|url-access=limited}}</ref> but slowly this vision changed.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Caputi|first=Jane|title=The Age of Sex Crime|publisher=Bowling Green State University Popular Press|publication-date=1987|page=96}}</ref>

The prosecution of witchcraft generally became more prominent in the late medieval and Renaissance era, perhaps driven partly by the upheavals of the era – the [[Black Death]], the [[Hundred Years War]], and a gradual cooling of the climate that modern scientists call the [[Little Ice Age]] (between about the 15th and 19th centuries). Witches were sometimes blamed.<ref>[[Brian P. Levack|Levack]], ''The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe'', p. 49</ref><ref>Heinrich Institoris, Heinrich; Sprenger, Jakob; Summers, Montague. ''The Malleus maleficarum of Heinrich Kramer and James Sprenger''. Dover Publications; New edition, 1 June 1971; {{ISBN|0-486-22802-9}}</ref> Since the years of most intense witch-hunting largely coincide with the age of the [[Reformation|Protestant Reformation]] and [[Counter-Reformation]], some historians point to the influence of the Reformation on the European witch-hunt. However, witch-hunting began almost one hundred years before [[Martin Luther|Luther]]'s  ninety-five theses.<ref>{{citation|surname1=Brian P. Levack|title=The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe|pages=110, 111|edition=London/New York 2013|language=de|quote=The period during which all of this reforming activity and conflict took place, the age of the Reformation, spanned the years 1520–1650. Since these years include the period when witch-hunting was most intense, some historians have claimed that the Reformation served as the mainspring of the entire European witch-hunt.(...) It would be unwise, however, to attribute the entire European witch-hunt to these religious developments, since witch-hunting began again almost one hundred years before Luther nailed his ninety-five theses to the castle church at Wittenberg."|author1-link=Brian P. Levack}}</ref>