INQUISITIONS in the CROWN of ARAGON the Origins Of

CHAPTER FIVE

INQUISITIONS IN THE CROWN OF ARAGON

Th e Origins of Inquisition

Th e institution which would, very much later, come to be mytholo- gized as ‘the Inquisition’ was fi rst established in the Iberian Peninsula as a response to the heretics and the Waldensians who had fi rst appeared in the lands of the crown of Aragon in the later twelft h century.1 Already by then, of course, inquisitiones were not uncommon and the desire of rulers and judges, secular and ecclesiastical, to enquire into rights and wrongs was already an increasingly notable feature of government.2 But heresy posed its own special problems and since there had been, in living memory, little by way of manifest heresy, equally there were few guidelines concerning how heretics were to be investigated or what should be their punishment when they had been found culpable. Th e Usatges de Barcelona, which were themselves of little practical use before the 1190s, with their peculiar mix of the requirements of princely power interwoven with the antiquated cus- toms which would give that power legitimacy, concerning heretics only declared that they could in fact confi de in the sincerity of the prince.3 Th at was decidedly out of tune with how heretics were being

1 On inquisitions in Spain, see J. Vincke, Zur Vorgeschichte der Spanischen Inquisi- tion; L. Vones, ‘Krone und Inquisition. Das aragonesische Königtum und die Anfänge der kirchlichen Ketzerverfolgung in den Ländern der Krone Aragón’, in Die Anfänge der Inquisition im Mittelalter, 195–233; Fort i Cogul, Catalunya i la Inquisició; Baraut, ‘Els inicis de la inquisició’, 407–38. 2 On inquisition generally see, H. Maissonneuve, Études sur les origines de l’Inquisition (Paris, 1960); W. Trusen, ‘Von den Anfängen des Inquisitionprozesses zum Verfahren bei der inquisitio haereticae pravitatis’, in Die Anfänge der Inquisition, 39–76; L. Kolmer, Ad capiendas vulpes. Die Ketzerbekämpfung in Südfrankreich in der ersten Hälft e des 13. Jahrhunderts und die Ausbildung des Inquisitionsverfahrens (Bonn, 1982); R. Kieckhefer, ‘Th e Offi ce of Inquisition and Medieval Heresy: eTh Transition from Personal to Institutional Jurisdiction’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 46 (1995), 36–61; E. Peters, Inquisition (Berkeley, 1989); B. Hamilton, Th e Medieval Inquisition (London, 1981); Lea, A History of the Inquisition. Also, most recently, see C. Caldwell Ames, Righteous Persecution. Inquisition, Dominicans and Christianity in the Middle Ages (Phildelphia, 2008). 3 Usatges de Barcelona: El Codi a mitjan segle XII, ed. J. Bastardas (Barcelona, 1984), 96, no. 60; Th e Usatges of Barcelona: the fundamental law-code of Catalonia, ed. 172 chapter five viewed and of no guidance in how to deal with them. Th e legislation of many ecclesiastical councils was equally of little help. In the councils of Lleida both in 1155 and 1174, Cardinal Hyacinth Bobone had con- demned heretics, but he had neither indicated how the heretics should be defi ned nor what should be done with them.4 Sometimes, even towards the end of the twelft h century, there was a vagueness concerning the problem in the minds of some churchmen. In 1191, when Hyacinth, as Celestine III, appointed Berenguer, as archbishop of Narbonne, he did so sure that the half-brother of Alfonso II of Aragon would be the man to uproot heresy from that troubled region.5 But he gave little indication as to what exactly he thought Berenguer was supposed to do in practical terms and there is no indication that as abbot of Montearagón or as bishop of Lleida, Berenguer had ever combated heresy at all or, indeed, had the opportunity to do so. Yet concerning how heresy was to be treated, not everything needed to be quite as nebulous as it might have fi rst appeared, since legislation developing outside the crown lands was increasingly tackling the problem. At the council of Tours in 1163, which had been well-attended by the prelates of the province of Tarragona, Alexander III had legislated for the confi scation of the goods of the heretics.6 If they paid close attention to its constitutions, and particularly to Canon 27, those prelates who attended the Th ird Lateran Council in 1179 (and that was most of the Tarragonan province) would certainly have been given some idea concerning the nature of the problem and how the church was supposed to treat it. Canon 27 specifi ed the heretics with which it was concerned.7 Th ey were of Gascony and the regions of Albi and Toulouse, and were called Cathars, as well as Patarenes or Publicans,

D. Kagay (Philadelphia, 1994), no. 60; A. Kosto, ‘Th e limited impact of the Usatges de Barcelona in Twelft h-Century Catalonia’, Traditio, 56 (2001), 53–88. 4 Les Constitucions de Pau i treva de Catalunya, 53, no. 12, 61, no. 13. On the dating of the council to 1174, see Smith, ‘Th e Iberian legations of Cardinal Hyacinth Bobone’, in Pope Celestine III: Diplomat and Pastor, ed. J. Doran and D. J. Smith (Farnham, 2008), 88, n. 59. 5 Gallia Christiana, vi, 49. On Berenguer, see Smith, Innocent III and the Crown of Aragon, 38–9; E. Graham-Leigh, ‘Hirelings and Shepherds: Archbishop Berenguer of Narbonne (1191–1211) and the ideal bishop’, English Historical Review, 116 (2001), 1083–1102. 6 Mansi, xxi, 1177–8; R. Somerville, Pope Alexander III and the Council of Tours (1163): A Study of Ecclesiastical Politics and Institutions in the Twelft h Century (Berkeley, 1977), 28. 7 Conciliorum Oecumenicorum Decreta, ed. G. Alberigo, G. L. Dossetti, P. Joannou, C. Leonardi, P. Prodo, H. Jedin (Bologna, 1991), 224–5; Mansi, xxii, 231–3.