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Black hooded robe on a wooden hanger, chained bound book on a lectern, parchment sealed with a Latin cross, burning torch on faggots and unbalanced scale
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Religions & SpiritualityHard

The Inquisition and Heresies

1231: Gregory IX hands the Inquisition to the Dominicans. 1244: 220 Cathar Parfaits walk to the pyre at Montsegur. 1600: Giordano Bruno burns at Campo de' Fiori. 1633: Galileo recants on his knees.

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The 10 quiz questions

Question 1 : In what year does Gregory IX entrust the medieval Inquisition to the Dominicans?

Possible answers:

  • 1184
  • 1231
  • 1252
  • 1481

Explanation: It was through the bull Excommunicamus of 1231 that Pope Gregory IX organized the centralized Inquisition, entrusted to the Dominicans, an order founded a decade earlier by Saint Dominic. Before that, bishops judged heretics, each one in his own way: the procedure was uneven and considered too soft.

Question 2 : Which fundamental belief do the Cathars hold?

Possible answers:

  • A dualism between a good god and a bad god
  • Total rejection of the Trinity
  • Mystical union with Allah
  • A return to the practices of the early Church

Explanation: The Cathars taught a radical dualism: a good God who created souls, and a bad god (likened to the God of the Old Testament) who created matter and the visible world. The goal was to flee matter by leading an ascetic life. The belief came from the Bulgarian Bogomils and spread all the way to Languedoc.

Question 3 : Which Cathar fortress falls in 1244 after a ten-month siege?

Possible answers:

  • Carcassonne
  • Montsegur
  • Queribus
  • Peyrepertuse

Explanation: The rocky peak of Montsegur sheltered the Cathar elite. After the surrender, 220 "Perfecti" refused to renounce their faith and walked voluntarily towards the pyre set up below, at a spot since called "le Prat dels Cremats" (the meadow of the burned ones). It was the deathblow to Catharism in the South-West.

Question 4 : In what year does Galileo appear before the Roman Inquisition for his defense of heliocentrism?

Possible answers:

  • 1543
  • 1600
  • 1633
  • 1687

Explanation: The trial took place in 1633. Galileo was forced to abjure his Copernican theses on his knees. Legend has it he muttered "Eppur si muove" ("And yet it moves") as he stood up. No contemporary source confirms this quip: it appears only a century later.

Question 5 : Which Italian philosopher is burned alive in Rome in 1600 for his theses on the infinity of the universe?

Possible answers:

  • Giordano Bruno
  • Tommaso Campanella
  • Lucilio Vanini
  • Pico della Mirandola

Explanation: Giordano Bruno defended the idea of an infinite universe filled with countless worlds, plus several extremely unorthodox positions on the divinity of Christ. On February 17, 1600, he was burned alive on the Campo de' Fiori, where his statue still stands today, his gaze fixed on the Vatican.

Question 6 : Which Dominican becomes in 1483 the first Grand Inquisitor of Spain?

Possible answers:

  • Bernard Gui
  • Tomas de Torquemada
  • Diego de Deza
  • Gaspar de Quiroga

Explanation: Confessor to Isabella the Catholic, Tomas de Torquemada centralized the Spanish Inquisition and wrote very precise instructions on procedure (the Instrucciones of 1484). He is credited with between 2,000 and 8,000 death sentences in fifteen years: a huge number for the time, which would lastingly shape the "black legend" of Spain.

Question 7 : Who are called the "marranos" in late fifteenth-century Spain?

Possible answers:

  • Muslims converted to Christianity
  • Christians who turned Protestant
  • Spanish nobles rebelling against the Crown
  • Jews converted to Christianity, often under duress

Explanation: The term refers to Spanish and Portuguese Jews converted to Christianity, often under duress, but suspected of continuing to practice Judaism in secret. Hunting them was the very reason the Spanish Inquisition was created in 1478. The word may come from the Spanish marrano ("pig"), an insult signaling the supposed refusal of pork.

Question 8 : Which Czech preacher is burned at Constance in 1415 despite an imperial safe-conduct?

Possible answers:

  • John Wycliffe
  • Peter Waldo
  • Jan Hus
  • Savonarola

Explanation: Jan Hus, rector of the University of Prague, denounced the corruption of the clergy and the sale of indulgences a century before Luther. Summoned to the Council of Constance with a safe-conduct, he was finally judged a heretic and burned. His death sparked twenty years of Hussite wars in Bohemia, the first European wars of religion.

Question 9 : Which medieval heretical group is born in Lyon at the end of the twelfth century around a merchant who gives away his property?

Possible answers:

  • The Cathars
  • The Bogomils
  • The Lollards
  • The Waldensians

Explanation: Peter Waldo, a wealthy Lyon merchant, gave away his fortune and preached evangelical poverty. His disciples, the Waldensians, translated the Bible into the vernacular, against Catholic practice. Excommunicated in 1184, they would nonetheless survive underground for centuries, and their descendants still exist in Italy.

Question 10 : What does the word "auto-da-fe" actually mean in the Inquisition's vocabulary?

Possible answers:

  • The public ceremony where sentences are proclaimed
  • The pyre where the condemned are burned
  • The torture inflicted on suspects to extract confessions
  • The accusation document sent to the defendant

Explanation: From the Portuguese auto da fe ("act of faith"), it is above all a public ceremony where sentences are read out solemnly, not just the final pyre. The condemned paraded in sambenito, a yellow tunic marked with symbols indicating the punishment. Most autos-da-fe ended with prison sentences or fines, not death.

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