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Kicked Out of Heaven

The Untold History
Of The White Race
Cir. 700 1700 Anno Domini

This Book is Dedicated to My Sons

All Pagans & Women both Dead & Alive
All Religions, All Martyrs & The Human Passions
Time, Mysticism & The Ether of Existence

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Intro…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………26

The Church

Chapter 1: History of Early Christianity…………………………………………………………………………………………..………………….36

Chapter 2: The Religious Order………………………………………………………………………………………………….….………..…….....45
Chapter 3: The Holy Sacraments………………………………………………………………………………………………..………………………61
Chapter 4: Beyond Belief………………………………………………………………………….………………………………….…………………...73
Chapter 5: The Holy See………………………………………………………………………….………………………………….……………………..91
Chapter 6: Whose World is This…………………………………..……………………………….…………………………….……………..……126
Chapter 7: The State of Ecstasy……………………………………….…………………………….…………………………….…………..…….156
Chapter 8: Wanted Dead or Alive…………………………………………………………………….…………….…………….………………….174
Chapter 9: Tis’ The Season to be Folly ………………………………………………………………………………………….…………………192
Chapter 10: The Non Believers…………………………………………………………………...…………………………….………………….…259
Chapter 11: The Minority Report…………………………………………………………………………..……………….……………………….273
Chapter 12: “Thou Shalt Not Suffer A Witch to Live”………………………………………………………………………..……………..314
Chapter 13: The Inquisition Torture Chamber………………………………………………………..………………………….……………337

Medieval Art & Artifact

The Art Gallery

1. The Weather ………………………………………………………..………………………………………………………………………..366
2. The Environment…………………………………………………..………………………………………………………………………..374
3. Castles & Gargoyles………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..382
4. Knight Armory…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………399
5. Medical Equipment & The Sickly……………………………………………………………………………………………………..406
6. The Plague………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………414
7. The Monsters………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….417
8. Witches & The Sabbath………………….……………………………………………….………………………………………………449
9. Werewolves……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………447
10. The Undead & Death Masks……………………………………………….…………………………………………………………..451
11. Visions of Hell ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..455
12. Death, Demons & The Devil…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….466
13. The Black Virgins, Mary’s & Madonnas…………………………………………………………………………………………..471
14. The Black Saints………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………513
15. The Arch Angels………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………528
16. The Bejewelled Saints …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….533
17. The Catacomb Church’s………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….536
18. Alchemy, Astrology & Aliens …………………………………………………………………………………………………………..554

Outro…..…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..564

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 List of Illustrations
Cover: Sculpted by Ligier Richier in 1547, a pupil of Michelangelo, in France “Transi de René de Chalon”
Bind: Santa Cecilia in Trastevere - Rome, Italy
1. Fig. 1.). Our Lady of the Good Death (Notre Dame de la Bonne Mort), 12th century, Clermont Ferrand, France,
discovered in 1972 in the mortuary chapel of a bishop. Pg. 1
2. Fig. 2.). Milan Cathedral is the cathedral church of Milan, Italy. Dedicated to St Mary of the Nativity (Santa
Maria Nascente) pg. 34
3. Fig. 3.). Fig. 3.). The Chi Rho pg. 37
4. Fig. 4.). Fig. 4.). Chi Rho 2 pg. 38
5. Fig. 5.).Drawing done by Milo Manara pg. 64
6. Fig. 6.). Eucharistic Miracle of Ludbreg 1411 pg. 66
7. Fig. 7.). Eucharistic Miracle of Siena, Italy 1730 pg. 66
8. Fig. 8.). Eucharistic Miracle of Erding 1417 pg. 66
9. Fig. 9.). Castration Tool. Taken at Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum , Hollywood California and A drawing for
instructions on circumcision. pg. 75
10. Fig. 10.). “Altar of Castration” pg. 75
11. Fig. 11.). 'Berenstat, Cuzzoni and Senesino' c1725. The Italian opera singers Gaetano Berenstadt (c1687 1735),
Francesca Cuzzoni Sandoni (1700 1770) and Francesco Bernardi, known as 'Senesino' (c1686 1758) performing
Handel's opera 'Flavio'. pg. 76
12. Fig. 12.). This is the blood relic of St. Gennaro, the patron saint of Naples, Italy. pg. 81
13. Fig. 13.). The Bizarrely Beautiful World of Relics in Religious History pg. 81
14. Fig. 14.). The Basilica of Santa Maria Assunta in Bagno di Romagna guards the Holy Corporal pg. 84
15. Fig. 15.). Two drops of the precious blood collected by St. Louis, and displayed in a reliquary in the Basilica of
the Precious Blood of Neuvy Saint Sepulchre. pg. 84
16. Fig. 16.). This reliquary contains pieces of heart tissue, organs, and skin of St. Anthony. pg. 84
17. Fig. 17.). This is kept at Basilica of the Holy Blood in Bruges, Belgium. pg. 84
18. Fig. 18.). Reliquary vial of the blood of St Lawrence to be brought to Gozo pg. 85
19. Fig. 19.). Relic of Saint Anthony at Shrine (his skin) pg. 85
20. Fig. 20.). First Class Relic of St. John Paul II pg. 85
21. Fig. 21.). The Holy Tooth of Saint Apollonia Cathedral of Porto, Portugal St Apollonia is the special intercessor
for those with tooth troubles ie; you pray to her and she asks God to stop your tooth hurting. pg. 85
22. Fig. 22.). Reliquary of Thomas Becket. Copper and enamel, 13th century. Museo della Cattedrale di Anagni,
Anagni, Italy pg. 85
23. Fig. 23.). The head of St. John Chrysostom, the Archbishop of Constantinople in the late 4th and early 5th
century pg. 85
24. Fig. 24.). The church of Sant'Agnese in Agone in Rome's Piazza Navona has the head pg. 85
25. Fig. 25.). Heart relic of St Charles in Rome's Church of Saint Ambrose and of Saint Charles Borromeo pg. 85
26. Fig. 26.). The heart of Saint Camillus de Lellis, founder of the Order Of Camilians in the late 16th century pg. 85
27. Fig. 27.). The tissue of the 16th century Italian priest Philip Neri, The Apostle of Rome surrounding his
expanding heart pg. 85
28. Fig. 28.). Reliquary Bust of a Female Saint, 1600s (Vander Kelen Mertens Museum Leuven, Belgium) pg. 86
29. Fig. 29.). Reliquary of the Jaw of St. Anthony, 1349 pg. 86
30. Fig. 30.). Antique Reliquary with A RARE Relic of St Martin...his tooth pg. 86
31. Fig. 31.). The Roman Catholics bows down before a bone of Francis Xavier, and pray. pg. 87
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32. Fig. 32.). “La sacra testa” (the sacred head)—the actual head of Catherine of Siena pg. 87
33. Fig. 33.). A blue eyed skeleton in a box, with the moth region and teeth covered with jewels. pg. 87
34. Fig. 34.). Incorrupt Heart of St John Vianney Visiting the United States Catholic Pilgrimage Sites pg. 88
35. Fig. 35.). Crypt Relic of St. Blaise Late 17th century pg. 88
36. Fig. 36.). Relics of St. Theodore of Tyro (known as St. Theodore of Amasea in the West) pg. 88
37. Fig. 37.). A dismembered holy head stares out from her beautiful reliquary at the St. Dominic Basilica pg. 88
38. Fig. 38.). Medieval Skull of Saint Vitalis of Assisi, Obscure Catholic Saint from the 14C pg. 88
39. Fig. 39.). Around 1450 1500. Origin Church of St. Justus, Flums, Canton of St. Gallen pg. 88
40. Fig. 40.). Reliquary for the Extended Familly Al Farrow pg. 88
41. Fig. 41.). The burnt head of St. Lawrence, displayed at the Vatican pg. 88
42. Fig. 42.). Below is the small reliquary upon the altar in San Antonio de Belen parish. This reliquary contains a
piece of the rib of Antonio. pg. 88
43. Fig. 43.). Venezia San Geremia Saint Lucy relics feet pg. 89
44. Fig. 44.). Basel (BS), Cathedral Treasury, ca. 1450, The National Swiss Museum pg. 89
45. Fig. 45.). Alleged relics of Saint Séverin in Paris. pg. 89
46. Fig. 46.). The Holy Right Hand Of King Saint Stephen pg. 89
47. Fig. 47.). Reliquary hand, Belgium, 1250 pg. 89
48. Fig. 48.). The hand bones of St. John the Baptist Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, Turkey. Skull of John The Baptist II
Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, Turkey pg. 89
49. Fig. 49.). Relic holder of a part of the skulls of St. John the Baptist, pg. 89
50. Fig. 50.). Relic of the heart of saint Clare of Montefalco pg. 89
51. Fig. 51.). The hand of a 16th century Jesuit missionary, St. Francis Xavier (Il Gesu, Rome), His right hand was cut
off the mummified corpse located in Old Goa, India in 1614 and kept in Rome. Shortly after the first exhibition
of the corpse, a Portugese woman bit off one of the Saint's big toes. The toe is now in a silver reliquary in
another cathedral in Goa. One of St. Francis Xavier's (diamond encrusted) fingernails is on display in a nearby
village and his left hand is in Japan. pg. 89
52. Fig. 52.). Bone of Giselle of Bavaria pg. 90
53. Fig. 53.). Feet of St. Gervasius or Protasius, 3rd cent., pg. 90
54. Fig. 54.). Saint Clare's Fingernails And Hair Clippings pg. 90
55. Fig. 55.). Saint Peter's Basilica, Rome. pg. 90
56. Fig. 56.). Reliquary of Saint Andrew, 17th century, tooled silver, St. Andrew’s Cathedral pg. 90
57. Fig. 57.). Reliquary bust of St. Ladislas from Várad cathedral Győr, Cathedral Treasure pg. 90
58. Fig. 58.). Reliquary Head of Saint Eustace, c. 1210. pg. 90
59. Fig. 59.). Facing difficulty in continuing his monastic existence as bishop, St. Martin fled to live in a cabin made
of branches. Head reliquary of Saint Martin, from the second quarter of the 14th centuy. (C) RMN Grand Palais
(musée du Louvre) / Droits réservés pg. 90
60. Fig. 60.). A reliquary for one of St. Ursula's virgin's at at El Escorial palace. pg. 90
61. Fig. 61.). The Sea Monk a large, scaly creature with a fish shaped body and a large fin which wraps around an
animal like a clergyman's cloak. Ulisse Aldrovandi: Monstrorum historia (1642) pg. 100
62. Fig. 62.). According to one legend, the sea bishop, also called bishop fish, was a sea monster that was caught
off the coast of Poland in 1531. The bishop fish in Johann Zahn's 1696 work Specula physico mathematico
historica notabilium ac mirabilium sciendorum. Pg. 100
63. Fig. 63.). Pope Boniface VIIi pg. 104
64. Fig. 64.). St Gemma Blood stained garments from stigmata pg. 110

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65. Fig. 65.). Giacomo Pacchiarotti saint catherine receiving the stigmata 16th century pg. 110
66. Fig. 66.). St Francis receiving the stigmata Master of San Francesco Bardi pg. 110
67. Fig. 67.). Pietro Lorenzetti Stigmata of St Francis (c. 1320), Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi pg. 110
68. Fig. 68.). Illustration from the Nuremberg Chronicle, by Hartmann Schedel (1440-1514), depicting flagellants
whipping themselves in penance. pg. 151
69. Fig. 69.). Wood cut of Bonner punishing a heretic from John Foxe’s book (1563) pg 151
70. Fig. 70.). Curious Punishments of Bygone Days, By Alice Morse Earle. pg. 152
71. Fig. 71.). End Times Church Countdown: the busy busy church hits back pg. 152
72. Fig. 72.). The Original Rosary Beads pg. 153
73. Fig. 73.). Saint Francis and the Wolf Gubbio, Italy pg. 159
74. Fig. 74.). Blessed Margaret of Metola (Castello) Died in 1320 and was found incorrupt in 1558. Her body is on
display under the high altar of the Church of St. Domenico at Citta di Castello , Italy pg. 164
75. Fig. 75.). St. Margaret of Cortona, laywoman, Franciscan penitent pg. 171
76. Fig. 76.). Incorrupt Body of St. Rose of Viterbo pg. 171
77. Fig. 77.). Closeup view of the incorrupt body of Saint Catherine of Genoa pg. 175
78. Fig. 78.). The incorrupt body of St. Rita at Basilica of St Rita in Cascia, Italy pg. 176
79. Fig. 79.). Saint Catherine of Bologna pg. 176
80. Fig. 80.). St Zita Virgin and Miracle Worker 1212-1272 pg. 177
81. Fig. 81.). Blessed Imelda Lambertini (1322 – May 12, 1333) is the patroness of First Holy Communicants. pg.
178
82. Fig. 82.). Saint Vincent de Paul (incorruptible) pg. 179
83. Fig. 83.). The incorrupt body of St. Teresa Margaret pg. 180
84. Fig. 84.). Saint Virginia Centurione: died on December 15, 1651, at the age of 64. pg. 181
85. Fig. 85.). The most celebrated work of art in the Cologne Cathedral is the Sacrophagus of the Magi pg. 183
86. Fig. 86.). Gold, frankincense, and myrrh, of course. It is kept at St. Paul’s Monastery on Mount Athos in Greece.
pg. 183
87. Fig. 87.). Reliquary of the Holy Crib Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore pg. 183
88. Fig. 88.). Reliquaire du chef de Sainte Marie Magdeleine dans la crypte de la basilique de Saint Maximin. pg.
183
89. Fig. 89.). Incorrupt Left Hand of St. Mary Magdalene Reliquary pg. 184
90. Fig. 90.). Reliquary Pendant for the Holy Thorn Treasures of Heaven Culture French (Paris)Date ca. 1340 pg.
184
91. Fig. 91.). This is where Jesus was tied while he was flogged during his passion. It is kept at the Basilica of Saint
Praxedes in Rome, Italy. pg. 184
92. Fig. 92.). This is claimed to be the sign that hung above Jesus on the cross saying that he was “king of the
Jews.” It is kept at the Basilica of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem in Rome, Italy. pg. 184
93. Fig. 93.). This claims to be one of the nails used in the crucifixion of Jesus (look near the top), kept at the
Bamberg Cathedral in Bamberg, Germany. pg. 185
94. Fig. 94.). The fragments in the picture above are in the Imperial Treasury in Vienna, Austria. pg. 185
95. Fig. 95.). Jesus wore this during his passion and crucifixion. This is kept at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris,
France. pg. 185
96. Fig. 96.). This is claimed to be the seamless robe of Christ that the Roman soldiers gambled off during his
crucifixion. It is kept at the Cathedral of Trier in Trier, Germany. pg. 185

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97. Fig. 97.). The Holy Lance (Spear of Destiny), displayed in the Imperial Treasury at the Hofburg Palace in Vienna,
Austria pg. 185
98. Fig. 98.). The 'Sandals of Jesus' displayed in Prüm Abbey in Germany pg. 186
99. Fig. 99.). This chalice is believed to be the one used by Christ at the Last Supper to institute the Eucharist. It is
kept at Valencia Cathedral in Valencia, Spain. pg. 186
100. Fig. 100.). Chrystus Emmanuel (Jesus as a child) bySzymona Uszakowa, 1686 pg. 186
101. Fig. 101.). The Mandylion, Church of Saint Bartholomew of the Armenians, Genoa Holy Face Genoa pg. 186
102. Fig. 102). St Anne and the infant Virgin Mary Chartres Cathedral BAY 121 The North Transept Rose Window
France (c. 1220) · Saint Anne pg. 187
103. Fig. 103.). Reliquary of the skull of John the Baptist pg. 187
104. Fig. 104.). Reliquary of the skull of the Holy Forerunner of the Lord Saint John the Baptist pg. 187
105. Fig. 105.). Circumcision of Christ (detail), by Friedrich Herlin pg. 188
106. Fig. 106). Circumcision of Christ, fresco from the Preobrazhenski Monastery, Bulgaria pg. 188
107. Fig. 107.). UK stamp medieval mummers from folklore pg. 197
108. Fig. 108.). Masquerade ball 14th century. Source National Endowment For The Humanities pg. 197
109. Fig. 109.). Roitschaeggaetae Mask. Loetsch Valley, Wallis Canton, Switzerland. dress in mottled furs
covered in a mixture of soot, blood and manure, and then chase the frightened villagers. The mask is also
called a shrovetide mask. pg. 198
110. Fig. 110.). The Dorset Ooser is the name of a horned mask that has been a part of folklore in the town of
Dorchester, in the county of Dorset in southern England, for several centuries. pg. 198
111. Fig. 111.). Pictures from the Jab Jab ritualistic dance that occurs before The Mardi Gras Carnival pg. 200
112. Fig. 112.). The Lord of Misrule pg. 202
113. Fig. 113.). Battle between Carnival and Lent pg. 205
114. Fig. 114.). Mursi South Ethiopian Tribal woman dressed up for the Donga stick fighting ceremony pg. 221
115. Fig. 115.). A Classical Baphoment image(Arms read SOLVE COAGULA) ( Bottom reads Eliphas Levi Del) pg.
221
116. Fig. 116.). Saint Nicholas, Bishop of Myrrh pg 223
117. Fig. 117.). A picture of Grýla painted by: Þrándur Þórðarsson (to catch your eye) pg. 227
118. Fig. 118.). 3 different Krampus greeting cards pg. 229
119. Fig. 119.). Saint Valentine and the Death Penalty pg. 237
120. Fig. 120.). Feast of St. Valentine February 14, 270 pg. 237
121. Fig. 121.). The Lupercalian Festival in Rome (ca. 1578–1610), drawing by the circle of Adam Elsheimer,
showing the Luperci dressed as dogs and goats, with Cupid and personifications of fertility pg. 240
122. Fig. 122.). St. Patrick Statue and Milagros pg. 248
123. Fig. 123.). Of course, leprechaun legends and sightings aren’t just limited to Ireland’s shores pg. 253
124. Fig. 124.).A facsimile of a Leprechaun pg. 253
125. Fig. 125.). DA Fe Presided Over By Saint Dominic Of Guzmán (1475); Pedro Berruguete (around 1450-1504)
Now in the Museo del Prado, Madrid. Detail Cathars being burned pg. 270
126. Fig. 126.). The Waldensians are a pre Protestant Christian movement founded by Peter Waldo c. 1173. Pg.
276
127. Fig. 127.). Print illustrating the 1655 massacre in La Torre, from Samuel Moreland's History of the
Evangelical Churches of the Valleys of Piemont, published in London in 1658 pg. 278

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128. Fig. 128.). Illustrations depicting Waldensians as witches in Le champion des dames, by Martin Le France,
1451 pg. 278
129. Fig. 129.). A Jew is hung in White Stone / Swabia in 1553 along with two dogs on the feet. The woodcut
comes from the Swiss chronicle of Johann Stumpf pg. 298
130. Fig. 130.). Jews taking the Blood from Christian Children, for their Mystic Rites. From a Pen and Ink
Drawing, illuminated in the Book of the Cabala of Abrham the Jew (Library of the Asenal, Paris). Pg. 298
131. Fig. 131.). Medieval, Anti Semitic stone sculpture "Judensau" (Jew´s Sow) at the church "Ritterstiftskirche
St. Peter" pg. 301
132. Fig. 132.). 1305 stone carving “Judensau” (Jew pig) on the outside Wittenberg City Church pg. 301
133. Fig. 133.). Copperplate engraving in Johann Jacob Schudt's “Jüdische Merckwürdigkeiten” pg. 302
134. Fig. 134.). A Murdered child, a pig, devil and three Jews pg. 302
135. Fig. 135.). The "Blood Libel" (The Damascus Affair) pg. 304
136. Fig. 136.). Simon of Trent blood libel. Illustration in Hartmann Schedel's Weltchronik, 1493 pg. 304
137. Fig. 137.). Spanish Inquisition, Goa Photograph by Granger pg. 323
138. Fig. 138.). Auto da fé in the Plaza Mayor of Madrid Rizi, Francisco 1683 pg. 342
139. Fig. 139.). Torture Chamber of the Inquisition from Moore's Martyrology 1809 pg. 346
140. Fig. 140.). 2 Different Type of Pincers designed for Tongue pulling pg. 349
141. Fig. 141.). 2 Iron Gags pg. 349
142. Fig. 142.). For The Head – Knobby Crown pg. 350
143. Fig. 143.). Inquisition Torture Mask boiling oil was poured through the ear funnels pg. 350
144. Fig. 144.). Máscara de tortura Santísima Trinidad, Santa Inquisición Holy Inquisition. Mask was put on
when red hot. When taken off, it would also take the wearers scalp, skin and eyes with it. Pg. 350
145. Fig. 145.). 2 Pictures of Barrel Rolls. Different castles, different torture exhibits. Pg. 350
146. Fig. 146.). Contemporary illustration of the auto da fé of Valladolid, in which fourteen Protestants were
burned at the stake for their faith, on May 21, 1559 Pg. 351
147. Fig. 147.). Unknown Painting and Location Pg. 351
148. Fig. 148.). A Ladder Rack and Instruction sheet on how to use it. Pg. 352
149. Fig. 149.). 3 Different Popes Pears also known as the Pear of Anguish Pg. 355
150. Fig. 150.). A 3 Different Witches Chairs The Middle Photo is located at the Torture Museum in Siena Pg.
355
151. Fig. 151.). 2 Head Crushers Different Castles/Torture exhibits Pg. 356
152. Fig. 152.). 2 Iron Maidens. Supposedly a myth torture device. I personally don’t think it is real. Torture and
its devices is an Art of simplicity with application but complexity on how it can be utilized. Pg. 356
153. Fig. 153.). 3 Different Judas’s Cradles Different Castles/Torture Exhibits Pg. 357
154. Fig. 154.). 3 Different Types of Spanish Boots. Pg. 357
155. Fig. 155.). Rome, Italy: Criminology Museum Pg. 358
156. Fig. 156.). Gračanica, Manastir Built by King Stefan Uroš II Milutin (r. 1282-1321) in 1310. Frescoes painted
most likely b/n 1318 and 1321. Pg. 358
157. Fig. 157.). Heretic fork and one shown in usage. Pg. 359
158. Fig. 158.). The Heretic catcher. Pg. 359
159. Fig. 159.). Rose Water Sprinkler & Lead Sprinkler with definition. Pg. 360
160. Fig. 160.). Crocodile shears Pg. 360
161. Fig. 161.). The Spanish Horse Pg. 361

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162. Fig. 162.). Jougs located on Church Walls Pg. 361
163. Fig. 163.). Cross Branding Tool Pg. 362
164. Fig. 164.). Branding Irons of the Chruch. Pg. 362
165. Fig. 165.). The Flood, The City of God (BNF Fr. 28, fol. 66v), third quarter of the 15th century pg. 366
166. Fig. 166.). Bibliothèque nationale de France, Français 174, pg. 366
167. Fig. 167.). The Christmas flood of 1717 pg. 366
168. Fig. 168.). 1607 Flood — Burnham Woodcut pg. 367
169. Fig. 169.). The Plague of Hail (f17a) The Rylands Haggadah (mid 14th Century Catalonia) pg. 367
170. Fig. 170.). Behringer offers up a 1486 woodcut of a sorceress conjuring up a hailstorm and Giant hailstones
fell here today en Argentina, these are from 2015 pg. 368
171. Fig. 171.). Medieval image of an earthquake, with ruins and fallen stars, and the dead in holes. British
Library MS Royal 19 B XV f. 11v pg. 368
172. Fig. 172.). The murrain, Hail and locusts pg. 369
173. Fig. 173.). A plague of locusts depicted in a bible produced by Nuremberg based printer/publisher Anton
Koberger in 1483 pg. 369
174. Fig. 174.). In the year A.D. 864, countless locusts with wings and two teeth pg. 369
175. Fig. 175.). In the year 1483 locusts swarmed in Italy pg. 370
176. Fig. 176.). Picture of Locusts swarming in unknown region. The largest swarm of locusts documented is at
20 miles in length and 5 miles in width. At such proportions to have the ability to block out the sun. pg. 370
177. Fig. 177.). Nicolaes de Bruyn’s mystifying engraving from 1594 pg. 371
178. Fig. 178.). 1556 comet and earthquake in Constantinople Cropped pg. 371
179. Fig. 179.). In 1546, in the month of August, the fire from the sky struck a tower in which were more than
four hundred tons of powder, in Mechel in Niederland. And exactly half of the city burned down, which is also
a special sign from God.” Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550 The Book of Miracles pg. 372
180. Fig. 180.). A woodcut of 1544, representing the damaged Basel by the 1356 earthquake pg. 372
181. Fig. 181.). “In A.D. 1362, at the time of Otto, the emperor from Saxony, a stone — wondrous and big — fell
from the sky in heavy wind and rain. And on many people, little blood red crosses appeared and a great eclipse
of the sun appeared.” pg. 373
182. Fig. 182.). The Great Famine and Murrains in England 1315-1322. pg. 373
183. Fig. 183.). Woman selling fish from a barrel, London, c. 1910 pg. 374
184. Fig. 184.). Here is another, shown courtesy of the British Museum pg. 374
185. Fig. 185.). Title The Four Conditions of Society Poverty (vellum) Creator Bourdichon, Jean (1457 1521) pg.
375
186. Fig. 186.). “Mad as a hatter” In 18th 19th century England pg. 375
187. Fig. 187.). Ned Ward, The CoffeeHous Mob, frontispiece to Part IV of Vulgus Britannicus, or the British
Hudibras (London, 1710). Courtesy the British Library. pg. 375
188. Fig. 188.). Tom King's Coffee House by William Hogarth c.1720 pg. 376
189. Fig. 189.). La prostitution élément d une infra société médiévale pg. 376
190. Fig. 190.). Depiction of a 1600s London coffee house with women at the table pg. 376
191. Fig. 191.). The Gloomy Day is an oil on wood painting by Pieter Bruegel in 1565. pg. 377
192. Fig. 192.). Matthias Grünewald Isenheim Altarpiece (reverse side, The Temptation of St Anthony) pg. 377
193. Fig. 193.). Actors of the Commedia dell'Arte Francois Bunel Oil Painting pg. 378
194. Fig. 194.). A French counter that was minted between 1656-1680 pg. 378

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195. Fig. 195.). Brothel token, France (nineteenth century) pg. 379
196. Fig. 196.). French Brothel Token unknown time period possible facsimile pg. 379
197. Fig. 197.). Unknown origin most likely Britain or France. Spaceship like object on one side of the coin. 1648
pg. 380
198. Fig. 198.). Unknown origin similar unidentified flying object in the air 1656 pg. 380
199. Fig. 199.). Boar's Head Coffee House Southwark England, Elizabeth I, 1558 – 1603 pg. 381
200. Fig. 200.). Different prints of Different Reigns of Kings Medieval Life – Paul Lacroix pg. 381
201. Fig. 201.). chateau de chambord france pg. 382
202. Fig. 202.). Bodiam Castle is a 14th century moated castle. It was built in 1385 by Sir Edward Dalyngrigge pg.
382
203. Fig. 203.). Ashford Castle. Co Mayo. Ireland pg. 382
204. Fig. 204.). Josselyn Castle, Brittany, France pg. 383
205. Fig. 205.). England Northumberland Alnwick Castle viewed from Lion bridge. The castle is one of the finest
Medieval castles to be found in England, often referred as the Windsor of the North. It was also a Harry Potter
movie set pg. 383
206. Fig. 206.). Hohenzollern Castle, Germany pg. 383
207. Fig. 207.). Vorselaar Castle, Belgium pg. 383
208. Fig. 208.). Sazova Castle, Eskişehir, Turkey pg. 384
209. Fig. 209.). The Alcázar of Segovia,in the old city of Segovia pg. 384
210. Fig. 210.). Brothel wall carving Nördlingen – a medieval town. pg. 387
211. Fig. 211.). Konrad von Hochstaden at the tower of Cologne City Hall Germany standing atop an autofellatio
performing grotesque. pg. 387
212. Fig. 212.). West Knoyle male sheela na gig pg. 387
213. Fig. 213.). Exhibitionist Corbel Abbey Church of Sainte Radegonde Poitiers, France 13th century pg. 387
214. Fig. 214.). Gargoyle on Walking Bridge, Wiesbaden, Germany pg. 388
215. Fig. 215.). Paris, France, gargoyles on Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, July pg. 388
216. Fig. 216.). San pedro de Cervatos (Cantabria, Spain) Romanic 12th century church (1129), it's specially
famous because of its extensive repertoire of explicit sexual scenes in the... canecillos (pieces under the roof)
pg. 388
217. Fig. 217.). Erotic/rude roof corbel, Collegiate Church of San Pedro de Cervatos, 12th C. Romanesque .. pg.
388
218. Fig. 218.). The Collegiate church of San Pedro de Cervatos is a collegiate church located in Campoo de
Enmedio, Spain. pg. 389
219. Fig. 219.). The Collegiate church of San Pedro de Cervatos is a collegiate church located in Campoo de
Enmedio, Spain. pg. 389
220. Fig. 220.). Unspecified location. Sources online have tried to use this Sheela Na Gig as an excuse to justify
homosexuality. From the part on the person on the left and no cheek bone representation it differs from the
male right. pg. 389
221. Fig. 221.). Greek mythological Tricephalus dog (three headed dog) Cerberus, stone sculpture on Notre
Dame de Paris Cathedral, France. pg. 389
222. Fig. 222.). Devils dragging a sinner to Hell Cathédrale Notre Dame de Noyon, Noyon, France pg. 390
223. Fig. 223.). Unknown Location pg. 390
224. Fig. 224.). Unknown location animal performing some form of sexual act on other animal. pg. 390

10
225. Fig. 225.). Possibly Male Sheela Na Gig pg. 390
226. Fig. 226.). Modern day gargoyle unknown location pg. 390
227. Fig. 227.). Modern day gargoyle unknown location pg. 390
228. Fig. 228.). Modern day gargoyle unknown location pg. 391
229. Fig. 229.). Original Ireland Sheela Na Gig pg. 391
230. Fig. 230.). In Oxford's Ashmolean Museum you will find a pair of rather cumbersome looking shoes, the
result of hundreds of separate pieces of leather being nailed on top of one another. They tell the story of one
John Bigg, the 'Dinton Hermit', who was once the executioner of the King and took to living in a cave for his
remaining forty years pg. 391
231. Fig. 231.). While some gardeners might now throw in a gnome statue among their flowers and
shrubberies, back in the 18th century wealthy estate owners were hiring real... pg. 391
232. Fig. 232). Ludicia Widmann was an executionieress in Nuremberg (mother of J. M. Widmann, born 3 .12.
1645.) pg. 392
233. Fig. 233.). Executioners mask pg. 392
234. Fig. 234.). Executioners axe pg. 392
235. Fig. 235.). A Business card for an undertaker, very interesting shows colloquial language from the time
1745 undertaker's trade card morbid anatomy pg. 392
236. Fig. 236.). Iron Mask, German, 1607 1700. This grotesque mask is believed to have been worn by prisoners
being led to their executions in Nuremburg, Germany, during the 1600s pg. 393
237. Fig. 237.). Schandmaskes: masks of shame pg. 393
238. Fig. 238.). Schandmaske, deutsch, 17./18. Jhdt. Noch im Spätmittelalter wurden Grabschände pg. 393
239. Fig. 239.). An German executioner's mask, 17th century Multiple coloured half mask of hammered sheet
iron, the edge hemmed with strong linen pg. 393
240. Fig. 240.). Possibly an Executioner mask of Either France or Germany pg. 393
241. Fig. 241.) The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft Demonology. Russell Robbins pg 394
242. Fig. 242.). German Executioner Axe Torture Axe 1600 1750 Hache Du Bourreau pg 395
243. Fig. 243). German Executioner's Sword, 2 Half 17 c pg 395
244. Fig. 244.). German Executioner's Sword, Late 17 C pg 395
245. Fig. 245.). Executioners Axe in Rothenburg Criminal and Punishment Museum pg 395
246. Fig. 246.). Pig Head shaped branks pg 395
247. Fig. 247.). Pig Head shaped branks B pg 395
248. Fig. 248.). Early 18th Century Executioner Cloak pg 396
249. Fig. 249.). Executioners cloak Germany pg 396
250. Fig. 250.). Pig Head Shaped Branks C pg 396
251. Fig. 251.). Scolds Bridle in use pg 396
252. Fig. 252.). Mary The Elephant being hung pg 397
253. Fig. 253.). Hand and half sword, ca. 1400–1430 pg 399
254. Fig. 254.). 1500's Italian Cinquedea pg 399
255. Fig. 255.). A very scarce ceremonial dagger, Italy, 19th century pg 399
256. Fig. 256.). An Italian Stiletto 17th Century. pg 399
257. Fig. 257.). Double Barreled Wheellock Pistol Made for Emperor Charles V (reigned 1519–56) Peter Peck
(German, Munich, 1503–1596). pg 399
258. Fig. 258.). Pair of wheellock pistols. Date ca. 1655–65. Culture Dutch, Maastricht. pg 399

11
259. Fig. 259.). Pistolier armé de quatre pistolets, vers 1580, Liliane et Fred Funcken pg 399
260. Fig. 260.). Medieval gun in the military museum at the head of Gold Street, Hradcany Castle. pg 400
261. Fig. 261.). Weapon in the Torture Museum at the Golden Lane pg 400
262. Fig. 262.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor A pg 400
263. Fig. 263.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor B pg 401
264. Fig. 264.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor C pg 401
265. Fig. 265.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor D pg 401
266. Fig. 266.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor E pg 401
267. Fig. 267.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor F pg 402
268. Fig. 268.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor G pg 402
269. Fig. 269.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor H pg 402
270. Fig. 270.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor I pg 402
271. Fig. 271.).1475 – 1500 Paris, France, Musée de l'Armée (Les Invalides), pg 403
272. Fig. 272.). The Armour of Henry, Prince of Wales, 1608 at Windsor Castle England pg 403
273. Fig. 273.). 1480 1490 Ingolstadt, Germany, Bayerisches Armeemuseum, south German pg 403
274. Fig. 274.). 1480 1490 Alemania Siglo XIX pg 403
275. Fig. 275.). Maximilian field armor with visor for ceremony and tournament, south Germany, 1510 1520
Higgins Armory Museum pg 404
276. Fig. 276.). Desiderius Helmschmid, German, documented 1513–1579 Equestrian Armor of Emperor Charles
V, Augsburg, c. 1535–1540 pg 404
277. Fig. 277.). Armour of George Clifford, Third Earl of Cumberland, a gentleman of the court of Queen
Elizabeth I pg 404
278. Fig. 278.). Armour of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II, 1600s. pg 404
279. Fig. 279.). 14th century Armor (Italian) Leather covered with Gold trim. Love that splint armour! pg 405
280. Fig. 280.). Knight of the Mirrors from Man of La Mancha pg 405
281. Fig. 281.). English Knight from the time of the battle of Agincourt, from the Azincourt museum pg 405
282. Fig. 282.). 15th Century German Gothic Armour which armors the armpits with articulated plates instead
of chainmaille or a rondel. pg 405
283. Fig. 283). Shaffron, German, c. 1540 horse helm pg 405
284. Fig. 284.). This is a late medieval urine wheel from 1506. pg 406
285. Fig. 285.). MEDICAL ILLUSTRATION on Pinterest Vintage Medical, Roses and 29 Years Old pg 406
286. Fig. 286.). 18th century medical illustration of hermaphoditism. Paris, 1773. Colored mezzotint. National
Library of Medicine Jacques Fabien Gautier D’Agoty (1717-1785) pg 406
287. Fig. 287.). Journal of Cutaneous and Venereal Diseases, 1884 pg 406
288. Fig. 288.). MD Medical – Instruments – Instruments used for bloodletting. Leeches. pg 407
289. Fig. 289.). A man sitting in chair, arms outstretched, streams of blood pouring out as a nun places leeches
on his body. Images from the History of Medicine (NLM) pg 407
290. Fig. 290.). A bottle for Mumia , which was discussed in Vol. 1 pg 407
291. Fig. 291.). Medical Childbirth Art Painting France 1800 pg 407
292. Fig. 292.). Drawing of Birth taking place, note the birthing chair which was open in the seating are and only
had a cushioned rim for sitting pg 407
293. Fig.293.). A Monkey rejects the old style clyster for his new 'clysopompe', which he fills with opium and
marshmallow pg 408

12
294. Fig.294.). A man and woman use a redeveloped clyster for scatological pg 408
295. Fig. 295.). late eighteenth century Pewter, wood pg 408
296. Fig. 296.). the iron hand of götz von berlichingen 1480 pg 409
297. Fig. 297.). cholreaTwenty three year old Viennese woman, depicted before and after contracting cholera in
the first epidemic in 1831 pg 409
298. Fig. 298.). A physician inspects the growth of cowpox on a milking maid pg 410
299. Fig. 299.). The Cow Pock or the Wonderful Effects of the New Inoculation pg 410
300. Fig. 300.). The Sick Rose: or; Disease and the Art of Medical Illustration: Richard Barnett pg 411
301. Fig. 301.). Englishman John Lambert exhibited his porcupine skin disorder, Ichthyosis hystrix, in Leipzig. pg
411
302. Fig. 302.). Maestro Rolando, Trattato di Chirurgia, Roma Biblioteca Casanatense Ms. 1382 pg 411
303. Fig. 303.). Drainage of tumor Exercitationes Practicae, (Leiden, 1694) Author: DEKKERS, Frederick pg 411
304. Fig. 304.). Thyroid Disease” 1817 illustration by Jean Louis Alibert pg 412
305. Fig. 305.). Eleanor of Castile sucks the poison out of Edward I of England pg 412
306. Fig. 306.). Illustration of a “hairy child” born in France in 1597, with umbilical cord sprouting from the
forehead, from an 1831 edition of Aristotle’s Masterpiece pg 412
307. Fig. 307.). Barbara Urslerin presents one of the earliest and most well documented historical cases of
hypertrichosis pg 412
308. Fig. 308.). In the 16th century, corrective 'squinting hoods' were used in an attempt to realign the gaze of
cross eyed children pg 413
309. Fig. 309.). Of Lice and Men – A Brief History of Head Lice & Treatments pg 413
310. Fig. 310.). The Hospital for Lunatics. Bethlem Hospital, London the incurables being inspected by a member
of the medical staff, with the patients represented by political figures. Drawing by Thomas Rowlandson, 1789
pg 413
311. Fig. 311.). Winged phallus pilgrim badge 1 pg 414.
312. Fig. 312.). Winged phallus pilgrim badge 2 pg 414
313. Fig. 313.). Man riding on phallus with tail and sweater on with more phallues in the cartwheel. pg 414
314. Fig. 314.). Pig playing bagpipe or similar instrument pg 414
315. Fig. 315.). A vagina wearing a hat with a phallus on her staff and rope in other hand pg 414
316. Fig. 316.). Stoned winged phallus pg 414
317. Fig. 317.). Led winged phallus pg 414
318. Fig. 318.). Woman riding a running phallus with tail, 3 bells attached pg 414
319. Fig. 319.). 3 marching phalluses, 2 holding a Queen Vagina on their shoulders pg 414
320. Fig. 320.). Plague doctor, Frontispiece from Jean Jacques Manget, Traité de la peste, 1721 pg 415
321. Fig. 321.). Plague doctor Denmark pg 415
322. Fig. 322.). Museum of artifacts — Plague doctor mask, 16th century Ingolstadt Museum pg 415
323. Fig. 323.). Torture during the plague epidemic at Milan, 1630. pg 415
324. Fig. 324.). 1892 Harper's Weekly hand colored wood engraving titled, "In A Public Dispensary -- Treating
Patients of La Grippe." Drawn by C.S. Reinhart. pg 416
325. Fig. 325.). Boethius’ Rota Fortuna or wheel of fortune casting a shadow over a dog; engraving emblematic
of the black plague, ca. 1650 pg 417
326. Fig. 326.). Plague of Locusts, above an angel blowing a trumpet with the star falling into the pit of hell,
Georg Lemberger, c. 1523. Cipactli López Rodríguez pg 417

13
327. Fig. 327.). Traditional eastern depiction of a dog-headed Saint Christopher: an icon from the Byzantine pg
421
328. Fig. 328.). St. Guinefort The Folk Greyhound dog Saint pg 421
329. Fig. 329.). The Saintly and Savage Cynocephali pg 421
330. Fig. 330.). Dog Headed Cannibals, woodcut from Cartha Marina, 1530 pg 422
331. Fig. 331.). Dog headed men from Livre des merveilles du monde, a 13th century travelogue with stories
told by Marco Polo pg 422
332. Fig. 332.). From: Mundus subterraneus by Athanasius Kircher, 1678 pg 424
333. Fig. 333.). 1444-1445 The adventures of Alexander the Great pg. 425
334. Fig. 334.). 1646 Originally published in A Declaration Now appears in Reading the Medieval in Early
Modern Monster Culture by Serina Patterson in Studies in Philology Despite monsters' lingering effects on
Europeans' nightmare pg. 425
335. Fig. 335.). Augustin De Civitate Dei contra Paganos (c. 1475). The antipodes. Illumination by Maître
François. pg 426
336. Fig. 336.). 1444 - 1445: The adventures of Alexander the Great · Medieval Books Medieval Manuscript
Illuminated pg 426
337. Fig. 337.). Found in a garage in Oxfordshire, England pg 427
338. Fig. 338.). Dragon wounded by a knight (f°23r) «Messire Lancelot du Lac», par Gaultier Moap, France,
1470 [BNF Ms Fr 112(3)] pg 427
339. Fig. 339.). Most likely a fictional Dragon pg 427
340. Fig. 340.). Bibliotheque Nationale De France Francais Detail Of F Lancelot Fighting The Dragons In The Val
Sans pg 428
341. Fig. 341.). St. Margaret and the Dragon Prayer Book of Anne de Bretagne Illuminated by Jean Poyer France,
Tours, ca. 1492–95 The Pierpont Morgan Library, Purchased in 1905 MS M.50 (fol. 20v) pg 428
342. Fig. 342.). Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550 The Book of Miracles pg 428
343. Fig. 343.). Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550 The Book of Miracles pg 429
344. Fig. 344.). The unicorn is a fierce beast that can only be captured by a maiden British Library, Royal MS 12
pg 431
345. Fig. 345.). Yale, from the Aberdeen Bestiary. It was rumored that the yale's horns could twist pg 431
346. Fig. 346.). Yale, paint on vellum from a French manuscript, c.1450, Museum Meermanno pg 431
347. Fig. 347.). Extinction of endangered species Hours, France ca. 1475 1500.BNF, Latin 1173, fol. 41v pg 432
348. Fig. 348.). The basilisk and the weasel Wenceslas Hollar pg 433
349. Fig. 349.). The Cat Piano :: Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments pg. 435
350. Fig. 350.). Illustration of the cat piano from La Nature, Vol. 11 (1883). Pg 436
351. Fig. 351.). A German 16th Century Magician's Mirror, from the collection of the Cuming Museum Pg 436
352. Fig. 352.). Magickal Ritual Sacred Tools: Dancing With Dragons Scrying Mirror. Black Pg 436
353. Fig. 353.). Magickal Ritual Sacred Tools Dancing With Dragons Scrying Mirror Pg 437
354. Fig. 354.). Scrying Mirror in Windsor Museum Pg 437
355. Fig. 355.). Boxing Hares Scrying Mirror Pg 437
356. Fig. 356.). Mandrake Man root Pg 437
357. Fig. 357.). Different styles of pin dolls Pg 437
358. Fig. 358.). This calf’s heart stuck with pins, on display in the National Museum of Scotland, shows evidence
of sympathetic magic practices being carried out in Scotland. Pg 438

14
359. Fig. 359.). Animal testicles pierced with silvers of thorn wood Pg 438
360. Fig. 360.). Artifact's from the Witch Museum. The WitchWitchcraftWitches Pg 438
361. Fig. 361.). Real Witches at Work: Portraits of English Pagans, LIFE Magazine, 1964 Pg 438
362. Fig. 362.). Stoppered and waxed, bottle is said !pg. 438
363. Fig. 363.). Poison Ring pg. 439
364. Fig. 364.). Poison cabinet (most likely a witches) Pg 439
365. Fig. 365.). Poison cabinet (most likely an assassins) Pg 439
366. Fig. 366.). Witch bottles can be used as protection from curses and to drive the evil back to the
perpetrator. Pg 439
367. Fig. 367.). In witchcraft a stang is a wooden staff with a forked top. A stang can have 2 or 3 forks made of
wood, antler, horn or metal. Some stangs incorporate or antlered skull. Pg. 439
368. Fig. 368.). King Solomon before the Djinn by Jacobus de Teramo, 1473 pg. 439
369. Fig. 369.). Witch conjuring demons from a circle. Two other witches flying brooms. Pg. 439
370. Fig. 370.). A Lady accompanied by her familiars making a pact with the devil pg. 440
371. Fig. 371.). A water witch or dowser, redrawn from a sixteenth century woodcut. Pg. 440
372. Fig. 372.). Witch Milking Axe Handle. J. Geiler von Kaisersberg, Die Emeis. Strassburg, Johannes Grienniger,
1517. Pg. 440
373. Fig. 373.). A goat riding witch brings down a storm from the Compendium Maleficarum of Francesco
Maria Guazzo (1628). Pg. 441
374. Fig. 374.). This wood carving from the medieval period shows witches cooking a thunderstorm. It wasn’t
until the publication of Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus Maleficarum or, Hammer of Witches in 1487 pg 441
375. Fig. 375.). A witch and a devil making a nail with which to make a boy lame, woodcut, 1720 pg 441
376. Fig. 376.). Witches at a Sabbath having supper with the Devil and his demons pg . 442
377. Fig. 377.). Satan requesting the trampling on the cross pg . 442
378. Fig. 378.). Witches raising storm at sea. From Olaus Magnus' Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus. 1555
pg . 442
379. Fig. 379.). Behringer offers up a 1486 woodcut of a sorceress conjuring up a hailstorm pg . 442
380. Fig. 380.). John Hammond pamphlet issued 1643. pg . 443
381. Fig. 381.). Engraving of a Witches' Sabbath pg . 443
382. Fig. 382.). Any dancing around in a circle is considered the dance of the devil. Pg 444
383. Fig. 383.). Uit Pierre de Lancre 1613 pg 444
384. Fig. 384.). Witches’ Sabbath, Claude Gillot, 1673 1722 Paris pg 445
385. Fig. 385.). Witches Sabbath, 18th Century Performing The Osculum Infame pg 445
386. Fig. 386.). Bacchanalia Painting by Peter Paul Rubens 446
387. Fig. 387.). Witches' Sabbath, 1821–23. Oil on plaster wall, transferred to canvas; Museo del Prado, Madrid
pg. 446
388. Fig. 388.). Beast of Gévaudan pg. 447
389. Fig. 389.). A werewolf hunting kit most likely false. pg. 447
390. Fig. 390.). The furious beast that is supposed to be a hyena. The text tells of two peasants who were made
into national heroes for fighting the beast—a twelve year old boy who led an attack on the creature on January
12, 1765 pg. 447
391. Fig. 391.). A priest administering last rites to the dying wife on the right while the cursed husband is
standing on the left, a miniature from Topographica Hibernica, c. 1196 1223 pg. 447

15
392. Fig. 392.). De Monstrorum Caussis, Natura, et Differentiis, Libri Duo author Fortunio Liceti published in
1694. pg. 448
393. Fig. 393.). Douglas, Adam. “The class image of the bloodthirsty werewolf.” The Beast Within. London:
Chapmans Publishing Ltd., 1992. Print. pg. 448
394. Fig. 394.). Louis XV meets the king of the Wolves, 1765 pg. 448
395. Fig. 395.). Marie-Jeanne Valet vs. the Beast of Gevaudan pg. 448
396. Fig. 396.). Male and female werewolves being executed in a broadside, Werewolves from Jülich, printed by
Georg Kress, 1591. Broadside of Werewolves from Jülich, Germany. Georg Kress, 1591. pg. 449
397. Fig. 397.). Werewolf, by Lucas Cranach the Elder, c. 1512 Gilles Garnier (1573) pg. 450
398. Fig. 398.). Body snatchers at work, Old Crown Inn, Penicuik pg. 451
399. Fig. 399.). Grave robber gun pg. 451
400. Fig. 400.). Anglesey, Talwrn, Llanffinan, St Finan's Church Victorian grave of Owen and Sarah Thomas of
Rhydyrarian Bach, Gaerwen pg. 451
401. Fig. 401.). Mortsafe in Old Kinnernie pg. 451
402. Fig. 402.). Mortsafes Scotland Kirkyard pg. 451
403. Fig. 403.). Mortsafe,_Greyfriars Kirk pg. 451
404. Fig. 404.). 'Mortsafe', or iron coffin case, 19th century. pg. 452
405. Fig. 405.). Metal Coffin pg. 452
406. Fig. 406). British Mortsafe pg. 452
407. Fig. 407.). Metal coffin pg. 452
408. Fig. 408.). Mortsafe 1 pg. 452
409. Fig. 409.). Mortsafe 2 pg. 452
410. Fig. 410.). Mortsafe 3 pg. 453
411. Fig. 411.). Two men in the process of making a death mask, New York, c. 1908 pg. 453
412. Fig. 412.). (1469-1527) Niccolò Machiavelli (Life Mask) pg. 453
413. Fig. 413.). The earliest European death mask is that of England's King Edward III, who reigned from 1312 to
1377 pg. 454
414. Fig. 414.). Isaac Newton (1642 1727) – cause of death kidney stone aged 84. pg. 454
415. Fig. 415.). Death mask of Saint Francis Borgia pg. 454
416. Fig. 416.). Dante Alighieri 1321 pg. 454
417. Fig. 417.). The Death Mask of Mary Queen Of Scots pg. 454
418. Fig. 418.). Ulysses S Grant (1822 1885) – cause of death throat cancer aged 63 pg. 454
419. Fig. 419.). Martin Luther (1483 1546) – cause of death apoplectic stroke aged 62. pg. 454
420. Fig. 420.). Napoleon Bonaparte (1769 1821) – likely cause of death gastric cancer aged 51. pg. 454
421. Fig. 421.). Death Mask of Nikola Tesla pg. 454
422. Fig. 422.). Ludwig van Beethoven 1770 1827 likely cause of death liver damage from heavy alcohol
consumption aged 56 pg. 455
423. Fig. 423.). Pieter Bruegel The Younger The Triumph of Death pg. 455
424. Fig. 424.). EL INFIERNO Pieter Huys (Amberes, c. 1519 - c. 1584 pg. 456
425. Fig. 425.). Jacobi de Ancharano (alias de Teramo), Litigatio Christi cum Belial, verdeutscht BSB Cgm 48
([S.l.] 1461 pg. 456
426. Fig. 426 Hans Memling Last Judgment pg. 457

16
427. Fig. 427.). Confusion of Tongues The Construction of the Tower of Babel on SOCKS German Late Medieval
(c. 1370s) – Depiction of the construction of the tower. Pg. 458
428. Fig. 428.). Mouth of hell, detail Hours of Catherine of Cleves pg. 458
429. Fig. 429.). Triptych of Temptation of St Anthony by Hieronymus Bosch 1505-06 Oil on panel pg. 458
430. Fig. 430.). BARTOLOMEO DI FRUOSINO Inferno, from the Divine Comedy by Dante (Folio 1v) 1430 35
Manuscript (Ms. it. 74), 365 x 265 mm Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris pg. 459
431. Fig. 431.). FRANCKEN, Frans IIThe Damned Being Cast into Hell Oil on oak cmResidenzgalerie, Salzburg
Bodleian Library, MS. Douce 134, f. 67v (‘Lucifer composite devil with many heads) being judged by Christ in
majesty, while the saints intercede for him Livre de la Vigne nostre Seigneur. France 1450 1470 pg. 460
432. Fig. 432.). Giotto Arena Chapel Le jugement dernier, Giotto di Bondone Augustine, La Cité de Dieu (Vol. I).
Translation from the Latin by Raoul de Presles. Paris c. 1475 (c.) c. 1478 1480 pg. 461
433. Fig. 433.). Jaws of Hell. detail. c.1250 60. English. Bodl Auct.D.4. BL by tony harrison, pg. 461
434. Fig. 434.). Fra Angelico Hell, detail (Triptych The Last Judgment, Winged Altar), circa 1395. pg. 462
435. Fig. 435.). Hell. Herri met de Bles. Interior of the Doge's Palace Venice. Sala dell'Avogaria de Comùnca ~
16th century pg. 462
436. Fig. 436.). A painting of hell by the Limbourg brothers in Les Tres Riches Heures a prayer book of the Duc
de Berry printed in 1416. pg. 463
437. Fig. 437.). Jacob Isaacsz van Swanenburg - The Harrowing of Hell, 16th-17th century pg. 464
438. Fig. 438.). Beware the beast of 10,000 hands. The Gates of Hell and Lucifer in The Visions of the Knight
Tondal, 1475, Simon Marmion. The J. Paul Getty . pg. 464
439. Fig. 439). Hortus deliciarum (Jardín de los deleites en latín) (1167) pg. 464
440. Fig. 440.). The Fall of the Damned by Peter Paul Rubens, about 1620 pg 465
441. Fig. 441.). Jean Colombe Death in art pg. 466
442. Fig. 442.). John Taylor and the devil; pamphlet by Henry Walker, pg. 466
443. Fig. 443.). Book of Hours, use of Rome. 15th century pg. 466
444. Fig. 444.). Young man and death from Book of HoursLife of St Margaret c. 1490 pg. 466
445. Fig. 445.). Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Français 4962, detail of f. The
Order of The Good Death pg. 467
446. Fig. 446.). Death attacking a man, from a Dutch Book of Hours. c. 1480 (Very Rare White Death) pg. 467
447. Fig. 447.). Les trois âges de la vie humaine - Barthélemy l'Anglais, Le Livre des pg. 467
448. Fig. 448.). Devils trying to stop the Harrowing of Hell by shooting at Jesus. Fifteenth century. The Foretress
of Faith Alfonse de Spina. La Forteresse de la foi, traduction française. Bibliothèque municipale de
Valenciennes, ms. 244, fol. 27. pg. 467
449. Fig. 449.).Illustration of the Grim Reaper on horseback, MS 1766. pg. 468
450. Fig. 450.). Belzebub (Beelzebub), Compendium rarissimum totius Artis Magicae..., Wellcome Library,
London, ca. 1775 pg. 468
451. Fig. 451.). Asmodée (Asmodaï) pg. 468
452. Fig. 452.). Stephen Ellcock Fall of the Rebel Angels from Vincent of Beauvais, Le Mirouer historial (French
translation of Speculum historiale), Paris 1463 pg. 468
453. Fig. 453.). The devil carrying off a group of political dignitaries. June 1832 pg. 469
454. Fig. 454.). Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Français 2225, detail of f. 3v.
Louenges à Notre Dame. 15th century pg. 470
455. Fig. 455.). Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 11308, image 27. Psalter mit Kalendarium, c.1235 pg. 470

17
456. Fig. 456.). devil on horseback book of hours, Paris ca. 1420 LA, Getty, Ms pg. 470
457. Fig. 457.). Eucharistic Miracle of Ludbreg 1411 pg. 470
458. Fig. 458.). Oil painting on canvas, Sibylla Aegyptia, Italian School, 18th century. A woman reading a book
and holding a scroll in her left hand. pg. 512
459. Fig. 459.). Johan Boeckhorst Portrait of the Libyan Sibyl, Symbol of the South Wind Netherlands (1630) Oil
on panel Noordelijk Scheepvaartmuseum pg. 512
460. Fig. 460.). Libyan Sybil by Guidoccio Cozzarelli 1482 pg. 512
461. Fig. 461.). Pope Francis and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI kneals in pray together in front of the Black
Madonna pg. 512
462. Fig. 462.). Our Lady of the Gate of Dawn (Lithuanian: Aušros Vartų Dievo Motina, Polish: Matka Boska
Ostrobramska, Belarusian: Маці Божая Вастрабрамская) is the prominent painting of the Blessed Virgin Mary
venerated by the faithful in the Chapel of the Gate of Dawn in Vilnius, Lithuania.Ostrabrama prayer pg. 512
463. Fig. 463.). Pope John Paul II bows Black jesus pg. 513
464. Fig. 464.). Pope John Paul II visited Angola, bends the knee in submission and prays to the Black Jesus pg.
513
465. Fig. 465.). St. Benedict the Moor (1526 1589) pg. 514
466. Fig. 466.). St. Benedict the Moor Catholic Church pg. 514
467. Fig. 467.). Saint Benedetto’s actual body in its glass coffin pg. 515
468. Fig. 468.). Linaioli Tabernacle St John the Evangelist c. 1433 Tempera on panel Museo di San Marco,
Florence pg. 516
469. Fig. 469.). St Nicholas of Zarazsk, Kirillo Belozersky Monastery (16th Century)St Nicholas of Zarazsk, Kirillo
Belozersky Monastery pg 516
470. Fig. 470.). Andrei Rublev ~ Saint John Chrysostom, 1408 pg 516
471. Fig. 471.). St Flour Black Christ pg 516
472. Fig. 472.). Saint Martin de Porres Statue from the Dominican church of Nuestra Señora de Atocha in
Madrid pg 516
473. Fig. 473.). St Peter 17th century pg 516
474. Fig. 474.). Master of the Gereon Altar Marienaltar aus St. GereonGermany (c. 1420 30) pg 517
475. Fig. 475.). Caspar the Black King of Germany (Moorish Man) pg 517
476. Fig. 476.). Saint Angus (Oengus, Aengus) of Keld, Hermit, Abbot, Bishop (died 824) pg 517
477. Fig. 477.). Didn’t believe this could get any darker version of the Gero Cross. 965–970, pg 517
478. Fig. 478.). The Black Christ of Portobelo pg 517
479. Fig. 479.). (ITALY) SaInt Calocerus (AKA Calogero) a 2nd Century Christian martyr. pg 517
480. Fig. 480.). Saint Francis of Assisi An Exorcist of Demons pg 518
481. Fig. 481.). Saint Andrew pg 518
482. Fig. 482.). A Russian icon of St. Vsevolod Of Pskov, Central Russia, 18th century. pg 518
483. Fig. 483.). Real Constantine with St. helen. 27 February c. 272 AD – 22 May 337 AD, also known as
Constantine I or Saint Constantine, Roman Emperor from 306 to 337 AD. pg 518
484. Fig. 484.). Prester John Il prete Ianni, Re d'Ethiopia. Priest John (Prester John) continued for centuries what
still capture the imagination throughout Europe. Until the eighteenth century in Europe you find Heroic
portraits of him pg 519
485. Fig. 485.). St. Basil, from triptych with Christ, St Basil the Great and St Blaise triptych painting icon 19thC
Russia. The Trustees of the British Museum pg 520

18
486. Fig. 486.). The Life of Saint Cyprian of Carthage pg 520
487. Fig. 487.). Grunewald, Matthias (1470c. 1528) 1517 23 Meeting of St. Erasmus and St. Maurice (Alte
Pinakothek, Munich) St Maurice, pictured with St. Elmo, was a black patron saint of the Holy Roman Empire,
who was the Knight Commander of the famous Roman Theban Legion pg 521
488. Fig. 488.). 16th century depiction of a dark skinned King Solomon from Vologda, Russia pg 522
489. Fig. 489.). Coburg Moor - Germany The black nobility of medieval Europe, including Germany. Whites
overthrew the black rulers of Europe around 1848 pg 522
490. Fig. 490.). Georges Lallemand; formerly attributed to Claude Vignon Adoration of the Magi France (1630)
pg 522
491. Fig. 491.). St. Vincent de Paul, patron saint of charities & volunteers . Born, b 1581 d 1660 pg 523
492. Fig. 492.). Деисусный чин Троицкого собора Троице Сергиевой лавры (1425 1427) pg 523
493. Fig. 493.). Saint Angus (Oengus, Aengus) of Keld, Hermit, Abbot, Bishop (died 824) pg 523
494. Fig. 494.). Artist unknown. In the style of Adrei Rublev, 1360 14278 Theophanese the Greek, born 1330s
died 14057 pg 523
495. Fig. 495.). Andre Brustolon Black Warrior Italy (c. 1715) pg 523
496. Fig. 496.). Very Rare image of Henry II (972 1024) King of Italy and Germany also Holy Roman Emperor
during the time of the Ottonian Dynasty. From the Sacramentary of Henry II (1002 1014) pg 523
497. Fig. 497.). Philip II, 21 May 1527 – 13 September 1598 was King of Spain 2nd Philip to Castille, 1st to
Aragon and Fi the fourth to Navarre, from 1556 and of Portugal from 1581 as Philip I. pg 524
498. Fig. 498.). Frederick I Barbarossa(1122 – 10 June 1190) was a German Holy Roman Emperor. He was
elected King of Germany at Frankfurt on 4 March 1152 King of Italy in Pavia in 1155, and finally crowned
Roman Emperor by Pope Adrian IV pg 524
499. Fig. 499.). John VIII, Moorish Emperor of the Byzantine Empire...History not a mystery. pg 524
500. Fig. 500.). 18th century Russian Icon of the Prophet Elijah (Ahlayah) pg 524
501. Fig. 501.). The Festival of San Calogero pg 524
502. Fig. 502.). Seventh ecumenical council Nicea pg. 525
503. Fig. 503.). The council of nicea pg. 526
504. Fig. 504.). Saint Raphael Church @ Calaca, Batangas pg 528
505. Fig. 505.). St. Raphael the Archangel (Tridentine Rite), the Healer of God, Patron of Travellers and
Fishermen. Image featured is the famed San Rafael of Calaca, Batangas. St. Raphael The Archangel, pray for us!
pg 529
506. Fig. 506.). San Rafael Arcangel statua w Kordoba, Hiszpania pg 530
507. Fig. 507.). Arcángel URIEL pg 530
508. Fig. 508.). Archangel Gabriel in Budapest Gyorgy Zala (sculptor) – György Zala plaque in Budapest. pg 530
509. Fig. 509.). The Synaxis of the Archangel Gabriel is celebrated on the day after the Annunciation, and a
second time on July 13. It was instituted in the ninth century, perhaps to celebrate the dedication of a church
at Constantinople. Originally, the Feast was observed on October 16. pg 530
510. Fig. 510.). Archangel Michael, protector of Kiev, Ukraine, Independence Square pg 530
511. Fig. 511.). Archangel Michael, protector of Kiev, Ukraine, Independence Square pg 531
512. Fig. 512.). The Archangel Michael couldn’t find facts on the statue but it appears to stand somewhat
maybe 10 feet tall. pg 532
513. Fig. 513.). The Archangel Azrael (Azrael might be one of the names of the Archangel of Death) pg 532
514. Fig. 514.). Statue of Lucifer Cathédrale Saint Paul Liège pg 532

19
515. Fig. 515.). Relic of St. Deodatus in Rheinau pg 533
516. Fig. 516.). St. Friedrich at the Benedictine abbey in Melk pg 533
517. Fig. 517.). Dr Paul Koudounaris – St. Luciana pg 533
518. Fig. 518.). Dr. Paul Koudounaris – St. Valentine, Hand (Bad Schussenried, Germany) pg. 534
519. Fig. 519.). St Maximus in Bürglen, Switzerland, a patron of the poor pg. 534
520. Fig. 520.). The decorated skeleton of St. Pancratius (Wil, Switzlerand) pg. 534
521. Fig. 521.). St. Justina Gutenzell, Germany martyr from the Roman Catacombs (Katakombenheilige) pg 535
522. Fig. 522.). St. Gratien by Toby De Silva pg 535
523. Fig. 523.). Saint Munditia is as a Christian martyr. Her relics are at St. Peter's Church in Munich pg 535
524. Fig. 524.). Jeweled Skeleton, the bones of St. Clemens, Church of Saints Peter and Paul pg 535
525. Fig. 525.). St. Felix, pictured here, arrived in Sursee, Switzerland, in 1761, pg 536
526. Fig. 526.). Dr Paul Koudounaris – St. Valerius pg 536
527. Fig. 527.). Roman catholic church in Poland pg 539
528. Fig. 528.). The spine-tingling Sedlec Ossuary in the Czech Republic is estimated to hold the remains of
between 40,000 and 70,000 people, many of whom died in the plague in 1318 and during the Hussite Wars in
the 15th century. pg 539
529. Fig. 529.). Ossuary Chapel, Alcantarilha, Portugal. pg 539
530. Fig. 530.). The Sedlec Ossuary is a small Roman Catholic chapel, located beneath the Cemetery Church of
All Saints, part of the former Sedlec Abbey in Sedlec, a suburb of Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic. pg 540
531. Fig. 531.). The Ossuary Chapel of San Martino Della Battaglia in Italy pg. 540
532. Fig. 532.). Schwarzenberg Coat of Arms, In Bones pg. 541
533. Fig. 533.).Brother Silvestro is the oldest monk to be buried in the Capuchin Catacombs. pg. 541
534. Fig. 534.). Bone pillar, Catacombs of Paris pg 541
535. Fig. 535.). San Bernardino alle Ossa is a church in Milan, northern Italy, best known for its ossuary, a small
side chapel decorated with numerous human skulls and bones. In 1210, when an adjacent cemetery ran out of
space, a room was built to hold bones. pg 541
536. Fig. 536.). Capuchin Monks mummified in the Crypt; Brno, Czech Republic pg 542
537. Fig. 537.). The Catacombs of Paris are underground ossuaries in Paris, France, which hold the remains of
more than six million people in a small part of a tunnel network built to consolidate Paris' ancient stone mines.
Pg 542
538. Fig. 538.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) pg 542
539. Fig. 539.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) 1 pg 542
540. Fig. 540.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) 2 pg 542
541. Fig. 541.). The Sedlec Ossuary is a small gothic church in Kutna Hora, Czech Republic pg 543
542. Fig. 542.). Capela dos Ossos, Evora, Portugal pg 543
543. Fig. 543.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo )1 pg 543
544. Fig. 544.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) 2 pg 543
545. Fig. 545.). The Ossuary Chapel of San Martino Della Battaglia in Italy pg 544
546. Fig. 546.). Skulls in Lima Catacombs (Rímac, Peru) pg 545
547. Fig. 547.). Our Lady of the Conception of the Capuchins and Santa Maria della Concezione. Pg. 545
548. Fig. 548.). Convento de SanFrancisco is the Spanish name for Saint Francis Monastery located in Lima, Peru
Pg. 545
549. Fig. 549.). Monk praying in the Catacombs of Rome, 1897 Pg. 545

20
550. Fig. 550.). Our Lady of the Conception of the Capuchins and Santa Maria della Concezione. Pg. 546
551. Fig. 551.).The Chapel of Bones (Capela dos Ossos), Campo Maior, Portugal Pg. 546
552. Fig. 552.). The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo are burial catacombs in Palermo, Sicily, southern Italy,
underneath the Capuchin Monastery. Pg. 546
553. Fig. 553.). The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo are burial catacombs in Palermo, Sicily, southern Italy. Pg.
546
554. Fig. 554.). La Chiesa dei Morti, The Church of the Dead, is located in Urbania in Italy. Inside lies the
Cemetery of the Mummies, which was built in 1833. Pg. 546
555. Fig. 555.). Catacombs of Paris Prayer Room Pg. 546
556. Fig. 556.).paris catacombs underground prayer chamber Pg. 547
557. Fig. 557.). William Tyndale, Protestant reformer and Bible translator. Portrait from Foxe's Book of Martyrs
pg. 548
558. Fig. 558.). martyrdom of st eulalia of mer pg. 549
559. Fig. 559.). Bernat Martorell - Martyrdom of Saint Eulalia pg. 549
560. Fig. 560.). Martyrdom of Saints Cosmas and Damian with their Three Brothers pg. 549
561. Fig. 561.). All Martyrs Da Costa Hours Illuminated by Simon Bening ca. 1515 pg. 549
562. Fig. 562.). Michiel van Coxcie, La tortura di S. Giorgio, 1580 , Cattedrale di S. Rombout, Mechelen pg. 550
563. Fig. 563.). The Execution of St. Catherine, ca.1409, pg. 551
564. Fig. 564.). Stefan Lochner Martyrdom of the Apostles. 1435 pg. 552
565. Fig. 565.). antonio pollaiuolo martyrium des hl. sebastian pg. 552
566. Fig. 566.). the martyrdom of St. Barbara pg. 552
567. Fig. 567.). Master of the Holy Kinship, Cologne The Torture of the Maccabean Brothers before 1517 pg. 553
568. Fig. 568.). Python (from: Alchemical and Rosicrucian Compendium), ca 1760. Artist: German master pg.
554
569. Fig. 569.). Johann Homann map (1730) of the decadent medieval German mythological utopia of
Schlaraffenland pg. 555
570. Fig. 570.). Biserica Manastirii, or Church of the Dominican Monastery, in the town of Sighisoara, Romania.
pg. 556
571. Fig. 571.). 1561 celestial phenomenon over Nuremberg pg. 556
572. Fig. 572.). Astronomical calendar, by Nicholas of Lynn, ca. 1324 Sacred Geometry pg. 556
573. Fig. 573.). Masolino da Panicale Fondazione della chiesa di Santa Maria Maggiore a Roma circa 1428 pg.
556
574. Fig. 574.). Carlo Crivelli 1430 1495 and is called The Annunciation with Saint Emidius 1486 pg. 556
575. Fig. 575.). The Madonna with Saint Giovannino It was painted in the 15th century by Domenico Ghirlandaio
1449 1494 pg. 556
576. Fig. 576.). Barthélémy l’Anglais’ Livre des propriétés des choses, c. 1230 pg. 557
577. Fig. 577.). Augustin De Civitate Dei contra Paganos (c. 1475). Augustin explains the Creation to Epicurus.
pg. 557
578. Fig. 578.). Black Sun (Sol Niger) setting on the outskirts of a city from ‘Splendor Solis’ (The Splendour of the
Sun) a German illuminated alchemical treatise. (1582) pg. 557
579. Fig. 579.). Alchemical and hermetic emblems pg. 557
580. Fig. 580.). Alchemical and hermetic emblems pg. 557
581. Fig. 581.). Adam McLean's Gallery of Astrological, Astronomical and Cosmological images pg. 557

21
582. Fig. 582.). The first recorded Crop Circle of the world dates back to 1678 pg. 558
583. Fig. 583.). Maximized and updated photo of original pg. 558
584. Fig. 584.). Sophia (Gnosticism) pg. 559
585. Fig. 585.). A bloodletting chart from 1493 pg. 559
586. Fig. 586.). 11th 14th century T O Map of the Earth pg. 559
587. Fig. 587.). The Hermaphrodite Heinrich Khunrath pg. 559
588. Fig. 588.). Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, from the Secret Symbols of the Rosicrucians, German
School, 1785 pg. 560
589. Fig. 589.). Tree of Battles Honore Bouvet 1470 pg. 560
590. Fig. 590.).
591. Fig. 591.).

The Black Virgins, Mary’s, & Madonnas

Starts pg 482
1. Fig. 1.).Louise Marie Thérèse, the Black Nun of Moret is rumoured to be the daughter of Maria Teresa of Spain,
wife of Louis XIV of France. Apparently the Queen had an affair with her African attendant, Nabo, pg 482
2. Fig. 2.). Queen Sophia Charlotte was queen consort of the United Kingdom and wife to King George III of
Britain direct descendant of the Sousa family, a black branch of the Portuguese Royal House pg 482
3. Fig. 3.). Empress Menen Queen of Queens of Judah (aethiopia) Beloved Wife of Emperor Haile Selassie I King of
Kings and Lord of Lords of Ethiopia pg 482
4. Fig. 4.).St. Ifigenia Painting A Female Friendly, Fiery Nubian Saint pg 482
5. Fig. 5.). The Black Madonna of Montserrat. Also, the Holy Grail was said to be kept safe at the castle of
Munsalvaesche (mons salvationis) or Montsalvat (Montserrat) pg 483
6. Fig. 6.). Black Madonna Notre Dame du Pilier, Chartres (France). pg 483
7. Fig. 7.). Enthroned Virgin and Child, 1130–40, French; Made in Burgundy; Birch with paint. pg 483
8. Fig. 8.). Black Madonna of Czestochowa, graces the south wall of St. Stanislaus Kostka Catholic Church. pg 483
9. Fig. 9.). Dusseldorf, Germany, Image of Grace of the Black Mother of God of Benrath pg 483
10. Fig. 10.). Depiction of the Virgin Mary in the Gates of Dawn, a holy site drawing pilgrams from all over Europe,
Vilnius, Lithuania pg 483
11. Fig. 11.). Tindari Madonna Bruna: restoration work in the 1990s found a medieval statue with later additions.
Nigra sum sed formosa, meaning "I am black but beautiful" (from the Song of Songs, 1:5), is inscribed round a
newer base. pg 483
12. Fig. 12.). A baroque copy of the statue of Our Lady of Loreto pg 483
13. Fig. 13.). Artist unknown The Black Madonna of Anjony Statue (c. 1400s) pg 483
14. Fig. 14.). The Black Virgin of Meymac, 12thC France French and Italian Virgins were nicknamed 'The Egyptian'
for centuries. pg 483
15. Fig. 15.). Black Madonna Southern France pg 483
16. Fig. 16.). Artist unknown The Black Madonna of Anjony Statue (c. 1400s) pg 483
17. Fig. 17.). Unknown pg 485
18. Fig. 18.). Black Madonnas in Belgium. Legend says that she was brought here by a crusader, though art
historians date her to the end of the 15th century pg 485
19. Fig. 19.). Our Lady of Peñafrancia Venerated in the Bicol Region of the Philippines. pg 485

22
20. Fig. 20.). Black Madonna of Einselden, Switzerland pg 485
21. Fig. 21.).Black Madonna of Guingamp. Original sculpture dates to no later than 17th century. pg 485
22. Fig. 22.).Byzantine Icons Holy Virgin Mary The icon of the Mother of God of Three Hands pg 485
23. Fig. 23.). Spain Unspoilt - Black Madonna pg 486
24. Fig. 24.). Altötting, Germany. Our Dear Lady of Altötting (Unsere liebe Frau von Altötting) pg 486
25. Fig. 25.). Black Madonna of Loreto, Italy pg 486
26. Fig. 26.). Black Virgin of Notre Dame de Beaune FRANCE. Black Madonna pg 486
27. Fig. 27.). Black Madonna, Basilica of Notre Dame de la Daurade in Toulouse. Ceramic altar by Gaston Virebent .
pg 486
28. Fig. 28.). The Original Miraculous Image of Nuestra Señora Virgen de Regla, Patrona de Opon by Don Lemoin pg
486
29. Fig. 29.). Cologne Germany The Black Mother of God St Mary in the Kupfergasse Mother of Mercy 1600 pg 487
30. Fig. 30.). Black Madonna, Women's Island in Lake Chiem (Fraueninsel im Chiemsee), Bavaria, Germany pg 487
31. Fig. 31.).The miraculous Madonna of Tindari, Sicily pg 487
32. Fig. 32.). LADY of AFRICA, Notre Dame d’Afrique pg 487
33. Fig. 33.). Madone noire, Le Puy, France pg 487
34. Fig. 34.). Most Holy Mary Crowned One of the Poor (Maria Santissima L'Incoronata dei Poveri) In her
sanctuary12 km outside of the city, in the region PugliaApulia, at least 11th century if not much older, natural
wood. pg 487
35. Fig. 35.). Our Lady, the original 'Black Madonna', enshrined at the Abbey of Einsiedeln pg 488
36. Fig. 36.). Our Lady of Goshiv. In 1736 the monastery received from its founders the wonder working icon of the
Mother of God. pg 488
37. Fig. 37.). Le Puy Black Madonna As Virgin and Mother she incorporated the two faces of the ancient triple
goddess (Virgin, Matron, Crone) which were least threatening to the church pg 488
38. Fig. 38.). Prague The Black Madonna under the Chain pg 488
39. Fig. 39.). Praga, Stare Miasto, figura Czarnej Madonny pg 488
40. Fig. 40.). Our Lady of Guidance, Manila pg 488
41. Fig. 41.). Sainte Sara la Kali in the South of France, they elaborately dress her on festival day, May 28th. pg 489
42. Fig. 42.). Our Lady of Loreto refers to the Holy House of Loreto, the house in which Mary was born, and where
the Annunciation occurred pg 489
43. Fig. 43.). A Visit to Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage in Antipolo pg 489
44. Fig. 44.). The Black Madonna of Chartres, “Our Lady of the Pillar,” France (1508; commissioned copy of silver
original c. 13th century) pg 489
45. Fig. 45.). The Black Madonna of Oropa In her sanctuary near Biella and the source of the river Oropa, age
uncertain, 132 cm, painted wood. Virtual Babaji Vishwananda Black Madonna Statue pg 489
46. Fig. 46.). The Black Madonna in Barcelona pg 489
47. Fig. 47.). The Black Madonna of Pescasseroli, Italy in the St. Peter and St. Paul Abbey pg 490
48. Fig. 48.). The icon of the Mother of God of Kazan of Chimeevo, Russia. pg 490
49. Fig. 49.). The Black Virgin given in the Chadaraita given by Louis XI pg 490
50. Fig. 50.). The Madonna della Salute 12th century Wood Santa Maria della Salute, Venice pg 490
51. Fig. 51.). The Black Virgin is on display in the Cathedral of Jerez pg 490
52. Fig. 52.). The Black Virgin of Prague pg 490
53. Fig. 53.). Black Madonna in Candelaria pg 491

23
54. Fig. 54.). Puigcerda, Spain, Mother of God of the Sacristy pg 491
55. Fig. 55.). Austria black madonna HEILIGENLEITHENCopy made in Einsiedeln around 1650. pg 491
56. Fig. 56.). A visit to the restored shrine of Our Lady of Caversham pg 491
57. Fig. 57.). La Mesopanditissa (Madonna della Salute Venezia). pg 491
58. Fig. 58.). Jacobi de Ancharano (alias de Teramo), Litigatio Christi cum Belial, verdeutscht BSB Cgm 48 ([S.l.]
1461) pg 491
59. Fig. 59.). Vierge noire Cathédrale de Moulins Par Sergey Prokopenko pg 492
60. Fig. 60.). Vassiviere, Our lady of Vassiviere pg 492
61. Fig. 61.). Toute Sainte Koukouzelisa Saint Monastère de la Grande Lavra pg 492
62. Fig. 62.). THURET FRANCE (Auvergne, Puy de Dôme) The Virgin Warrior of the Crusades. In the 13th century
the seventh Crusade was preached in the Sanctuary of the Black Virgin of Le Puy en Velay in the presence of
the King Louis IX pg 492
63. Fig. 63.). Our Lady of Good Deliverance, Neuilly near Paris, 14th C. variation on 11th C. original pg 492
64. Fig. 64.). The Black Virgin of Meymac, 12thC France pg 492
65. Fig. 65.). The Black Virgin of Saint Victor, Marseille pg 493
66. Fig. 66.). The Black Madonna, Our Lady of Dublin In the church of the Carmelite order pg 493
67. Fig. 67.). The Black Madonna statue and church of Notre Dame de Marsat pg 493
68. Fig. 68.). Sant Llorenc de Morunys Mare de Deu dels Colls Mother of God of the Mountain Pass pg 493
69. Fig. 69.). San Zeno, placed inside the basilica di San Zeno, Verona, Italy pg 493
70. Fig. 70.). Romanesque Madonna of Chastreix, Puy de Dome, France Photo Francis Debaisieux pg 493
71. Fig. 71.). Pena de Francia La Virgen Morena (the dark skinned Virgin), La Morenita, pg 494
72. Fig. 72.). Our Lady of the Rosary and the Rule (Bacolod, Negros Occidental) pg 494
73. Fig. 73.). Our Lady of Tindari, Italy, the Ethiopian, about 7th century pg 494
74. Fig. 74.). A RUSSIAN ICON OF THE MOTHER OF GOD OF TENDER EMOTION (UMILENIE), CIRCA pg 494
75. Fig. 75.). Our Lady of Mariazell pg 494
76. Fig. 76.). Our Lady of Nuria, Queen of the Pyrenees, Spain, 12th century pg 494
77. Fig. 77.). Our Dear Lady of Regula (Onze Lieve Vrouw van Regula) Brugge In the Church pg 495
78. Fig. 78.). Our Lady of Candelaria pg 495
79. Fig. 79.). La Madonna del Soccorso di SAN SEVERO Puglia pg 495
80. Fig. 80.). Notre Dame de Liesse à la basilique de Saint Quentin dans l'Aisne pg 495
81. Fig. 81.). Notre Dame de Belloc, Église Saint Jean de Dorres, Dorres (Pyrénées Orientales) Photo by Dennis
Aubrey pg 495
82. Fig. 82.). Monte Civita Italy The Black Madonna Most Holy Mary of Civita Most holy Mary della civita pg 495
83. Fig. 83.). May 15th Ireland Our Lady of Loreto pg 496
84. Fig. 84.). Madonna del Sacro Monte di Viggiano Monte viggiano, Italy, The Black Madonna of the Sacred Mount
Viggiano pg 496
85. Fig. 85.). La Vierge Noire de l'église de Saint Gervazy pg 496
86. Fig. 86.). Lord,BlackMadonna, Sanctuary of Lord del hort Mother of God of Lord 970 pg 496
87. Fig. 87.). Devotion to Lady of Piat pg 496
88. Fig. 88.). Black Madon Icon, church of Guadalupe, Spain. legend, carved during 1st century pg 496
89. Fig. 89.). Klagenfurt Kapuzinerkirche Schwarze Madonna pg 497
90. Fig. 90.). in the Chapel of the Black Virgin inside the Cathedral Our Lady of the Annunciation (Notre Dame de
l'Annontiation) , 11th century, pg 497

24
91. Fig. 91.). In church of Molompize, N D de Molompize, 15 C, Virgin of wood, naked Child covered in stucco and
painted black, pg 497
92. Fig. 92.). Halle Madonna pg 497
93. Fig. 93.). Finestret, France, The Black Madonna pg 497
94. Fig. 94.). Virgin and the Child (Limoges, about 1250) pg 497
95. Fig. 95.). Black Christ Child with Black Ethiopian Madonna pg 498
96. Fig. 96.). Black Virgin of the Recollects, Mother of Mercy, Belgium pg 498
97. Fig. 97.). Black Virgin of Città di Castello (Italy) In the crypt of the Cathedral pg 498
98. Fig. 98.). Black Madonna, Our Dear Lady in Kötschach pg 498
99. Fig. 99.). Black Madonna of Vassivière (63 Puy de Dôme) pg 498
100. Fig. 100.). Black Madonna of St. Meinrad Archabbey pg 498
101. Fig. 101.). Black Madonna painted in the late nineteenth century by an unknown artist. pg 499
102. Fig. 102.). Unknown pg 499
103. Fig. 103.). A statue of Our Lady of Einsiedeln in a mandorla in the church of the Dominican pg 499
104. Fig. 104.). Madonna and Child St. Pierre de Chaillot Paris pg 499
105. Fig. 105.). our lady of the abandoned ones pg 499
106. Fig. 106.). Saint Romain d’Ay, la vierge noire pg 499
107. Fig. 107.). The Holy Icon of Panagia Tricherousa – Holy Monastery of Hilandariou Mount Athos. pg 500
108. Fig. 108.). Our Lady of Deliverance (Senegal) pg 500
109. Fig. 109.). Thuir, France, The Virgin of the Victory pg 500
110. Fig. 110.). Marija Bistrica pg 500
111. Fig. 111.). Vierge noire de Graville (Le Havre) The Black Madonna Statue pg 500
112. Fig. 112.). Image of the Virgin of Candelaria, in the Basilica of Candelaria (Tenerife). pg 500
113. Fig. 113.). One of three of Turkey's surviving icons of the Theotokos on the island of Heybeliada at the
Theological School of Halki pg 501
114. Fig. 114.). Nossa Senhora Aparecida pg 501
115. Fig. 115.). A baroque Loreto Madonna in the parish church of Gutau in Austria. pg 501
116. Fig. 116.). Aurillac France Our Lady of the Snows pg 501
117. Fig. 117.). Austria Vienna Black Madonna pg 501
118. Fig. 118.). Black Madonna Notre Dame de Confession, Marseille (France). pg 501
119. Fig. 119.). Basilica del Pilar, Basilica-Cathedral of Our Lady of the Pillar, Zaragoza, Black Madonna pg 502
120. Fig. 120.). The Black Madonna without Vestments and Crown in Pescasseroli, Italy pg 502
121. Fig. 121.). Virgen de Regla, patrona de Chipiona
122. Fig. 122.). Madonna della Tempesta, Santuario,Tolentino (MC) pg 502
123. Fig. 123.). magen de la Virgen de Atocha en su nicho, Venezuela pg 502
124. Fig. 124.). Notre Dame du Palais, Toulouse A Black Virgin pg 502
125. Fig. 125.).Toledo, Spain Taken by my sister pg 503
126. Fig. 126.).Toledo, Spain Taken by my sister pg 503
127. Fig. 127.).Toledo, Spain Taken by my sister pg 503
128. Fig. 128.). Statue of Liberty pg 506
129. Fig. 129.). Miniature of the Queen of Sheba from a manuscript of the Bellifortis by Konrad Kyeser, early
15th century. Göttingen Niedersächsische Staats und Universitätsbibliothek pg 506

25
 Intro
Welcome to Volume 3. I’m glad you’ve made it thus far. As many people couldn’t. I know it may be very
difficult for one to wrap their mind around these events with our modern understanding. In essence, all of what
you have read and will read in this volume is a quickened psychological build of Caucasian culture based off of an
in depth understanding of the Medeival times. In the beginning of this volume we will be going through the
organization of the church and how it got that way. This will be provided via bullet list. The list will note the
events that shaped the church, starting in the year c.34 A.D. The majority of the information for the first 2 chapters
is Wikipedia. Some scholars may have a problem with this. This in essence is the problem with the academia of
this planet. All information relative to a subject needs to be considered and reviewed. The internet is a
phenomenal resource for information. Intellectual discernment is used to decipher authenticity from the hoaxes
when relying on unknown sources. Utilizing a keen skill in comparison and contrasting, 3-5 unconnected sources
that state the same thing pertaining to a subject or story gives validity to accept said documentation as fact.
In this volume the time periods had to be adjusted a tad bit. The catholic church and its origins begin truly
at around 300-400 a.d. The further back you go in religious history the more extravagant it gets. Theology walks a
very thin line between the supernatural and reality to enforce the mind to fall into a space of “belief”. If this is the
case then believing by definition is the practice of a person making themself accept something that is not or is not
exact, as truth and reality. The activity of one committing this trauma upon them self could definitely be
categorized as unhealthy and dangerous. The mind would have to tell the eyeballs to not recognize or act upon
what it is seeing, ears for hearing so on and so forth. There is some distortion of the senses or a disconnect of
information being processed correctly. Basically, the nerve synapses of the brain arent functioning correctly. This
is one way belief is defined. To stretch the definition of belief even further I’d like to look at its functioning in a
community. In order to do this properly, we need to understand that belief is either an already preset faculty of
the mind embedded into the human think structure or it is a self-inflicted trauma/tear in the mind. With this being
stated we need to understand what the mind is.
The mind is the primordial darkness that connects humans to outer space, understanding that outer space
is both unknown and uncontrollable. The mind holds all the base thinking patterns for the functioning of humans.
These thinking patterns are the base perceptions of this planets realities, inclusive with physical/psyche maturity
development, the possibility of the invisible forces that can control men by good or evil and entities of what we
claim to be “odd” shapes that are of a different species (plants, animals, aliens, trolls, etc.,). The mind is the
doorway that cannot be closed, in which all things good and bad will enter through in unknown forms, sizes and
also spontaneously. The mind is where our Art comes from, where everything that you see, touch, and smell
comes from.
I had to be long winded to bring the next point which is the mind has no one specific owner. To be literal
what I’m referring to is Unconscious Suggestion. You may have your own mind individually, but your mind is based
off of a language that describes/defines everything in your knowledge of your existence. The mind is also based off
of the experiences of your parents and the blood lineage before them. Language is the basis of a culture that
allows one to be understood and connected to those you communicate with. If a person submits to and accepts
lies because he is enforced by the elders of his culture to do so, it will be extremely traumatic on his person if he
does not because of potential social exile. This also depends on the philosophical diversity provided by said
culture. In which diversity is depended upon population numbers. Hence, a civilization has far greater opportunity,
mental expansion and diversity, then say a tribe. This is true even when a tribe has a large population. The bottom
line difference between a tribe and civilization would be industry as there are many other factors. The person will

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submit and succumb to the force of his elders. This is what has happened to us all. Centuries of souls, screams,
deaths which maximized a fear that is encoded into words and phrases which triggers the right amount of deep
rooted fear in a person that’s needed to join a group with as less questioning and investigation of the group, as
possible. In conclusion, submission to lies is another form/level of unifying the connection between all of a culture
and region.
The lies that they enforce themselves to believe is the glue that keeps them connected. Therefore, as they
protect each other they must also protect and defend the lies. When lies are discovered, hatred will either be
destroyed and/or newly created. Therefore the lies must be supported and put into a position of being
uncontested. Because of time, the position these lies get put into is a status of null and void, hidden in plain sight.
Nobody remembers the lies, they die in time but the damage stays implanted into the culture and carried down
generationally. Whatever individual brain wiring occurred from the embedded trauma and lies will also pass
down, if said schema is accepted, especially if similar experiences occur. Stories change, legends merge and new
events happen. This is one level to the complexity of all religions. All religions aren’t necessarily based off of lies,
they are all symbolic for psychological development in how this dimension and several others operate.
I had to explain the mind and how belief works for you to be able to walk through this book with a fine eye
of discernment. In Chapter 3 we will discuss the Holy Sacraments. The word Sacrament is a combination of 2
words that is sacred and mystery. Sacrament is also the root word for the capitol city Sacramento, California. The
transubstantiation and the the eucharist (in American Christianity this is called communion) will be first. Then we
will go over the 7 sacraments of the church in which the Eucharist is one of them. The 7 sacraments are divided
into healing and servitude. That’s 2 sacraments for the healing and 5 sacraments for the servitude.
Then we have to start scratching our heads with Chapter 4. Nothing on this planet is divine and to impose
that you are divine, also reinforces the possibility that your shit stacks sky high, giving the reason on why you
impose divinity. Ancient Gods & Goddesses never imposed themselves as perfect. They represented what they
were made to represent, but they did demand prayer, tithings, sacrifice, ceremonial observance, etc.,. The
religious mania is the opening section. There was much odd activity that is a direct sign of the psychosis that
religious fantasies can put in the mind. Ive witnessed this activity as a child in churches. A scene where grown
adults lose all mental functioning in some form of delirium that causes a full body collapse to the ground or other
seemingly uncontrollable body movements such as running around franticly or jumping up and down. During the
course of my life, I’ve never seen children partake in this type of activity but only to get scared of the state that
their parents are in. This type of activity obviously comes from some form of alteration of the soul or mind. When
they come to, they act as if they do not know what just occurred, but all mental faculties are replaced. This type of
activity comes from the Medieval times and is not to be confused with the St. Vitus’s Dancing Mania.
The castrati is a very interesting subject. The Boy Choirs of today or the usher boy definitely comes from
this scenario. The practice of castrating boys for the means of a specific tenor in the choir was at mania
proportions for once again 350-450 years. After this we must discuss a more peculiar area of the church, which are
the relics. The relics are basically body parts of saints. This is everything from head to toe, literally. There are
even hair and fingernail relics that sit in gold cases and are to be taken very seriously. Supposedly, great miracles
occur when praying to these relics. The facts of the relics will be discussed. Because it is definitely a mystery.
Next we visit the rulers of the church. A few Popes will be discussed and the oddities/miracles committed
by them and other significant areas that altered the church. If I was to do a thorough draft on the Popes and their
influences on our modern day system, Id have to write another 3 volume series. So to shorten it I only gave a few
examples. I took the same approach with the bishops. There is a fish bishop, supposedly. The bishop of the sea
has the responsibility of spreading the word of the divine to the world of the aquatic. The bishops are rarely seen,

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as the pope is rarely seen. To keep ones contact short with the populace also maintains a form of glorification
amongst them. These individuals, the priest, saints and nuns included are considered intermediaries to God. They
are the protectors of the relics and all other knowledge or items considered holy. What they possess is kept a
mystery which also enforces worship. The mysticism that maintains the worship, is provided by the ancient stories
of saints that cannot be verified thoroughly to had have occurred. The majority of these saints are of the roman
time periods. But because there are literally thousands of Saints any and everybody can find a saint that relates to
them. THis relationship between the devout and the saint is the same as Americans with Jesus.
When it comes to the catholic system of saints you will find astrology, biology, herbs, stones and even the
element table fused into their character and their stories before and after death. The saints names are used as the
basis for some English words for example: St. Eloi is the patron saint over goldsmithing and blacksmithing, hence
our term alloy for the combining of metals. The saints also represent all animal kingdoms and also the mystical
beings of the otherworld. Saints feast days and pagan holidays are intertwined sharing similar ceremonial
practices. With respect we find pagan holidays predate any religious orientated practice, therefore all religion
systems are mere cloaks or filter systems which have fragmented the power and magic systems of the ancient
civilizations and also tribes for that matter.
There are saints over bodily organs, diseases, criminals, victims of specific crimes, jails, police precincts,
cities, businesses and many other things. The power of the saint is to have a representation of the divine holy
father who does no wrong and is all loving and healing. These saints have committed great feats for and in the
name of the lord. Miracles are attributed to them, the stopping of wars and plagues and many have allowed their
lives to be taken in the name of the lord. The Martyrs are those who allowed themselves to be murdered by
refusing to denounce god. Martyrs are numerous, inclusive with the extravagant ways they were murdered. This
practice of the Martyr went on for over 1000 years. We must also understand that criminals took the same
process of the Martyr by denying to convert to Christianity. They’d rather die and go to hell, then try to repent at
the last minute like a coward. Lord Have Mercy Upon Their Souls. If they were even killed at all or even a real
person is a debate that’s been amongst the so called “scholars” for eons. There are literally 1000’s of saints and ¾
of them are supposedly Martyrs. If you ask me, I’d have to tell you the facts that are repeated by many scholars,
throughout many time periods and that’s it. So far as archaeological evidence to support the outrageous claims,
we will be reviewing them in this book and you can decide on your own.
The Medieval times of Europe was obviously filled with activity of a battling nature on all fronts. The
Catholic/Christian church and its philosophy was directly or indirectly involved with all forms of conflicts. This
social dominance and unpredictable governance because of a philosophy that’s amenable brought much conflict
between all groups of people (women & men, Jews & Christians, etc.,) for over a span of 1000 years. These
conflicts enforced Puritans and the Protestants to leave Europe, many different wars, and the exile of Jews and
Muslims. The church had spies deployed in all countries and towns. This elaborate communication system that is
designed in a pyramid structure allowed the church to have information on everybody at all times. The collecting
of this information permitted the pope to over tax or fine any individual, city or state that committed any
ecclesiastical crime being a mortal or venial sin. Even when crimes were discovered, depending on the
circumstance and/or the social standing of the individual the consequences may vary.
The Social control of a populace is governed by a Bishop. The Bishop rules over a diocese which is a
district. Basically, they have a certain level of jurisdiction and power in a geographical region over all the people
who are catholic in said region. This is why there was always a relationship between the king and the pope. There
are many cases where the pope has to witness thrones “consummate” the marriage by watching/confirming they
mated. This rule of jurisdiction is the same today and applies to the entire planet. Priests are the watchmen and a

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form of overseer for the bishop. The Jesuits are the secret agents, quietly seeing, reporting and instigating the
scene. More like the fingerprints to the invisible hand. There wont be much mention of Jesuits (Societ of Jesus) in
this book. To be God you must not be seen or allow the common man to have direct contact with you. This is the
psychological game being played here. I state that to further state that the Catholic church doesn’t necessarily
have a bible. Catholicism worships Mother Mary ( feminine principle) as American Christianity (masculine
principle) worships the son Jesus. Historically, Europe is the Mother and America is the son. As the Bible is based
more on Jesus and has very little to say about Mother Mary a different system was imposed. By 1611 when the
compiling of the Bible was complete, it was used as the scapegoat and excuse to pillage the earth and all of its
peoples. It was not needed or used to uphold Europe. The Catholic church was well grounded by that time.
The Big question is how did the Catholic church get so grounded at that time. Well, they conquered all but
most importantly the belief and fear areas of the human psyche, spirit, soul, blood and human existence. You see
the Catholic church doesn’t depend on just the miracles of Jesus as doesthe simplicity of Americans with American
Christianity. They believe in stories of many saints. I use the term many because in today’s basic understanding
the average catholic can maybe name 10 saints, this may vary depending on region across the planet. The stories
of the saints are outlandish if you try to take them literal. There are miracles of dogs being brought back to life,
saints floating in ecstacy of prayer and martyrs carrying their own heads for miles. The common layman
understanding will not be able to comprehend the complexity of the saints. In this book we will be deciphering the
complexity of many saints. Little did you know but you are about as catholic as a confession box itself. You eat
foods correlated to saints on their feast days. You drive on streets, live in cities, neighborhoods named after
saints. Every day of the year has at least 5-10 saints over that day.
You must understand that the saints and also the Black madonnas which we will go into detail on later is a
dynamic system, comparable to ancient Egypt, Maya, or any other ancient civilization with many accomplishments.
This system is obviously needed for the maintenance of civilization. Due to the fact that America was built on a
masculine Christianity principle, the female version goes unheard. This may also be the case because of the
church’s dealings in the Spanish Inquisition, African American Slave trade, child molestation and many other
unspeakable acts. The stigmata will also be discussed. There’s too much to say about it here, so you will have to
read that section. This is also the same for the Crusades. The Nuns manias also called motor hysteria were odd
and repetitive for again the span of 300-400 years. The majority of odd activity amongst nuns breaks down to
having fits/seizures. There are also other cases of throwing up needles and other foreign objects. During the
entirety of Medieval existence both Priest and Nuns were stereotyped as being lascivious, this was expressed in
the theatre, literature and all other forms of art.
In Chapter 6 we visit the plague and how the church encountered it, reacted to it and combated it. With
close examination it appears as if the church saw the plague as an opened womb and wanted to not be involved.
The Black death of 1347 set off an atom bomb in the European Mind. I don’t make this statement as if the black
death experiences were the origins of the activities of the peoples. What the plague did do was intensify and
maximize the understanding of death. It made all Europeans fall in love with death and therefore become immune
to it. This immunity allows the worship of the dead or maybe just the principle of death stronger amongst them.
At the same time, they were becoming completely numb to the physical representation of death which is the
carcass in all stages of decomposition and then the bones. These experiences assisted in the cpaabilities to build
the catacombs and the ossuaries.
It is very clear that there were large finances gained by the fear the plague provided. Many different
hustle schemes were created. Priests had to be paid to arrive at plague homes to give absolution from their sins
and reserve them a place in the heavens. Priests used to do other things like going door to door trying to sale a

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branch from the fiery bush that spoke to Moses. There are a multitude of other ways that the church used to
swindle money. The primary source of these finances was the Spanish inquisition in which we will be going over.
Pope Leo sold tickes out of hell and tickets into heaven.
The social control that the church utilized on the community was based on restricting sex and destroying
the peoples folklore/magic. This chapter details how they went about both attacks. There were multiple days on
the calendar where sex was not allowed. Every sexual crime had a penance to serve with it. A sex crime could be
as simple as having sex on a Friday. One reason this was so prevalent because of the diversity of the inhabitants of
city. There were people from many religious groups, mainly Jewish and Muslim and its variants. Crossing the
religious line and having sex with someone of another religion could bring death to either party. This will be
further explored in the Minority Report chapter. In this chapter we go over the laws that were laid against sexual
practices and also magic. The consequences built up to what we know as the Spanish Inquisition which will be
discussed in a later chapter as well.
The 7th chapter talks about the stage of ecstasy. Im not talking about the drug as many Americans would
immediately relate the word ecstasy with such due to our current social understanding. The catholic definition to
ecstasy may as well be the same reason as to why the word was applied to the drug. When the saints are so
engulfed into the status of prayer they commit supernatural activity, this is the stage of ecstasy. While in this stage
levitation has occurred, miracles, angels have come out of the sky, one woman even married Jesus. Once again I
see the activity of wanting to be or do something outside of human capability inside the guise of
hallucination/fantasy. Basically in a cartoon you can do anything. All you have to do is put your mind in the said
cartoon, when in this status you must dodge being labeled as insane by others. If these miracles occurred then
why aren’t they occurring now. I want to see the great phenomenal works of the lord and his magnificent power.
The 8th chapter goes over The Incorruptible Saints. A lot of people that I know were astounded by this
information. This includes Catholics that Ive encountered. It is pretty clear that America does not receive and
seems as if does not deserve the graces of the Catholic church. Why? This is a link I have not discovered. I do
assume that this is the situation because many criminals were sent here in the beginning stages of this country and
the church has knowledge of this. When Europeans decided to get rid of executioners and the extreme criminal
justice approach that was taken at the time, they began to send their career criminals to America. America has
one incorruptible saint that I know about located in Philadelphia. There are numerous ways that humans have
found to mummify or preserve a body after death. There are also many cases where it just naturally occurs.
Whether these are real or not, nobody knows but the catholic church. The stories behind these bodies are very
questionable due to the fact that many of these bodies were found to be incorruptible hundreds of years after the
death of the saint.
Tis the season to be folly is all of our religious oriented holidays explained. Yes these holidays are ours. All
people indigenous, tribal whatever your religion have holidays or celebration periods all in the same times. There
is no getting around this. It is clearly a part of the human existence and perception thereof. Orgies were done to
ensure maximum growth of crops and abundant wealth. This occurred in civilizations before Old Europe. It also
phased out of existence (to our knowledge) during Old Europe. There was always a reason applied to a practice.
Even the allowance of true freedom was controlled by the rules of the ritual of whoever was made king of the
bean. The Lord of Misrule Im pretty sure was immoral and enforced immoral activity. Why? I understand that
embarrassment, humiliation, leaves one in a position to do anything. If everything has been seen, lost, taken, or
you just understand nothing is yours, then in essence you have nothing. You are nothing, therefore you can do
anything. This is what they make sure eachother understands. Therefore the king must spend a day or a week as
the peasant. So he can feel the wrath and in essence take his gratuities of being king more serious and be relative

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with the common folk. They understand we all breath the same air. At any given moment, a plague, a war, a
woman, the devil or god himself can rip their souls right our of their chest. There is no dividing line amongst who
was great and who was small when death collects his debt. They make sure that this level of understanding is
encoded in all of them from the peasant to the king.
I had to be long winded because, I believe that is the bottom line understanding that s implemented come
from the styles of rituals that they do. Not to forget they usually end in a drunk filled indiscriminate orgy, one
reason for the mask wearing. We will be talking about the mask wearing as well. To be short there will be
explanations of Gods throughout the Holiday section. These gods come from ancient systems of Rome, Greece,
Egypt and there maybe others mentioned that predate these. It is very clear to me that 80-90% of the English
language is composed of words that are filled with souls. Damn near every other word you use day to day and
many other words that aren’t used still holding original energies are caskets, they are catacombs. There are Gods
and Goddess, Saints and the like stuffed into the words we use every day. The word is the original application, the
original remote control. If my theory is correct, which will be proven, I am also stating that the Gods and
Goddesses of ancient civilizations are real whether that be by a representation of energy or word usage conjuring
invisible entities from specific astrological zones. Either way it goes, the words are real, how you use them are real
and the results are real. Understand that this will the base understanding when it the holiday section.
The Non-Believer chapter goes over the heretical groups, there are way more than what was provided
here, but a few are to be mentioned. When it really comes down to it, it looks like in the Caucasian thinking
structure, at any given moment one can come to a philosophy or theory and they will immediately have followers.
They will have brothers that support and will crusade with them with much confidence and zeal. The activity
thoroughly fits the definition of “it was just something to do”. This is from the outside looking in. When one gets
detailed on these groups it is very clear that they were maintaining rites and the statuses of Ancient Gods from
prior civilizations. You can still see that there are many similar religious oriented groups here in America.
Americas laws, with the freedom of this and that was an indirect allowance for the development of these groups
and to hold whatever philosophy they want to justify in their own minds. Such as the religious groups in Utah and
other wierdos scattered all across the country in woods and hills somewhere. A prime example of these groups
would be The Children of God now called The Family International.
On another note I had to relook at the word heresy through my ghetto etymology lense. I see that when
you separate the word you can spell out her-i-see. In which indirectly this whole heretical talk during these times
could be identifying groups that were holding the doctrines and maintaining the survival of ancient literature
coming out of Egypt, Greece and other locations. There could be worship of the black Madonna and ancient Sybils
as well amongst these groups. This has to be stated so that the sexual practices can be viewed in another light.
Sex overall is serving the woman. There is no sexual activity without the woman or a man imitating the acts of a
woman. In essence the position of femininity cannot be divided from the sexual act. In the majority of sexual
positions it is the man doing the work, serving the woman. The whole element of licking is cleansing and/or
healing. Sucking the breast is life. Fellatio can end in coitus interrupts and is considered devilish, i.e., not
reproducing. When this is considered then all sexual activity is designed for a woman to receive pleasure and in
essence is work for a man, who also receives pleasure. But in initiation the aura/spirituality of sex is that the man
is receiving a gift that he has earned from either manipulation or force. When it is done by force there is still
energy given to the man such as fear, life/death thoughts, agony, pain, etc,. To state that all heretical groups were
sexually indulged is also stating that they worship the female/love principle which is a system of thought that goes
back before Egypt. Egypt was the first civilization of male hierarchy, this is why they are the most sought after for
information on how to maintain the new male world dominance. These groups had to be destroyed, so the

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catholic church could swallow their energy, money, blood and books. Then redistribute it later on as lesser
dominations under the Christian religion.
The Minority report is basically details on how racism worked during the Medeival times. Intentional hate
and individualistic separation is the basis of their history from Greece to now. Lets be real, the hatred is
extravagant for no real reason. It must be a fear or response from a trauma or maybe their just built this way. But
to continuously hate has got to be tiring. In the Medieval times the racism was far more advanced then what it is
now. The majority of the true racist mentality Im safe to say has dwindled down maybe 80-90% compared to
today’s actions. In reality Americans have nothing to complain about when comparing the events in human
history that had racism as its reasoning. The average man would say I sound nuts. An historian would say Im
correct. In the 1910s all men had a percentage of history in them. In the 2010s the majority of men have a
visectomy. Bwahahaha. I had to crack a joke. Anyways, we will look into the activities of the markets, the
prostitution and the law systems of the Medieval times to get a better grasp on how people treated eachother
basec on religion/race. There was no divide between religion and race unti America was established.
Then there will be a close detail on the Jews and why Caucasians hate Jews so much. For a long time it
looks like the Jews were just a scapegoat for free slaughter. Theres so many mentions of massacres that occurred
on jews and times they were exiled it makes you wonder. Because of the event with Jesus, if anything happened
weather, plague or any other mystical, outside, unkonwn force was to attack the community as a whole, the Jews
were blamed for it. Even if children are kidnapped it was blamed on Jews.
The Muslims were treated greater than the Jews. A statement you will find is “he who has no Muslim has
no gold.” Symbolically, black people, since the gates of Egypt have been shut down have religiously been
represented as “Islamic”. The Hebrew representation predates this study and was dwindling during these times.
Historically, during these times this Islamic title can be fragmented into different groups of various racial lines. All
sandy/brown/black skinned peoples though. Due to the fact these black children of Egypt assisted in the
development of damn near everything in Old Europe, they were alchemically represented with Gold. The
representation of Gold and black people cannot be divided. Because Black also represents gold, as the sun sits in
blackness, it gives it a double entendre complex of God = gold and devil = black. So, theologically at the same time
the Muslims who brought fruits, mathematics, architecture and a mass amount of other sciences are considered
the Devil as well. One of the reasons for this devil title is not only the superiority shown at the times, but the
complexity of their sciences and laws. Anything that is to complex to understand it is better to heal the headache
by writing it off as the devils work.
The Inquisition carried out its own witch hunts with the Inquisitors being the witch hunters. These witch
hunts have many similarities with the municipal witch hunters. I have read mentionings of both executioners and
Inquisitors at each others torture chambers exchanging tactics and comparing notes. The style of tactics and the
torture chamber itself, used by the inquisitioners was a little more extravagant than the ones of the city/kings
castle. In the catholic torture chamber, there were many words inscribed on the tools, doors, and the devices
themselves. Specific names were used which represented both angels & demons. They were usually underground
and there were far more people in these chambers then say the city would have in thiers while questioning was in
process. Usually as shown to us on modern day movies you could only get to these chambers by flame on torch.
Extreme blackness seems to be a major role as this was also the attire they wore. It is the same attire today mainly
held up by the nuns, black.
At the end of the day these witch hunts are an extreme attack on the female principle. In which women
cannot be removed from the human dimensions therefore, neither will her principle. You can take away her
herbs, you can take away her intelligence, you can put clothes on her but you will never be able to take away the

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fact that she will be desired and sought out by man for joy, cleanliness, health and comfort. This is why she is
making a comeback now. The Love principle on this planet is extremely destroyed. The Caucasian womans sexual
drive was obviously a problem for caucasian males who couldnt keep up, so they let the devil/God fuck her. In
reality they probably didn’t want to keep up. To keep up means youre chasing the pussy around all the time which
doesn’t allow the thinking to develop and make life easier. Women and sex are a distraction to the workforce so
sexuality had to be reduced to a goal. When it used to be a life maintainer. With sex as a goal to be achieved from
one woman, you can work for the world. Get married (hence the word mary) and tie the knot (hence witch magic
ties knots in ropes).
Understand that what you are about to read is a mirror/physical/materialized version of the extremity of
holiness that the human mind can attain. The endless possibilities of positive energy, basically. To argue the point
n if the incorruptibles are real or not in essence you have missed the point. So what is the point? The point is the
human can attain levels of holiness or common courtesy that are so pure, the genetics of your body will alter and
you in essence will be an Immortal. As many of these men and women have literature that they have composed
that is still available today. They are sol survivors literally. Due to the fact these individuals , the saints, have been
around for so long and have the patronage and attributes of everything in existence they are a magic system.
You will be learning how magic, metaphysics and history works in its synchronicity here in this volume. All
humans naturally, mentally operate off of a magic understanding. Metaphysics is the door way to understand this
“magic”. Metaphysics is the scientific form of spirituality. In which it is a science that operates on “coincidences,
similarities and social parallels.” These coincidences and similarities have no control by the person, it is literally a
“message” or “sign” given to them from unknown/ethereal spaces or entities. They can be both positive or
negative. These messages and signs are the permissions, allowances and confirmations to commit an act whether
that be allowing somebody in your life, a career choice or the sex or name of a child. With proper understanding
of metaphysics, it can be applied to the totality of existence and also the current times. With its knowledge one
can predict the future correctly and all other things. Metaphysics relies on mythology, principles, emotions, words,
colors, numbers, symbols, time and facts. It is an invisible magic system that has no altar of God. It can be used as a
tool or weapon when understood correctly. It is the language of Gods
The black madonnas is where we end up at the end of the series. Not from a bias approach, but in essence
I whole heartedly believe this was the biggest secret of the Dark Ages and may also be one if not the whole reason
the ages were called dark. Many principles both divine and archaic are inside the black madonnas and that is a
principle that the majority of humans cant handle. The average human today is 1 tracked brained with their
seriousness of a subject which usually is their career everything else is a write off. Due to this small capacity of
thinking which in turn enforces a lack of resepct, nothing is truly done from the heart and common courtesy of
man has dwindled to a text message. The wisdom and whoredom that the Madonna and the overall woman
principle represents in essence is to complex of a structure of thinking for the majority of males. I guess that’s why
God makes Priests and Pimps, who both make sure that the woman controls her own sexuality and also see them
off to be with other men.
There were many other subjects that needed to be expounded on but only could be talked about with
photography such as the fish ladies, black Moorish saints and the catacomb churches and not to forget the arch
angels. The arch angels are scattered all across Europe. They are blacker than oil. Like the black madonnas which
is also related to other elements of other religions, this black color is used as a communication device to outer
space. Many things are to be discovered in the Picture part of this book all photos are here for educational/sacred
geometry purposes and I do not claim ownership of any of the pictures used throughout the entire 3 volume
series. I hope you fun and tell a friend about your journey.

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Fig. 2.). Milan Cathedral is the cathedral church of Milan, Italy. Dedicated to St Mary of the Nativity (Santa Maria
Nascente)

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 The
Church
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 Chapter 1
The History of Early Christianity
• c. 34: St. Stephen, the first Christian martyr, is stoned to death in Jerusalem.
• c. 50: Council of Jerusalem determines that Gentile converts to Christianity do not have to abide by Mosaic
Laws. This begins the separation between Christianity and Judaism.
• c. 52: Traditional arrival of St. Thomas, the Apostle in India.
• c. 64: Christian persecution begins under Emperor Nero after the great fire of Rome. Persecution continues
intermittently until 313 AD.
• c. 70: Fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple.
• c. 72: Martyrdom of St. Thomas the Apostle at Mylapore.
• c. 96: Traditional date of First Epistle of Clement attributed to Pope Clement I written to the church of
Corinth.
• c. 100: St. John, the last of the Apostles, dies in Ephesus.
• c. 110: Ignatius of Antioch uses the term Catholic Church in a letter to the Church at Smyrna, one of the
letters of undisputed authenticity attributed to him. In this and other genuine letters he insists on the
importance of the bishops in the Church and speaks harshly about heretics and Judaizers.
• c. 150: Latin translations (the Vetus Latina) from the Greek texts of the Scriptures are circulated among
non Greek speaking Christian communities.
• c. 155: The teachings of Marcion, the gnostic Valentinus and pentecostal Montanists cause disruptions in
the Roman community. Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire continues.
• c. 180: Irenaeus's Adversus Haereses brings the concept of "heresy" further to the fore in the first
systematic attempt to counter Gnostic and other aberrant teachings.
• c. 195: Pope Victor I, first African Pope, excommunicated the Quartodecimans in an Easter controversy.
• c. 200: Tertullian, first great Christian Latin writer, coined for Christian concepts Latin terms such as
"Trinitas", "Tres Personae", "Una Substantia", "Sacramentum"
• c. 250: Pope Fabian is said to have sent out seven bishops from Rome to Gaul to preach the Gospel: Gatien
to Tours, Trophimus to Arles, Paul to Narbonne, Saturnin to Toulouse, Denis to Paris, Austromoine to
Clermont, and Martial to Limoges.
• January 20, 250: Emperor Decius begins a widespread persecution of Christians in Rome. Pope Fabian is
martyred. Afterwards the Donatist controversy over readmitting lapsed Christians disaffects many in North
Africa.
• October 28, 312: Emperor Constantine leads the forces of the Roman Empire to victory at the Battle of the
Milvian Bridge. Tradition has it that, the night before the battle, Constantine had a vision that he would
achieve victory if he fought under the Symbol of Christ; accordingly, his soldiers bore on their shields the
Chi Rho sign composed of the first two letters of the Greek word for "Christ" (ΧΡΙΣΤΌΣ).[1]

Fig. 3.). The Chi Rho (/ˈkaɪ ˈroʊ/; also known as chrismon or sigla) is one of the earliest forms of
christogram, formed by superimposing the first two (capital) letters—chi and rho (ΧΡ)—of the Greek word
ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ (Christos) in such a way that the vertical stroke of the rho intersects the center of the chi.
36
37
 Ignorant as they mainly were of both reading and writing, and persecuted for their faith in Christ, it was
obviously necessary that some symbol should be "found which should enablethem to express their belief, and be
at the same time unintelligible to their persecutors. Hence arose the use of two common symbols ; one of which is
called the Monogram (that is, one character composed of more than one letter), and the other is called the Fish. It
is thought that the monogram came first into use, but its signification being discovered, it was no longer capable of
shielding the Christian tombs from insult and desecration ; the other more occult symbol was consequently
employed. The monogram, in its earliest form, consisted only of the two Greek letters, X (Chi) and P (Rho), the
initial letters of Xptoros, the Greek name of Christ. These letters were like our X and P, and we find the X with the P
drawn standing within it, Thus : Here is a rude illustration, which reads TASARIS, IN CHRIST, THE FIRST AND THE
LAST. The monogram is here used for " Christ," and the Greek letters Alpha and Omega being added to it to
express " the first and the last," as the titles of the Lord Jesus Christ, adopted by Himself in the Book of
Revelation.* Here is another example of the symbol, and also of the prevailing ignorance upon literary points. A
fragment of stone containing part of a date, the first before the ides, has the monogram, with the Alpha and
Omega, surrounded by a circle, which device the sculptor has represented upside down.
Observe also two other forms of this symbol, each of them surrounded by a circle, evidently intended to
show belief in the eternity of Christ, the circle being a significant and very ancient symbol of eternity in use among
the ancients. In the one case the monogram is represented simply with the Alpha and Omega ; in the other case,
the letters escei: are found encircling the monogram, which is supposed to signify Christus est Bens (Christ is God).
A transition from the Greek Chi to the upright cross was likely soon to be suggested, as representing symbolically
the D instrument of our Lord's crucifixion. This took place in course of time, and is seen frequently on more recent
monuments ; the head of the Eho being affixed to the upper limb of the cross. Thus: Two instances I point out to
you ; one of them simple, the other enclosed in an equilateral triangle, supposed to signify the faith in the doctrine
of a Triune God.* The other symbol, which had reference to the faith in Christ, was a fish—most difficult to
unriddle, had it not been that inscriptions with the Greek word Ix^s, a fish, as well as the representation itself,
occurred, pointing out that the significance rested with the letters of the word, as well as with the object itself. The
explanation has been found to be that the word is formed from the initials of the Greek words describing the
names, titles, and office of the Lord Jesus Christ, viz., Ljo ovs X/>«rros, ©cow Yios, 2wr>yp(Jesus Christ, Son of God,
the Saviour).[2]

Fig. 4.). Chi Rho 2

38
313–476
• 313: The Edict of Milan declares the Roman Empire neutral towards religious views, in effect ending the
persecution of Christians.
• 318: Arius condemned and excommunicated by a council convened by Alexander, bishop of Alexandria.
• 321: Granting the Church the right to hold property, Constantine donates the palace of the Laterani to
Pope Miltiades. The Lateran Basilica (Basilica of Our Savior) becomes the episcopal seat of the Bishop of
Rome.
• November 3, 324: Constantine lays the foundations of the new capital of the Roman Empire in Byzantium,
later to be known as Constantinople.
• 323 Pope Sylvester I in his calender give to sunday, first day of the week, name Lord´s day and give
commandment to church members to keep it as a holy day and so he change old christian and jewish
sabbath to sunday.
• 325: The Arian controversy erupts in Alexandria, causing widespread violence and disruptions among
Christians.
• 325: The First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea, convened as a response to the Arian controversy, establishes
the Nicene Creed, declaring the belief of orthodox Trinitarian Christians in the Holy Trinity.
• November 18, 326: Pope Sylvester I consecrates the Basilica of St. Peter built by Constantine the Great
over the tomb of the Apostle.
• 360: Julian the Apostate becomes the last non Christian Roman Emperor.
• February 380: Emperor Theodosius I issues an edict, De Fide Catolica, in Thessalonica, published in
Constantinople, declaring Catholic Christianity as the state religion of the Roman Empire.
• 381: First Ecumenical Council of Constantinople.
• 382: The Council of Rome under Pope Damasus I sets the Canon of the Bible, listing the accepted books of
the Old Testament and the New Testament. No others are to be considered scripture.
• 391: The Theodosian decrees outlaw most pagan rituals still practiced in Rome, thereby encouraging much
of the population to convert to Christianity.
• 400: Jerome's Vulgate Latin Bible translation is published. This remained the standard text in the Catholic
world until the Renaissance, was used in Catholic services until the late 20th century, and remains an
influence on modern vernacular translations.
• August 24, 410: Sack of Rome. Alaric and his Visigoths burst in by the Porta Salaria on the northeast of the
city Rome.
• 431: The Ecumenical Council of Ephesus declares that Jesus existed both as Man and God simultaneously,
clarifying his status in the Holy Trinity. The meaning of the Nicene Creed is also declared a permanent holy
text of the church.
• October 8, 451: Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon opens.
• November 1, 451: The Council of Chalcedon, the fourth ecumenical council, closes. The Chalcedonian
Creed is issued, which re asserts Jesus as True God and True Man and the dogma of the Virgin Mary as the
Mother of God. The council excommunicates Eutyches, leading to the schism with Oriental Orthodoxy.
• 452: Pope Leo I (the Great) meets Attila the Hun and dissuades him from sacking Rome.
• 455: Sack of Rome by the Vandals. The spoils of the Temple of Jerusalem previously taken by Titus are
allegedly among the treasures taken to Carthage.

39
 • September 4, 476: Emperor Romulus Augustus is deposed in Rome, marked by many as the fall of the
Western Roman Empire. The focus of the early Church switches to expanding in the Eastern Roman
Empire, also known as the Byzantine Empire, with its capital at Constantinople.
477–799
• 480: Traditional birth of St Benedict, author of a Monastic Rule, setting out regulations for the
establishment of monasteries.
• 496: Clovis I pagan King of the Franks, converts to the Catholic faith.
• 502: Pope Symmachus ruled that laymen should no longer vote for the popes and that only higher clergy
should be considered eligible.
• 529: The Codex Justinianus (Code of Justinian) completed. First part of Corpus Iuris Civilis (Body of Civil
Law).
• January 2, 533: Mercurius becomes Pope John II. He becomes the first pope to take a regnal name. John II
obtains valuable gifts as well as a profession of orthodox faith from the Byzantine emperor Justinian.
• 533: The Digest, or Pandects, was issued; second part of Corpus Iuris Civilis (Body of Civil Law). The
Institutes, third part of Corpus Iuris Civilis (Body of Civil Law) comes into force of law.
• 536: Belisarius recaptures Rome.
• 553: Second Ecumenical Council of Constantinople condemned the errors of Origen of Alexandria, the
Three Chapters, and confirmed the first four general councils.
• 590: Pope Gregory the Great. Reforms ecclesiastical structure and administration. Establishes Gregorian
chant. Was also elected. (To be Pope)
• 596: Saint Augustine of Canterbury sent by Pope Gregory to evangelize the pagan English.
• 638: Christian Jerusalem and Syria conquered by Muslims.
• 642: Egypt falls to the Muslims, followed by the rest of North Africa.
• 664: The Synod of Whitby unites the Celtic Church in England with the Catholic Church.
• 680: Third Council of Constantinople puts an end to Monothelitism.
• 685: The Maradites used their power and importance to choose John Maron, one of their own, as Patriarch
of Antioch and all the East. John received the approval of Pope Sergius I, and became the first Maronite
Patriarch.
• 698: St Willibrord commissioned by Pope Sergius I as bishop of the Frisians (Netherlands). Willibrord
establishes a church in Utrecht.
• 711: Muslim armies invade Spain.
• 718: Saint Boniface, an Englishman, given commission by Pope Gregory II to evangelise the Germans.
• 726: Iconoclasm begins in the eastern Empire. The destruction of images persists until 843.
• 732: Muslim advance into Western Europe halted by Charles Martel at Poitiers, France.
• 751: Lombards abolish the Exarchate of Ravenna effectively ending last vestiges of Byzantine rule in central
Italy and Rome.
• 756: Popes granted independent rule of Rome by King Pepin the Short of the Franks, in the Donation of
Pepin. Birth of the Papal States.
• 787: Second Ecumenical Council of Nicaea resolved Iconoclasm.
• 793: Sacking of the monastery of Lindisfarne marks the beginning of Viking raids on Christian Europe.

40
800–1453
• December 25, 800: King Charlemagne of the Franks is crowned Holy Roman Emperor of the West by Pope
Leo III in St. Peter's Basilica.
• 829: Ansgar begins missionary work in Sweden near Stockholm.
• 863: Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius sent by the Patriarch of Constantinople to evangelise the Slavic
peoples. They translate the Bible into Slavonic.
• 869: Fourth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople condemns Photius. This council and succeeding general
councils are denied by the Eastern Orthodox Churches.
• 910: Great Benedictine monastery of Cluny rejuvenates western monasticism. Monasteries spread
throughout the isolated regions of Western Europe.
• 966: Mieszko I of Poland converts to Catholicism, beginning the Baptism of Poland.
• 988: St. Vladimir I the Great is baptized; becomes the first Christian Grand Duke of Kiev.
• 1012: Burchard of Worms completes his twenty volume Decretum of Canon law.
• July 16, 1054: Liturgical, linguistic, and political divisions cause a permanent split between the Eastern and
Western Churches, known as the East–West Schism or the Great Schism. The three legates, Humbert of
Mourmoutiers, Frederick of Lorraine, and Peter, archbishop of Amalfi, entered the Cathedral of the Hagia
Sophia during mass on a Saturday afternoon and placed a papal Bull of Excommunication on the altar
against the Patriarch Michael I Cerularius. The legates left for Rome two days later, leaving behind a city
near riots.
• November 27, 1095: Pope Urban II preaches to defend the eastern Christians, and pilgrims to the Holy
Land, at the Council of Clermont.
• 1098: Foundation of the reforming monastery of Cîteaux, leads to the growth of the Cistercian order.
• 1099: Retaking of Jerusalem by the 1st Crusade, followed by a massacre of the remaining non Christian
inhabitants, and the establishment of the Crusader kingdoms, in Latin bishops are appointed to dioceses
still largely populated by the Orthodox.
• 1123: First Ecumenical Lateran Council.
• 1139: Second Ecumenical Lateran Council.
• 1144: The Saint Denis Basilica of Abbot Suger is the first major building in the style of Gothic architecture.
• 1150: Publication of Decretum Gratiani.
• 1179: Third Ecumenical Lateran Council.
• 1182: The Maronite Church reaffirms its unbroken communion with the Holy See.
• October 2, 1187: The Siege of Jerusalem. Ayyubid forces led by Saladin capture Jerusalem, prompting the
Third Crusade.
• January 8, 1198: Lotario de' Conti di Segni elected Pope Innocent III. His pontificate is often considered the
height of the temporal power of the papacy.
• April 13, 1204: Sack of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade. Beginning of Latin Empire of Constantinople.
• 1205: Saint Francis of Assisi becomes a hermit, founding the Franciscan order of friars.
• November 11, 1215: Fourth Ecumenical Lateran Council opened by Pope Innocent III.
• November 30, 1215: Fourth Ecumenical Lateran Council is closed by Pope Innocent III. Seventy decrees
were approved, the definition of transubstantiation being among them.
• 1216: The Order of Preachers (Dominican Order) founded by Saint Dominic is approved as a body of
Canons Regular by Pope Honorius III on December 22 (Pope Innocent III having died in July).
• 1229: Inquisition founded in response to the Cathar heresy, at the Council of Toulouse.

41
 • 1231: Charter of the University of Paris granted by Pope Gregory IX.
• 1241: The death of Ögedei Khan, the Great Khan of the Mongols, prevented the Mongols from further
advancing into Europe after their easy victories over the combined Christian armies in the Battle of Liegnitz
(in present day Poland) and Battle of Mohi (in present day Hungary).
• 1245: First Council of Lyon. Excommunicated and deposed Emperor Frederick II.
• 1274: Second Council of Lyon; Catholic and Orthodox Churches temporarily reunited. Thomas Aquinas
dies.
• 1295: Marco Polo arrives home in Venice.
• February 22, 1300: Pope Boniface VIII published the Bull "Antiquorum fida relatio"; first recorded Holy Year
of the Jubilee celebrated.
• November 18, 1302: Pope Boniface VIII issues the Papal bull Unam sanctam.
• 1305: French influence causes the Pope to move from Rome to Avignon.
• August 12, 1308: Pope Clement V issues the Bull Regnans in coelis calling a general council to meet on
October 1, 1310, at Vienne in France for the purpose "of making provision in regard to the Order of Knights
Templar, both the individual members and its lands, and in regard to other things in reference to the
Catholic Faith, the Holy Land, and the improvement of the Church and of ecclesiastical persons".
• August 17–20, 1308: The leaders of the Knights Templar are secretly absolved by Pope Clement V after
their interrogation was carried out by papal agents to verify claims against the accused in the castle of
Chinon in the diocese of Tours.
• October 16, 1311: The first formal session of the Ecumenical Council of Vienne begins under Pope Clement
V.
• March 22, 1312: Clement V promulgates the Bull Vox in excelsis suppressing the Knights Templar.
• May 6, 1312: The Ecumenical Council of Vienne is closed on the third formal session.
• May 26, 1328: William of Ockham flees Avignon. Later, he was excommunicated by Pope John XXII, whom
Ockham accused of heresy.
• 1370: Saint Catherine of Siena calls on the Pope to return to Rome.
• 1378: Antipope Clement VII (Avignon) elected against Pope Urban VI (Rome) precipitating the Western
Schism.
• 1387: Lithuanians were the last in Europe to accept the Catholic faith.
• c.1412–1431: St. Joan of Arc, a peasant girl from France, has visions from God telling her to lead her
countrymen to reclaim their land from the English. After success in battle she is captured by the English in
1431 and is condemned as a heretic and was executed by burning at the age of 19. Later investigation
authorized by Pope Callixtus III would conclude she was innocent and a martyr.
• 1440: Johannes Gutenberg completes his wooden printing press using moveable metal type
revolutionizing the spread of knowledge by cheaper and faster means of reproduction. Soon results in the
large scale production of religious books including Bibles.
• May 29, 1453: Fall of Constantinople.
1454–1599
• 1492: Christopher Columbus reaches the Americas.
• 1493: With the Inter caetera, Pope Alexander VI awards sole colonial rights over most of the New World to
Spain.
• January 22, 1506: Kaspar von Silenen and first contingent of Swiss mercenaries enter the Vatican during
the reign of Pope Julius II. Traditional date of founding of the Swiss Guards.

42
• April 18, 1506: Pope Julius II lays cornerstone of New Basilica of St. Peter.
• 1508: Michelangelo starts painting the Sistine Chapel ceiling.
• October 31, 1517: Martin Luther posts his 95 Theses, protesting the sale of indulgences.
• 1516: Saint Sir Thomas More publishes Utopia in Latin.
• 1519: Spanish conquest of Mexico by Hernán Cortés.
• January 3, 1521: Martin Luther finally excommunicated by Pope Leo X in the bull Decet Romanum
Pontificem.
• 1521: Baptism of the first Catholics in the Philippines, the first Christian nation in Southeast Asia. This
event is commemorated with the feast of the Sto. Niño.
• October 17, 1521: Pope Leo X confers the title Fidei Defensor to Tudor King Henry VIII of England for his
defense of the seven sacraments and the supremacy of the pope in Assertio Septem Sacramentorum
against Protestantism.
• May 6, 1527: Sack of Rome.
• 1531: Our Lady of Guadalupe appears to Juan Diego in Mexico.
• November 16, 1532: Francisco Pizarro captures Atahualpa. Conquest of Incan Empire.
• August 15, 1534: Saint Ignatius of Loyola and six others, including Francis Xavier met in Montmartre, then
just outside Paris, to found the missionary Jesuit Order.
• October 30, 1534: English Parliament passes Act of Supremacy making the King of England Supreme Head
of the Church of England. Anglican schism with Rome.
• 1535: Michelangelo starts painting the Last Judgement in the Sistine Chapel.
• 1536 To 1540: Dissolution of the Monasteries in England, Wales and Ireland.
• December 17, 1538: Pope Paul III excommunicates King Henry VIII of England.
• 1540: Pope Paul III confirmed the order of the Society of Jesus.
• July 21, 1542: Pope Paul III, with the Constitution Licet ab initio, established the Supreme Sacred
Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition.
• 1543: A full account of the heliocentric Copernican theory titled, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly
Spheres (De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium) is published. Considered as the start of the Scientific
Revolution.
• December 13, 1545: Ecumenical Council of Trent convened during the pontificate of Paul III, to prepare the
Catholic response to the Protestant Reformation. Its rulings set the tone of Catholic society for at least
three centuries.

December 4, 1563: Ecumenical Council of Trent closed. The decrees were confirmed on January 26, 1564, by
Pius IV in the Bull "Benedictus Deus".

• 1568: St. John Chrysostom, St. Basil, St. Gregory Nazianzus, St. Athanasius and St. Thomas Aquinas are
made Doctors of the Church.
• July 14, 1570: Pope St. Pius V issues the Apostolic Constitution on the Tridentine Mass, Quo Primum.
• October 7, 1571: Christian fleet of the Holy League defeats the Ottoman Turks in the Battle of Lepanto.
• 1577: Teresa of Ávila writes The Interior Castle, one of the classic works of Catholic mysticism.
• February 24, 1582: Pope Gregory XIII issues the Bull Inter gravissimas reforming the Julian calendar.
• October 4, 1582: The Gregorian calendar is first adopted by Italy, Spain, and Portugal. October 4 is
followed by October 15 – ten days are removed.

43
 • September 28, 1586: Domenico Fontana successfully finished re erecting the Vatican Obelisk at its present
site in St. Peter's Square. Hailed as a great technical achievement of its time.
• 1593: Robert Bellarmine finishes his Disputationes de controversiis christianae fidei.
• 1598: Papal role in Peace of Vervins.
1600–1699
• 1600: Pope Clement VIII sanctions use of coffee despite petition by priests to ban the Muslim drink as "the
devil's drink". The Pope tried a cup and declared it "so delicious that it would be a pity to let the infidels
have exclusive use of it. We shall cheat Satan by baptizing it."
• 1614: Tokugawa Ieyasu bans Christianity from Japan.
• April 19, 1622: Pope Gregory XV makes Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu a cardinal upon the
nomination of King Louis XIII of France – becoming Cardinal Richelieu. His influence and policies greatly
impact the course of European politics.
• November 18, 1626: Pope Urban VIII solemnly dedicates the New Basilica of St. Peter 1,300 years after the
first Constantinian basilica was consecrated by Pope Sylvester I.
• 1633: Trial of Galileo, after which he is sentenced to house arrest.
• 1638: Shimabara Rebellion leads to a further repression of Catholics, and all Christians, in Japan.
• 1653: The Coonan Cross Oath was taken by a group of Saint Thomas Christians against the Portuguese.
• September 12, 1683: Battle of Vienna. Decisive victory of the army of the Holy League, under King John III
Sobieski of Poland, over the Ottoman Turks, under Grand Vizier Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha. The Turks
do not threaten Western Europe militarily again.
• 1685: Louis XIV revokes the Edict of Nantes, and large numbers of Huguenot refugees leave France.
• 1691: Pope Innocent XII declares against nepotism and simony.
1700 1799
• 1713: Encyclical Unigenitus condemns Jansenism.
• 1715: Pope Clement XI rules against the Jesuits in the Chinese Rites controversy.Reversed by Pius XII in
1939
• 1721: Kangxi Emperor bans Christian missions in China.
• April 28, 1738: Pope Clement XII publishes the Bull In Eminenti forbidding Catholics from joining, aiding,
socializing or otherwise directly or indirectly helping the organizations of Freemasonry and Freemasons
under pain of excommunication. Membership to any secret society would also incur the penalty of
excommunication.
• 1738: Grey Nuns founded.
• 1740–1758:Pope Benedict XIV,appointed first women as professors to Papal Universities in Bologna,
reformed canonization procedures, intellectual open to all sciences;
• 1769: Passionist religious institute granted full rights by Pope Clement XIV.
• 1769: Junípero Serra establishes Mission San Diego de Alcalá, the first of the Spanish missions in California.
• 1773: Suppression of the Jesuits by Pope Clement XIV, already excluded from many states. Only in the
Russian Empire are they able to remain.
• 1789: John Carroll becomes the Bishop of Baltimore, the first bishop in the United States.
• 1793: French Revolution institutes anti clerical measures.
• 1798: Pope Pius VI taken prisoner by the armies of Napoleon I, dies in captivity in France.[3]

44
 Chapter 2
The Religious Order
Catechism
A Catechism (pronunciation: /ˈkætəˌkizəm/; from Greek: κατηχέω, "to teach orally"), is a summary or
exposition of doctrine and serves as a learning introduction to the Sacraments traditionally used in catechesis, or
Christian religious teaching of children and adult converts. Catechisms are doctrinal manuals often in the form of
questions followed by answers to be memorised a format that has been used in non religious or secular contexts
as well. The term catechumen refers to the designated recipient of the catechetical work or instruction. In the
Catholic Church, catechumens are those who are preparing to receive the Sacrament of Baptism. Traditionally,
they would be placed separately during Holy Mass from those who baptized, and would be dismissed from the
liturgical assembly before the Profession of Faith (Creed) and General Intercessions (Prayers of the Faithful).
Early catecheticals emerged from Greco Roman messianism, especially the late Mithraists meant to
educate their members into the secretive teachings, which gave way to the Christian Church as an underground
religion in the 1st to 4th centuries CE. Today, they are characteristic of Western Christianity but are also present in
Eastern Orthodox Christianity. [4]
cat e chism (kat’e kiz’em), n. 1. Eccles. A. an elementary book containing a summary of the priciples of the
Christian religion, esp. as maintained by a particular church, in the form of questions and answers. b. the contents
of such a book. 2. A similar book of instruction in other subjects. 3. Obs. A. a series of formal questions put to
political candidates, etc., to bring out their views. B. catechetical instruction.[5]
THE CATECHISM OF ST. PIUS X – The Main Kinds of Sins
1 Q: How many kinds of sin are there?
A: There are two kinds of sin: original sin and actual sin.
2 Q: What is original sin?
A: Original sin is the sin in which we are all born, and which we contracted by the disobedience of our
first parent, Adam.
3 Q: What evil effects has the sin of Adam brought upon us?
A: The evil effects of the sin of Adam are: The privation of grace, the loss of Paradise, together with
ignorance, inclination to evil, death, and all our other miseries.
4 Q: How is original sin canceled?
A: Original sin is canceled by holy Baptism.
5 Q: What is actual sin?
A: Actual sin is that which man, after coming to the use of reason, commits of his own free will.
6 Q: How many kinds of actual sin are there?
A: There are two kinds of actual sin: mortal and venial.
7 Q: What is mortal sin?
A: Mortal sin is a transgression of the divine Law by which we seriously fail in our duties towards God,
towards our neighbor, or towards ourselves.
45
8 Q: Why is it called mortal?
A: It is called mortal because it brings death on the soul by making it lose sanctifying grace which is the
life of the soul, just as the soul itself is the life of the body.
9 Q: What injury does mortal sin do the soul?
A: (1) Mortal sin deprives the soul of grace and of the friendship of God; (2) It makes it lose Heaven; (3) It
deprives it of merits already acquired, and renders it incapable of acquiring new merits; (4) It makes it
the slave of the devil; (5) It makes it deserve hell as well as the chastisements of this life.
10 Q: Besides grave matter, what is required to constitute a mortal sin?
A: To constitute a mortal sin, besides grave matter there is also required full consciousness of the gravity
of the matter, along with the deliberate will to commit the sin.
11 Q: What is venial sin?
A: Venial sin is a lesser transgression of the divine Law, by which we slightly fail in some duty towards
God, towards our neighbor, or towards ourselves.
12 Q: Why is it called venial?
A: It is called venial Because it is light compared with mortal sin; because it does not deprive us of divine
grace; and because God more readily pardons us.
13 Q: Then little account need be made of venial sin?
A: That would be a very great mistake, not only because venial sin is always an offense against God; but
also because it does no little harm to the soul.
14 Q: What harm does venial sin do the soul?
A: Venial sin: (1) Weakens and chills charity in us; (2) Disposes us to mortal sin; (3) Renders us deserving
of great temporal punishments both in this world and in the next.[6]

Beatification
Beatification (from Latin beatus, "blessed" and facere, "to make") is a recognition accorded by the Catholic Church
of a dead person's entrance into Heaven and capacity to intercede on behalf of individuals who pray in his or her
name.[7]
Be at i fi ca tion, n. 1. Act of beatifying. 2. State of being beatified #. Rom. Cath. Ch. The official act of the pope
whereby a deceased person is declared to be enjoying the happiness of heaven, and therefore a proper subject of
religious honor and public cult in certain places. [8]

Basilica
Basilica: The Latin word basilica (derived from Greek βασιλικὴ στοά, lit. "royal stoa", serving as the tribunal
chamber of a king) has three distinct applications in modern English. The word was originally used to describe an
ancient Roman public building where courts were held, as well as serving other official and public functions. To a
large extent these were the town halls of ancient Roman life. The basilica was centrally located in every Roman
town, usually adjacent to the main forum. These buildings, an example of which is the Basilica Ulpia, were
rectangular, and often had a central nave and aisles, usually with a slightly raised platform and an apse at each of
the two ends, adorned with a statue perhaps of the emperor, while the entrances were from the long sides.
By extension the name was applied to Christian churches which adopted the same basic plan and it

46
continues to be used as an architectural term to describe such buildings, which form the majority of church
buildings in Western Christianity, though the basilican building plan became less dominant in new buildings from
the later 20th century. Later, the term came to refer specifically to a large and important Roman Catholic church
that has been given special ceremonial rights by the Pope.
Roman Catholic basilicas are Catholic pilgrimage sites, receiving tens of millions of visitors per year. In
December 2009 the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City set a new record with 6.1 million pilgrims
during Friday and Saturday for the anniversary of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The Roman basilica was a large public building where business or legal matters could be transacted. The
first basilicas had no religious function at all. As early as the time of Augustus, a public basilica for transacting
business had been part of any settlement that considered itself a city, used in the same way as the late medieval
covered market houses of northern Europe, where the meeting room, for lack of urban space, was set above the
arcades, however. Although their form was variable, basilicas often contained interior colonnades that divided the
space, giving aisles or arcaded spaces on one or both sides, with an apse at one end (or less often at each end),
where the magistrates sat, often on a slightly raised dais. The central aisle tended to be wide and was higher than
the flanking aisles, so that light could penetrate through the clerestory windows.[9]

Schism
A schism (pronounced /ˈsɪzəm/ SIZ əm, /ˈskɪzəm/ SKIZ əm or, less commonly, /ˈʃɪzəm/ SHIZ əm) is a division
between people, usually belonging to an organization, movement, or religious denomination. The word is most
frequently applied to a split in what had previously been a single religious body, such as the East–West Schism or
the Great Western Schism. It is also used of a split within a non religious organization or movement or, more
broadly, of a separation between two or more people, be it brothers, friends, lovers, etc.
A schismatic is a person who creates or incites schism in an organization or who is a member of a splinter
group. Schismatic as an adjective means pertaining to a schism or schisms, or to those ideas, policies, etc. that are
thought to lead towards or promote schism.
In religion, the charge of schism is distinguished from that of heresy, since the offence of schism concerns
not differences of belief or doctrine but promotion of, or the state of, division. However, schisms frequently
involve mutual accusations of heresy. In Roman Catholic teaching, every heresy is a schism, while there may be
some schisms free of the added guilt of heresy Liberal Protestantism, however, has often preferred heresy over
schism. Presbyterian scholar James I. McCord (quoted with approval by the Episcopalian bishop of Virginia Peter
Lee) drew a distinction between them, teaching: "If you must make a choice between heresy and schism, always
choose heresy. As a schismatic, you have torn and divided the body of Christ. Choose heresy every time."
Christian denomination § Historical schisms and methods of classification scheme

• The Apostle Paul refers to factions or schisms (Greek: σχισματα, schismata) within the church at Corinth
• The schism of Marcionism, c.150
• The schism of Gnosticism, which some attribute to Valentinius, c. 150, others much earlier
• The schism of Montanism
• The schism of Monarchianism, c. 200
• The many Antipopes, beginning with Hippolytus (writer) in 217 though Hippolytus later reconciled.
• The Donatist schism, beginning in 311
• The schism with Arianism and Quartodecimanism at the First Council of Nicaea, 325

47
 • The Nestorian Schism, after the First Council of Ephesus in 431, between the State church of the Roman
Empire and Nestorianism
• The Oriental Orthodox schism and rejection of the Council of Chalcedon, c. 451
• The Acacian schism, 484 519
• The schism of the Armenian Orthodox, 491
• The Great Schism of 1054
• Lollardy in the 1350s
• Three Popes at the same time: Roman Pope Gregory XII, Avignon Pope Benedict XIII, Pisan Pope John XXIII,
resolved at Council of Constance, see also Western Schism, 1378–1417
• The Swiss Reformation beginning in 1516
• The Protestant Reformation beginning in 1517
• Anabaptist, c. 1525
• The English Reformation beginning in 1529
• Michael Servetus burned at the stake in 1553, considered founder of Unitarianism
• The Scottish Reformation in 1560
• The Dutch Reformation in 1571
• Socinianism in 1605
• The Jansenism schism of 1643
• See Old Believers and Raskol for schism within the Russian Orthodox Church in 1666[10]

Canonization
Canonization is the act by which the Catholic Church or the Anglican Communion declare that a person
who has died was a saint, upon which declaration the person is included in the "canon", or list, of recognized
saints. Originally, persons were recognized as saints without any formal process. Later, different processes were
developed, such as those used today in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic Church.
The Apostolic constitution Divinus Perfectionis Magister of Pope St. John Paul II of 25 January 1983 and the
norms issued by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints on 7 February 1983 to implement the constitution in
dioceses, continued the simplification of the process initiated by Bl. Pope Paul VI. Contrary to popular belief, the
reforms did not eliminate the office of the Promoter of the Faith (Latin: Promotor Fidei), popularly known as the
"Devil's Advocate", whose office is to question the material presented in favor of canonization. The reforms were
intended to reduce the adversarial nature of the process. In November 2012 Pope Benedict XVI appointed
Monsignor Carmello Pellegrino as Promoter of the Faith.
Candidates for canonization undergo the following process:
• "Servant of God" ("Servus Dei"): The process of canonization commences at the diocesan level. A bishop
with jurisdiction, usually the bishop of the place where the candidate died or is buried, although another
ordinary can be given this authority, gives permission to open an investigation into the virtues of the
individual in response to a petition of members of the faithful, either actually or pro forma. This
investigation usually commences no sooner than five years after the death of the person being
investigated. The Pope, qua Bishop of Rome, may also open a process and has the authority to waive the
waiting period of five years, e. g., as was done for St. Teresa of Calcutta by Pope St. John Paul II, and for
Lúcia Santos and for Pope John Paul II himself by Pope Benedict XVI. Normally, an association to promote
the cause of the candidate is instituted, an exhaustive search of the candidate's writings, speeches, and

48
 sermons is undertaken, a detailed biography is written, and eyewitness accounts are collected. When
sufficient evidence has been collected, the local bishop presents the investigation of the candidate, who is
titled "Servant of God" (Latin: "Servus Dei"), to the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints of the Roman
Curia, where the cause is assigned a postulator, whose office is to collect further evidence of the life of the
Servant of God. Religious orders that regularly deal with the Congregation often designate their own
Postulator General. At some time, permission is then granted for the body of the Servant of God to be
exhumed and examined. A certification "non cultus" is made that no superstitious or heretical worship, or
improper cult of the Servant of God or his tomb has emerged, and relics are taken and preserved.
• "Venerable" ("Venerabilis"; abbreviated "Ven.") or "Heroic in Virtue": When sufficient evidence has been
collected, the Congregation recommends to the Pope that he proclaim the heroic virtue of the Servant of
God; that is, that the Servant of God exercised to a heroic degree the theological virtues of faith, hope, and
charity and the cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance). From this time the one
said to be "heroic in virtue" is entitled "Venerable" (Latin: "Venerabilis"). A Venerable does not yet have a
feast day, permission to erect churches in his honor has not yet been granted, and the Church does not yet
issue a statement on his probable or certain presence in Heaven, but prayer cards and other materials may
be printed to encourage the faithful to pray for a miracle wrought by his intercession as a sign of God's will
that the person be canonized.
• "Blessed" ("Beatus" or "Beata"; abbreviated "Bl."): Beatification is a statement of the Church that it is
"worthy of belief" that the Venerable is in Heaven and saved. Attaining this grade depends on whether the
Venerable is a martyr:
o For a martyr, the Pope has only to make a declaration of martyrdom, which is a certification that
the Venerable gave his life voluntarily as a witness of the Faith and/or in an act of heroic charity
for others.
o For a non martyr, all of them being denominated "confessors" because they "confessed", i. e., bore
witness to the Faith by how they lived, proof is required of the occurrence of a miracle through the
intercession of the Venerable; that is, that God granted a sign that the person is enjoying the
Beatific Vision by performing a miracle for which the Venerable interceded. Presently, these
miracles are almost always miraculous cures of infirmity, because these are the easiest to judge
given the Church's evidentiary requirements for miracles; e. g., a patient was sick with an illness
for which no cure was known; prayers were directed to the Venerable; the patient was cured; the
cure was spontaneous, instantaneous, complete, and enduring; and physicians cannot discover
any natural explanation therefor.

The satisfaction of the applicable conditions permits beatification, which then bestows on the Venerable
the tile of "Blessed" (Latin: "Beatus" or "Beata"). A feast day will be designated, but its observance is ordinarily
only permitted for the Blessed's home diocese, to specific locations associated with him, and/or to the churches or
houses of the Blessed's religious order if he belonged to one. Parishes may not normally be named in honor of
beati.

• "Saint" ("Sanctus" or "Sancta"; abbreviated "St." or "S."): To be canonized as a saint, ordinarily at least two
miracles must have been performed through the intercession of the Blessed after his death, but for beati
confessors, i. e., beati who were not declared martyrs, only one miracle is required, ordinarily being
additional to that upon which beatification was premised. Very rarely, a pope may waive the requirement

49
 for a second miracle after beatification if he, the Sacred College of Cardinals, and the Congregation for the
Causes of Saints all agree that the Blessed lived a life of great merit proven by certain actions. This
extraordinary procedure was used in Pope Francis' canonization of Pope St. John XXIII, who convoked the
first part of the Second Vatican Council.
Canonization is a statement of the Church that the person certainly enjoys the Beatific Vision of Heaven.
The title of "Saint" (Latin: "Sanctus" or "Sancta") is then proper, reflecting that the Saint is a refulgence of the
holiness (sanctitas) of God Himself, which alone comes from God's gift. The Saint is assigned a feast day which may
be celebrated anywhere in the universal Church, although it is not necessarily added to the General Roman
Calendar or local calendars as an "obligatory" feast; parish churches may be erected in his honor; and the faithful
may freely celebrate and honor the Saint.
Although recognition of sainthood by the Pope does not directly concern a fact of Divine revelation,
nonetheless it must be "definitively held" by the faithful as infallible pursuant to, at the least, the Universal
Magisterium of the Church, because it is a truth related to revelation by historical necessity.
Regarding the Eastern Catholic Churches, individual sui juris churches have the right to "glorify" saints for
their own jurisdictions, though this has rarely happened.[11]

Venerated
Veneration (Latin veneratio or dulia, Greek δουλεία, douleia), or veneration of saints, is the act of honoring a saint,
a person who has been identified as having a high degree of sanctity or holiness. Angels are shown similar
veneration in many religions. Philologically, "to venerate" derives from the Latin verb, venerare, meaning to regard
with reverence and respect. Veneration of saints is practiced, formally or informally, by adherents of some
branches of all major religions, including Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism.
Within Christianity, veneration is practiced by groups such as the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Roman
Catholic, and Eastern Catholic Churches, all of which have varying types of canonization or glorification procedures.
In the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, veneration is shown outwardly by respectfully bowing or making the sign
of the cross before a saint's icon, relics, or statue, or by going on pilgrimage to sites associated with saints. In
general, veneration is not practiced by Protestants, with some denominations considering these practices
heretical.
Veneration towards those who were considered holy began in early Christianity, with the martyrs first
being given special honor. Official church commemoration of saints in Rome beginning as early as the third
century. Over time, the honor also began to be given to those Christians who lived lives of holiness and sanctity.
Various denominations venerate and determine saints in different ways, with some having a formal canonization
or glorification process.
In Roman Catholic and Orthodox theology, veneration is a type of honor distinct from the adoration due to
God alone. According to Deacon Dr. Mark Miravelle, of Franciscan University of Steubenville, the English word
"worship" has been associated with both veneration and adoration:
As St. Thomas Aquinas explains, adoration, which is known as latria in classical theology, is the worship and
homage that is rightly offered to God alone. It is the manifestation of submission, and acknowledgement of
dependence, appropriately shown towards the excellence of an uncreated divine person and to his absolute
Lordship. It is the worship of the Creator that God alone deserves. Although we see in English a broader usage of
the word “adoration” which may not refer to a form of worship exclusive to God—for example, when a husband

50
says that he “adores his wife”—in general it can be maintained that adoration is the best English denotation for
the worship of latria.
Veneration, known as dulia in classical theology, is the honor and reverence appropriately due to the
excellence of a created person. Excellence exhibited by created beings likewise deserves recognition and honor.
We see a general example of veneration in events like the awarding of academic awards for excellence in school,
or the awarding of olympic medals for excellence in sports. There is nothing contrary to the proper adoration of
God when we offer the appropriate honor and recognition that created persons deserve based on achievement in
excellence.
We must make a further clarification regarding the use of the term “worship” in relation to the categories
of adoration and veneration. Historically, schools of theology have used the term “worship” as a general term
which included both adoration and veneration. They would distinguish between “worship of adoration” and
“worship of veneration.” The word “worship” (in a similar way to how the liturgical term “cult” is traditionally
used) was not synonymous with adoration, but could be used to introduce either adoration or veneration. Hence
Catholic sources will sometimes use the term “worship” not to indicate adoration, but only the worship of
veneration given to Mary and the saints.
Church theologians have long adopted the terms latria for the type of worship due to God alone, and dulia
and proskynesis for the veneration given to angels, saints, relics and icons. Catholic and Orthodox theologies also
include the term hyperdulia for the type of veneration specifically paid to Mary, mother of Jesus, in Catholic and
Orthodox traditions. This distinction is spelled out in the dogmatic conclusions of the Seventh Ecumenical Council
(787), which also decreed that iconoclasm, i.e. forbidding icons and their veneration, a dogma central to the
Iconoclastic controversy, is a heresy that amounts to a denial of the incarnation of Jesus.
Now, the Roman Catholic tradition has a well established philosophy for the veneration of the Virgin Mary
via the field of Mariology with Pontifical schools such as the Marianum specifically devoted to this task.[12]

Ecstasy
Religious ecstasy is a type of altered state of consciousness characterized by greatly reduced external awareness
and expanded interior mental and spiritual awareness, frequently accompanied by visions and emotional (and
sometimes physical) euphoria.
Although the experience is usually brief in time, there are records of such experiences lasting several days
or even more, and of recurring experiences of ecstasy during one's lifetime.
A person's sense of time and space disappear during a religious ecstasy forsaking any senses or physical
cognizance in its duration. Among venerated Catholic saints who dabble in Christian mysticism, a person's physical
stature, human sensory, or perception is completely detached from time and space during an ecstatic experience.
In the monotheistic tradition, ecstasy is usually associated with communion and oneness with God.
However, such experiences can also be personal mystical experiences with no significance to anyone but the
person experiencing them. Some charismatic Christians practice ecstatic states (such as "being slain in the Spirit")
and interpret these as given by the Holy Spirit. The firewalkers of Greece dance themselves into a state of ecstasy
at the annual Anastenaria, when they believe themselves under the influence of Saint Constantine.
Historically, large groups of individuals have experienced religious ecstasies during periods of Christian
revivals, to the point of causing controversy as to the origin and nature of these experiences. In response to claims
that all emotional expressions of religious ecstasy were attacks on order and theological soundness from the Devil,
Jonathan Edwards published his now famous and influential Treatise on Religious Affections. Here, he argues,

51
religious ecstasy could come from oneself, the Devil, or God, and it was only by observing the fruit, or changes in
inner thought and behaviour, that one could determine if the religious ecstasy had come from God.
In modern Pentecostal, charismatic and spirit filled Christianity, numerous examples of religious ecstasy
have transpired, similar to historic revivals. These occurrences however, have changed significantly since the time
of the Toronto Blessing phenomena and several other North American so called revivals and outpourings from the
mid 1990s. From that time, religious ecstasy in these movements has been characterized by increasingly bizarre
behaviors that are understood by adherents to be the anointing of the holy spirit and evidence of God 'doing a
new work'. One of the most controversial and strange examples is that of spiritual birthing a highly bizarre
practice during which women, and at times even men, claim to be having actual contractions of the womb while
they moan and retch as though experiencing childbirth. It is said to be a prophetic action bringing spiritual
blessings from God into the world. Many believe spiritual birthing to be highly demonic in nature and more occult
like than Christian. Religious ecstasy in these Christian movements has also been witnessed in the form of
squealing, shrieking, an inability to stand or sit, uttering apocalyptic prophecies, holy laughter, crying and barking.
Some people have made dramatic claims of sighting 'gold dust', 'angel feathers', 'holy clouds', or the spontaneous
appearance of precious gem stones during ecstatic worship events. Others have claimed to have received
spontaneous gold tooth fillings. The Range Christian Fellowship in the conservative Australian city of Toowoomba
demonstrates such displays of religious ecstasy on an almost weekly basis. In addition to all of the above,
worshippers there also use textile banners and during moments of religious ecstasy believe these banners carry
special powers of 'anointing' as a result of divinely inspired artwork. Adherents in this church, who are caught up
in such religious ecstasy are free to put forward virtually any statement as a 'revelation', 'word from the Lord', or
prophecy without being challenged and bible verses are used in a highly selective manner, at times out of context,
to justify these statements. This in turn, provides great scope for those who deem themselves as being 'in the river'
to exercise a form of spiritual elitism that becomes quite cultish in practice.
In hagiography (writings about Christian saints) many instances are recorded in which saints are granted
ecstasies. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia religious ecstasy (called "supernatural ecstasy") includes two
elements: one, interior and invisible, in which the mind rivets its attention on a religious subject, and another,
corporeal and visible, in which the activity of the senses is suspended, reducing the effect of external sensations
upon the subject and rendering him or her resistant to awakening. The witnesses of a Marian apparition often
describe experiencing these elements of ecstasy.
Modern Witchcraft traditions may define themselves as "ecstatic traditions," and focus on reaching
ecstatic states in their rituals. The Reclaiming Tradition and the Feri Tradition are two modern ecstatic Witchcraft
examples.[13]

The Councils
Nature of Catholic Ecumenical Councils
• Theism – belief that there is at least one God
• Monotheism – belief that there is only one God
• Abrahamic Religions – monotheistic religions claiming Abraham as a forebear
• Christianity – monotheistic religion proclaiming Jesus Christ, a descendant of Abraham, as the Son of God
• Catholicism – largest branch of Christianity
• Ecumenical Councils – councils of bishops convened by the Catholic Church to address theological and
other concerns of the Church

52
First Seven Ecumenical Councils
First Council of Nicaea (325 A.D.)
• Arianism – the belief that the Son of God did not always exist, but was created by—and is therefore
distinct from—God the Father. The First Council of Nicaea declared this belief heretical, as did the First
Council of Constantinople.
• Easter date – the date for celebrating Easter was chosen so as not to conflict or be on the same day as the
Jewish Passover.
• Meletius of Lycopolis – bishop of Lycopolis in Egypt. Founder and namesake of the Melitians, who refused
to refuse to receive in communion those Christians who had renounced their faith during the persecution
and later repented of that choice.
• Nicene Creed – the declaration of the faith of the church
• Canon Law – body of laws, regulations, or disciplines made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority. 20 were
issued by this Council, including several addressing the primacy of Roman, Antochian, and Alexandrian
patriarchs.
First Council of Constantinople (381 A.D.)
• Arianism – the belief that the Son of God did not always exist, but was created by—and is therefore
distinct from—God the Father. The First Council of Nicaea declared this belief heretical, as did the First
Council of Constantinople.
• Macedonianism – also known as Pneumatomachi; an anti Nicene Creed sect which flourished in the
countries adjacent to the Hellespont during the latter half of the fourth, and the beginning of the fifth
century. They denied the divinity of the Holy Ghost, hence the Greek name Pneumatomachi or 'Combators
against the Spirit'.
First Council of Ephesus (431 A.D.)
• Nestorius – teachings included rejection of the long used title of Theotokos ("Mother of God") for the
Virgin Mary, and were understood by many to imply that he did not believe that Christ was truly God. The
Council formally condemned him and his followers for heresy.
• Nestorianism – emphasizes the disunion between the human and divine natures of Jesus.
• Caelestius – major follower of the Christian teacher Pelagius and the Christian doctrine of Pelagianism,
which was opposed to Augustine of Hippo and his doctrine in original sin, and was later declared to be
heresy. He and his followers were declared heretics during this council.
• Nicene Creed – the declaration of the faith of the church confirmed. Departure from the creed decreed as
heretical.
• excommunication – eviction from the church. This was the punishment decreed at this council for those
who did not accept Church doctrine
• The Virgin Mary – Mary, mother of Jesus. This council decreed she is to be called Theotokos (God bearer)
Council of Chalcedon (451 A.D.)
• Chalcedonian Creed – declares that Jesus Christ is both truly God and truly Man
• Canon Laws – body of laws, regulations, or disciplines made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority. 27 were
issued by this council.
Second Council of Constantinople (553 A.D.)

53
 • Three Chapters – three people and their writings – person and writings of Theodore of
Mopsuestia,Certain writings of Theodoret of Cyrus,The letter of Ibas of Edessa to Maris – repudiated as
Nestorian
Third Council of Constantinople (680 681 A.D.)
• Monothelitism – teaches that Jesus Christ had two natures but only one will. This council repudiated
this belief.
• Monoenergism – teaches that Jesus had two natures but only one "energy." This council repudiated
this belief.
Second Council of Nicaea (787 A.D.)
• Byzantine Iconoclasm – the practice of destroying icons and images. This council repudiated this belief.
• relics part of the body of a saint or a venerated person, or else another type of ancient religious object,
carefully preserved for purposes of veneration or as a tangible memorial. This council decreed that
altars must contain a relic.
• Canon Laws – body of laws, regulations, or disciplines made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority. 22
were issued by this council.
Other Catholic Ecumenical Councils
Fourth Council of Constantinople (869 870 A.D.)
• Photius – Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople from 858 to 867 and from 877 to 886. He is recognized in
the Eastern Orthodox churches and Byzantine Catholic churches as St. Photios the Great. Photios was
condemned by this council.
• Byzantine Iconoclasm – ban on religious images, accompanied by widespread destruction of images and
persecution of supporters of the veneration of images. This council reaffirmed the repudiation of this
practice by Second Nicene Council.
First Council of the Lateran (1123 A.D.)
• Investiture controversy – conflict over two radically different views of whether secular authorities such as
kings, counts, or dukes, had any legitimate role in appointments to ecclesiastical offices such as bishops.
• Burdinus – Gregory VIII (died 1137), born Mauritius Burdinus (Maurice Bourdin), was antipope from 10
March 1118 until 22 April 1121. The First Lateran Council affirmed his excommunication.
• Concordat of Worms – agreement between Pope Calixtus II and Holy Roman Emperor Henry V on
September 23, 1122 near the city of Worms. During the First Lateran Council, decisions of the Concordat of
Worms were read and ratified.
• Simony – act of paying for sacraments and consequently for holy offices or for positions in the hierarchy of
a church, named after Simon Magus. The First Lateran Council condemned the practice.
• Clerical celibacy – requirement that some or all members of the clergy in certain religions be unmarried.
Celibacy of the clergy was ordered by Canon Law issued by the First Council of the Lateran.
• Canon Law – body of laws and regulations made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority. 22 canon laws were
issued by the council.
Second Council of the Lateran (1139 A.D.)
• Council of Reims – council at which St. Bernard appeared, and the antipope Anacletus was
excommunicated. Its decrees affirmed by the Second Council of the Lateran.

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 • Council of Clermont – mixed synod of ecclesiastics and laymen of the Catholic Church, which was held from
November 18 to November 28, 1095 at Clermont, France. Pope Urban II's speech on November 27 was the
starting point of the First Crusade. Its decrees were affirmed by the Second Lateran Council.
• Canon Laws – body of laws, regulations, or disciplines made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority. The
Second Lateran Council issued 30.
Third Council of the Lateran (1179)
• Waldensian – Christian movement of the later Middle Ages. They made profession of extreme poverty a
prominent feature in their own lives, and emphasized by their practice the need for the much neglected
task of preaching. This heresy condemned by the Third Lateran Council.
• Cathar – Christian religious movement with dualistic and gnostic elements that appeared in the Languedoc
region of France and other parts of Europe in the 11th century and flourished in the 12th and 13th
centuries. This heresy condemned by the Third Lateran Council.
• cardinals – senior ecclesiastical official, usually an ordained bishop, and ecclesiastical prince of the Catholic
Church. They are collectively known as the College of Cardinals, which as a body elects a new pope. The
Third Lateran Council decreed that they only could elect a pope, by at least two thirds majority.
• antipopes – person who opposes a legitimately elected or sitting Pope and makes a significantly accepted
competing claim to be the Pope. The Third Lateran Council decreed that ordinations made by them are
void.
• usury – practice of charging excessive, unreasonably high, and often illegal interest rates on loans. This
council forbade the practice.
• Canon Laws – body of laws and regulations made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority. This council issued
27.
Fourth Council of the Lateran (1215)
• transubstantiation – doctrine that, in the Eucharist, the substance of wheat bread and grape wine changes
into the substance of the Body and the Blood of Jesus. The Fourth Council of the Lateran defined this
doctrine.
• Papal primacy – ecclesiastical doctrine concerning the respect and authority that is due to the Bishop of
Rome from other bishops and their sees. The Fourth Council of the Lateran declared this doctrine.
• confession – acknowledgment of sin (or one's sinfulness) or wrongs. The Fourth Council of the Lateran
declare that every Christian must perform confession at least once a year.
• communion – Christian sacrament or ordinance. The Fourth Council of the Lateran declare that every
Christian must take communion at least once a year.
• Papal decrees – particular type of letters patent or charter issued by a Pope of the Catholic Church. The
Fourth Council of the Lateran issued 70.
• Fifth crusade – attempt to reacquire Jerusalem and the rest of the Holy Land by first conquering the
powerful Ayyubid state in Egypt. The Fourth Council of the Lateran organized this effort.
• First Council of Lyon (1245)
• Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor – one of the most powerful Holy Roman Emperors of the Middle Ages
and head of the House of Hohenstaufen. He excommunicated and deposed at the First Council of Lyon.
• Seventh Crusade – crusade led by Louis IX of France from 1248 to 1254. The First Council of Lyons decreed
this Crusade.
Second Council of Lyon (1274)

55
 • Dominican Order – Roman Catholic religious order founded by Saint Dominic and approved by Pope
Honorius III (1216–27) on 22 December 1216 in France. The Second Council of Lyon approved the
establishment of this order.
• Franciscan – Roman Catholic religious orders founded by Saint Francis of Assisi. The Second Council of Lyon
approved the establishment of this order.
• tithe for crusade – The Second Council of Lyon approved the collection of a tithe to fund a crusade.
• Council of Vienne (1311–1312)
• Knights Templar – among the most famous of the Western Christian military orders. The organization
existed for nearly two centuries during the Middle Ages. The Council of Vienne disbanded them at the
behest of Philip II of France, who promptly seized their lands, arrested them, and burned many at the
stake.
• Council of Constance (1414–1418)
• Western Schism – also known as the Three Popes Controversy, was a split within the Catholic Church from
1378 to 1417. Two men simultaneously claimed to be the true pope. The Council of Constance resolved
this problem.
• Jan Hus – Czech priest, philosopher, reformer, and master at Charles University in Prague. After John
Wycliffe, the theorist of ecclesiastical Reformation, Hus is considered the first Church reformer (living prior
to Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli). The Council of Constance condemned him and burned him at the stake.
• Conciliarism – reform movement in the 14th, 15th and 16th century Catholic Church which held that
supreme authority in the Church resided with an Ecumenical council, apart from, or even against, the
pope. Council of Constance (1414–1418), which succeeded in ending the Great Western Schism,
proclaimed its own superiority over the Pope.
Council of Basel, Ferrara and Florence (1431–1445)
• Conciliarism – reform movement in the 14th, 15th and 16th century Catholic Church which held that
supreme authority in the Church resided with an Ecumenical council, apart from, or even against, the
pope. The Council of Florence denied this doctrine, and superiority of the Pope over the Councils was
affirmed in the bull Etsi non dubitemus of 20 April 1441..
• Fifth Council of the Lateran (1512–1517)
• Mount of piety – institutional pawnbroker run as a charity in Europe from the later Middle Ages times to
the 20th century. Allowed by the Fifth Council of the Lateran.
• Immortality of the soul Immortality of the soul – souls temporarily stay in purgatory to be purified for
heaven
Council of Trent (1545–1563, with interruptions)
• Protestantism – one of the major groupings within Christianity. It has been defined as "any of several
church denominations denying the universal authority of the Pope and affirming the Reformation
principles of justification by faith alone, the priesthood of all believers, and the primacy of the Bible as the
only source of revealed truth" and, more broadly, to mean Christianity outside "of a Catholic or Eastern
church". This set of beliefs was condemned by the Council of Trent.
• indulgences – indulgence is the full or partial remission of temporal punishment due for sins which have
already been forgiven. The Council of Trent curtailed and restricted how they are issued.
• sola fide – Protestant doctrine of "faith alone." The Council of Trent rejected this doctrine as "vain
confidence."

56
 • Canon of Trent – confirmed that the deuterocanonical books were on a par with the other books of the
canon; ended debate on the Antilegomena; coordinated church tradition with the Scriptures as a rule of
faith. It also affirmed Jerome's Latin translation, the Vulgate, to be authoritative for the text of Scripture
• sacraments – sacred rite recognized as of particular importance and significance; the Council of Trent
reaffirmed seven sacraments.
• purgatory – condition of purification or temporary punishment by which those who die in a state of grace
are believed to be made ready for Heaven. The Council of Trent affirmed this doctrine.
First Council of the Vatican (1870; officially, 1870–1960)
• Papal infallibility – dogma of the Catholic Church which states that, by action of the Holy Spirit, the Pope is
preserved from even the possibility of error when in his official capacity he solemnly declares or
promulgates to the universal Church a dogmatic teaching on faith or morals.
• Dei Filius – teaching of "the holy Catholic Apostolic Roman Church" on God, revelation and faith.
Second Vatican Council (1962–1965)
Four Constitutions
Dei verbum – dogmatic constitution on Divine Revelation
Lumen gentium – dogmatic constitution on the Church
Gaudium et spes – pastoral constitution on the Church in the Modern World
Sacrosanctum Concilium – constitution on the sacred liturgy
Nine Decrees
Ad gentes – decree on Church's missionary activity
Apostolicam actuositatem – decree on apostolate of the laity
Christus Dominus – decree on pastoral office of bishops in the church
Inter mirifica – decree on means of social communication
Optatam totius – decree on training of priests
Orientalium Ecclesiarum – decree on the Catholic Oriental Churches
Perfectae caritatis – decree on up to date renewal of religious life
Presbyterorum ordinis – decree on life and ministry of priests
Unitatis redintegratio – decree on ecumenism
Three Declarations
Dignitatis humanae – declaration on religious liberty
Gravissimum educationis – declaration on Christian education
Nostra aetate – declaration on Church's relation with non Christian religions[14]

Catholic Church Hierarchy

The Catholic Church is composed of dioceses, each overseen by a bishop. Dioceses are divided into individual
communities called parishes, each staffed by one or more priests. Priests may be assisted by deacons.
• Pope – The Pope (a child's word for father) is the Bishop of Rome and the leader of the worldwide Catholic
Church.
• Cardinal (Catholicism) – A cardinal is a senior ecclesiastical official, usually an ordained bishop, and
ecclesiastical prince of the Catholic Church.
• Patriarchs – Originally, a patriarch was a man who exercised autocratic authority as a pater familias over
an extended family.

57
 • Major archbishops – In the Eastern Catholic Churches, major archbishop is a title for an hierarch to whose
archiepiscopal see is granted the same jurisdiction in his autonomous (sui juris) particular Church that an
Eastern patriarch has in his.
• Primate (bishop) – Primate is a title or rank bestowed on some bishops in certain Christian churches.
• Metropolitan bishop – In Christian churches with episcopal polity, the rank of metropolitan bishop, or
simply metropolitan, pertains to the diocesan bishop or archbishop (then more precisely called
metropolitan archbishop) of a metropolis; that is, the chief city of a historical Roman province,
ecclesiastical province, or regional capital.
• Archbishops – An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of
the three orders of deacon, priest (presbyter), and bishop.
• Bishop (Catholic Church) – In the Catholic Church, a bishop is an ordained minister who holds the fullness
of the sacrament of Holy Orders and is responsible for teaching doctrine, governing Catholics in his
jurisdiction, and sanctifying the world and for representing the Church.
• Priest (Catholic Church) – The ministerial orders of the Roman Catholic Church include the orders of
bishops, deacons and presbyters. The ordained priesthood and common priesthood (or priesthood of all
the baptized) are different in function and essence.
• Deacon – The diaconate (deacons) is one of the major orders in the Catholic, Anglican, Eastern Orthodox,
and Oriental Orthodox churches.
Catechism of the Catholic Church – catechism promulgated for the Catholic Church by Pope John Paul II in 1992. A
catechism is a summary or exposition of doctrine and serves as a learning introduction to the Sacraments
traditionally used in catechesis, or Christian religious teaching of children and adult converts.
• Nicene Creed – The Nicene Creed is the creed or profession of faith that is most widely used in Christian
liturgy. It is called Nicene because, in its original form, it was adopted in the city of Nicaea by the first
ecumenical council, which met there in the year 325.
• Catholic theology of the body – In Roman Catholicism, the Theology of the Body is based on the premise
that the human body has its origin in God.
• Divine grace – Divine grace is a theological term which is present in many and varied spiritual traditions.
• Roman Catholic dogma – In the Roman Catholic Church, a dogma is an article of faith revealed by God,
which the magisterium of the Church presents to be believed.
• Four Marks of the Church – The Four Marks of the Church is a term describing four specific adjectives one,
holy, catholic and apostolic indicating four major distinctive marks or distinguishing characteristics of the
Christian Church.
• Original sin – Original sin is, according to a Christian theological doctrine, humanity's state of sin resulting
from the Fall of Man.
• Salvation – Salvation, in religion, is the saving of the soul from sin and its consequences.
• Sermon on the Mount – The Sermon on the Mount (anglicized from the Matthean Vulgate Latin section
title: Sermo in monte) is a collection of sayings and teachings of Jesus, which emphasizes his moral
teaching found in the Gospel of Matthew (chapters 5, 6 and 7).
• Ten Commandments – The Ten Commandments, also known as the Decalogue, are a set of biblical
principles relating to ethics and worship, which play a fundamental role in Judaism and most forms of
Christianity.
• Trinity – The doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons: the Father, the Son (Jesus Christ),
and the Holy Spirit.

58
 • Christian worship – In Christianity, worship is adoration and contemplation of God.
• Catechism of the Catholic Church – The Catechism of the Catholic Church (or CCC) is the official text of the
teachings of the Catholic Church.
• Papal infallibility – Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church which states that, by action of the
Holy Spirit, the Pope is preserved from even the possibility of error when in his official capacity he
solemnly declares or promulgates to the universal Church a dogmatic teaching on faith or morals.
Doctor of the Church – title given by a variety of Christian churches to individuals whom they recognize as having
been of particular importance, particularly regarding their contribution to theology or doctrine.
• Albertus Magnus – Albertus Magnus, O.P. (1193/1206 November 15, 1280), also known as Albert the
Great and Albert of Cologne, is a Catholic saint.
• Ambrose – Aurelius Ambrosius, better known in English as Saint Ambrose (c. between 337 and 340 4 April
397), was a bishop of Milan who became one of the most influential ecclesiastical figures of the 4th
century. He was one of the four original doctors of the Church.
• Anselm of Canterbury – Anselm of Canterbury (Aosta c. 1033 Canterbury 21 April 1109), also called of
Aosta for his birthplace, and of Bec for his home monastery, was a Benedictine monk, a philosopher, and a
prelate of the Church who held the office of Archbishop of Canterbury from 1093 to 1109.
• Anthony of Padua – Anthony of Padua or Anthony of Lisbon, O.F.M., (15 August 1195 13 June 1231) was a
Portuguese Catholic priest and friar of the Franciscan Order.
• Thomas Aquinas – Thomas Aquinas, O.P. (1225 7 March 1274), also Thomas of Aquin or Aquino, was an
Italian Dominican priest of the Roman Catholic Church, and an immensely influential philosopher and
theologian in the tradition of scholasticism, known as Doctor Angelicus ([the] Angelic Doctor), Doctor
Communis, or Doctor Universalis.
• Athanasius of Alexandria – Athanasius of Alexandria (b. ca. 296 298 d. 2 May 373) is also given the titles
St. Athanasius the Great, St. Athanasius I of Alexandria, St Athanasius the Confessor and (in the Coptic
Orthodox Church, mainly) St Athanasius the Apostolic.
• Augustine of Hippo – Augustine of Hippo (November 13, 354 August 28, 430), also known as Augustine,
St. Augustine, St. Austin, St. Augoustinos, Blessed Augustine, or St. Augustine the Blessed, was Bishop of
Hippo Regius (present day Annaba, Algeria). He was a Latin philosopher and theologian from Roman Africa.
His writings were very influential in the development of Western Christianity.
• Basil of Caesarea – Basil of Caesarea, also called Saint Basil the Great, (329 or 330 January 1, 379) was the
Greek bishop of Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia, Asia Minor (modern day Turkey).
• Bede – Bede (672/673 26 May 735), also referred to as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede, was an English
monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth and of its companion monastery,
Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow (see Monkwearmouth Jarrow), both in the Kingdom of Northumbria.
• Robert Bellarmine – Robert Bellarmine (full name in Italian: Roberto Francesco Romolo Bellarmino) (4
October 1542 17 September 1621) was an Italian Jesuit and a Cardinal of the Catholic Church.
• Bernard of Clairvaux – Bernard of Clairvaux, O.Cist (1090 August 20, 1153) was a French abbot and the
primary builder of the reforming Cistercian order.
• Bonaventure – A series of articles on Christian mysticism
• Petrus Canisius – Peter Canisius, S.J. (Dutch: Pieter Kanis), (8 May 1521 21 December 1597) was an
important Jesuit Catholic priest who fought against the spread of Protestantism in Germany, Austria,
Bohemia, Moravia, and Switzerland.
• Catherine of Siena –

59
 • Peter Chrysologus – Peter Chrysologus (c. 380 c. 450) was Bishop of Ravenna from about AD 433 until his
death.
• John Chrysostom – John Chrysostom (c. 347 407), Archbishop of Constantinople, was an important Early
Church Father.
• Cyril of Alexandria – Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376 444) was the Patriarch of Alexandria from 412 to 444.
• Cyril of Jerusalem – Cyril of Jerusalem was a distinguished theologian of the early Church (ca. 313 386).
• Peter Damian – Saint Peter Damian, O.S.B. (Petrus Damiani, also Pietro Damiani or Pier Damiani; c. 1007
February 21/22, 1072) was a reforming monk in the circle of Pope Gregory VII and a cardinal.
• Ephrem the Syrian – 28 January (Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Catholic Churches) 7th Saturday before
Easter (Syriac Orthodox Church) June 9 (Roman Catholic Church)
• Francis de Sales – Francis de Sales, T.O.M., A.O.F.M. Cap., (August 21, 1567 December 28, 1622) was a
Bishop of Geneva and is honored as a saint in the Roman Catholic Church.
• Gregory of Nazianzus – Gregory of Nazianzus (c. 329 January 25 389 or 390) was a 4th century Archbishop
of Constantinople.
• Pope Gregory I – Pope Gregory I (Latin: Gregorius I) (c. 540 12 March 604), better known in English as
Gregory the Great, was pope from 3 September 590 until his death.
• Hilary of Poitiers – Hilary of Poitiers (c. 300 c. 368) was Bishop of Poitiers and is a Doctor of the Church.
• Isidore of Seville – Saint Isidore of Seville (c. 560 4 April 636) served as Archbishop of Seville for more than
three decades and is considered, as the historian Montalembert put it in an oft quoted phrase, "le dernier
savant du monde ancien" ("the last scholar of the ancient world").
• Jerome – Saint Jerome (ca 347 30 September 420) was a Roman Christian priest, confessor, theologian
and historian, and who became a Doctor of the Church.
• John of Damascus – Saint John of Damascus (c. 645 or 676 4 December 749) was a Syrian monk and
priest.
• John of the Cross – John of the Cross (San Juan de la Cruz) (24 June 1542 14 December 1591), born Juan
de Yepes Álvarez, was a major figure of the Counter Reformation, a Spanish mystic, Catholic saint,
Carmelite friar and priest, born at Fontiveros, Old Castile.
• Lawrence of Brindisi – Saint Lawrence of Brindisi, O.F.M. Cap., (July 22, 1559, Brindisi, Apulia July 22,
1619), born Giulio Cesare Russo, was a Catholic priest and a member of the Order of Friars Minor
Capuchin.
• Pope Leo I – Pope Leo I, also known as Leo the Great (c. 391 or 400 10 November 461) was the Bishop of
Rome the Pope of the Catholic Church from 29 September 440 to his death on 10 November 461.
• Alphonsus Maria de Liguori – Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori (September 27, 1696 August 1, 1787) was
an Italian Catholic bishop, spiritual writer, scholastic philosopher and theologian, and founder of the
Redemptorists, an influential religious congregation.
• Teresa of Avila – Saint Teresa of Avila (March 28, 1515 October 4, 1582) was a prominent Spanish mystic,
Roman Catholic saint, Carmelite nun, and writer of the Counter Reformation, and theologian of
contemplative life through mental prayer.
• Thérèse of Lisieux – Saint Thérèse of Lisieux (2 January 1873 30 September 1897), or Saint Thérèse of the
Child Jesus and the Holy Face, was a French Carmelite nun.
Religious institute – "a society in which members...pronounce public vows...and lead a life of brothers or sisters in
common".

60
 • Assumptionists – a congregation of Catholic religious, founded by Fr. d'Alzon in 1845 and initially approved
by Rome in 1857.
• Augustinians – two separate and unrelated types of Catholic religious orders: several orders of mendicants,
and various congregations of clerics following the Rule of St. Augustine.
• Benedictines – the spirituality and consecrated life in accordance with the Rule of St Benedict
• Carmelites – a Catholic religious order said to be founded in the 12th century on Mount Carmel.
• Carthusians – also called the Order of St. Bruno. A Roman Catholic religious order of enclosed monastics.
• Congregation of Holy Cross – a Catholic congregation of priests and brothers founded in 1837 by Blessed
Father Basil Moreau
• Dominican Order – a Catholic religious order founded by Saint Dominic.
• Franciscan – members of Roman Catholic religious orders founded by Saint Francis of Assisi.
• Oratory of Saint Philip Neri – a society of apostolic life of Catholic priests and lay brothers
• Order of Friars Minor Capuchin – an Order of friars in the Catholic Church, a major offshoot of the
Franciscans.
• Society of apostolic life – a group of men or women within the Catholic Church who have come together
for a specific purpose.
• Society of Jesus – a Roman Catholic religious order founded by St. Ignatius of Loyola.[15]

Chapter 3
The Holy Sacraments
(Sacred Mystery)
Transubstantiation
In 1215, the church declared transubstantiation doctrine, claiming that the bread and wine were
transformed into the actual body and blood of Christ. [16]
Transubstantiation (in Latin, transubstantiation, in Greek μετουσίωσις metousiosis) is, according to the teachings
of the Catholic Church, the change of substance by which the bread and the wine offered in the sacrifice of the
sacrament of the Eucharist during the Mass, become, in reality, the body and blood of Jesus the Christ.
The Catholic Church teaches that the substance, or essence, of the Eucharistic offering is changed into
both the body and blood of Christ. Belief in this doctrine was made obligatory by the Fourth Council of the Lateran
in 1215, and was later challenged by various 15th century reformers—John Wycliffe in particular.
The manner in which the change occurs, the Catholic Church teaches, is a mystery: "The signs of bread and
wine become, in a way surpassing understanding, the Body and Blood of Christ." The precise terminology to be
used to refer to the nature of the Eucharist, and its theological implications, has a contentious history especially in
the Protestant Reformation.
In the Greek Orthodox Church, the doctrine has been discussed under the term of metousiosis, coined as a
direct loan translation of transsubstantiatio in the 17th century. In Eastern Orthodoxy in general, the Eucharist is
more commonly discussed using alternative terms such as "trans elementation" (μεταστοιχείωσις,

61
metastoicheiosis), "re ordination" (μεταρρύθμισις, metarrhythmisis), or simply "change" (μεταβολή,
metabole).
The Last Supper (upper image) and preparatory washing of feet (lower image) in a 1220 manuscript in the
Badische Landesbibliothek
The doctrine of transubstantiation is the result of a theological dispute started in the 11th century, when
Berengar of Tours denied that any material change in the elements was needed to explain the Eucharistic
Presence, thereby provoking a considerable stir. Berengar's position was never diametrically opposed to that of his
critics, and he was probably never excommunicated, but the controversies that he aroused (see Stercoranism)
forced people to clarify the doctrine of the Eucharist. The earliest known use of the term "transubstantiation" to
describe the change from bread and wine to body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist was by Hildebert de
Lavardin, Archbishop of Tours, in the 11th century. By the end of the 12th century the term was in widespread use.
The Fourth Council of the Lateran in 1215 spoke of the bread and wine as "transubstantiated" into the
body and blood of Christ: "His body and blood are truly contained in the sacrament of the altar under the forms of
bread and wine, the bread and wine having been transubstantiated, by God's power, into his body and blood". It
was only later, in the 13th century, that Aristotelian metaphysics was accepted and a philosophical elaboration in
line with that metaphysics was developed, which found classic formulation in the teaching of Thomas Aquinas."
During the Protestant Reformation, the doctrine of transubstantiation was heavily criticised as an
Aristotelian "pseudophilosophy" imported into Christian teaching and jettisoned in favor of Martin Luther's
doctrine of sacramental union, or in favor, per Huldrych Zwingli, of the Eucharist as memorial.

Title page of Martin Luther's De Captivitate Babylonica Ecclesiae.

In the Protestant Reformation, the doctrine of transubstantiation became a matter of much controversy.
Martin Luther held that "It is not the doctrine of transubstantiation which is to be believed, but simply that Christ
really is present at the Eucharist". In his "On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church" (published on 6 October 1520)
Luther wrote:

Therefore, it is an absurd and unheard of juggling with words, to understand "bread" to mean "the form,
or accidents of bread," and "wine" to mean "the form, or accidents of wine." Why do they not also understand all
other things to mean their forms, or accidents? Even if this might be done with all other things, it would yet not be
right thus to emasculate the words of God and arbitrarily to empty them of their meaning.
Moreover, the Church had the true faith for more than twelve hundred years, during which time the holy
Fathers never once mentioned this transubstantiation — certainly, a monstrous word for a monstrous idea — until
the pseudo philosophy of Aristotle became rampant in the Church these last three hundred years. During these
centuries many other things have been wrongly defined, for example, that the Divine essence neither is begotten
nor begets, that the soul is the substantial form of the human body, and the like assertions, which are made
without reason or sense, as the Cardinal of Cambray himself admits.

In his 1528 Confession Concerning Christ's Supper he wrote:

Why then should we not much more say in the Supper, "This is my body", even though bread and body are
two distinct substances, and the word "this" indicates the bread? Here, too, out of two kinds of objects a union has
taken place, which I shall call a "sacramental union", because Christ's body and the bread are given to us as a
sacrament. This is not a natural or personal union, as is the case with God and Christ. It is also perhaps a different

62
union from that which the dove has with the Holy Spirit, and the flame with the angel, but it is also assuredly a
sacramental union.
What Luther thus called a "sacramental union" is often erroneously called consubstantiation by non
Lutherans. In "On the Babylonian Captivity", Luther upheld belief in the Real Presence of Jesus and, in his 1523
treatise The Adoration of the Sacrament, defended adoration of the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist.
Huldrych Zwingli taught that the sacrament is purely symbolic and memorial in character, arguing that this was the
meaning of Jesus' instruction: "Do this in remembrance of me". The 39 articles of 1563, the Church of England
declared: "Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of Bread and Wine) in the Supper of the Lord,
cannot be proved by holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a
Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions"; and made Mass illegal.[17]

The Eucharist
The Eucharist /ˈjuːkərɪst/ (also called Holy Communion, the Lord's Supper, among other names) is a Christian rite
that is considered a sacrament in most churches and an ordinance in others. According to the New Testament, the
rite was instituted by Jesus Christ during his Last Supper; giving his disciples bread and wine during the Passover
meal, Jesus commanded his followers to "do this in memory of me" while referring to the bread as "my body" and
the wine as "my blood". Through the Eucharistic celebration Christians remember Christ's sacrifice of himself on
the cross.
The elements of the Eucharist, bread (leavened or unleavened) and wine (or grape juice), are consecrated
on an altar (or table) and consumed thereafter. Communicants (that is, those who consume the elements) may
speak of "receiving the Eucharist", as well as "celebrating the Eucharist". Christians generally recognize a special
presence of Christ in this rite, though they differ about exactly how, where, and when Christ is present. While all
agree that there is no perceptible change in the elements, Catholics believe that they actually become the body
and blood of Christ. Lutherans believe the true body and blood of Christ are really present in, with, and under the
bread and wine. Reformed Christians believe in a real but purely spiritual presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
Others, such as the Plymouth Brethren, take the act to be only a symbolic reenactment of the Last Supper.
In spite of differences between Christians about various aspects of the Eucharist, there is, according to the
Encyclopædia Britannica, "more of a consensus among Christians about the meaning of the Eucharist than would
appear from the confessional debates over the sacramental presence, the effects of the Eucharist, and the proper
auspices under which it may be celebrated."
Many Christian denominations classify the Eucharist as a sacrament. Some Protestants (though not all)
prefer to instead call it an ordinance, viewing it not as a specific channel of divine grace but as an expression of
faith and of obedience to Christ.
Most Christians, even those who deny that there is any real change in the elements used, recognize a
special presence of Christ in this rite. But Christians differ about exactly how, where and how long Christ is present
in it. Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and the Church of the East teach that the reality (the
"substance") of the elements of bread and wine is wholly changed into the body and blood of Jesus Christ, while
the appearances (the "species") remain. Transubstantiation (change of the reality) is the term used by Catholics to
denote what is changed, not to explain how the change occurs, since the Catholic Church teaches that "the signs of
bread and wine become, in a way surpassing understanding, the Body and Blood of Christ". Lutherans and
Reformed Christians believe that the whole Christ, including the body and blood of Jesus, are present in the
supper, a concept known as the sacramental union. Lutherans specify that Christ is "in, with and under" the forms
of bread and wine. Anglicans adhere to a range of views although the teaching in the Articles of Religion holds that
63
body of Christ is present, yet only in a heavenly and spiritual manner. Some Christians reject the concept of the
real presence, believing that the Eucharist is only a ceremonial remembrance or memorial of the death of Christ.
The Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry document of the World Council of Churches, attempting to present
the common understanding of the Eucharist on the part of the generality of Christians, describes it as "essentially
the sacrament of the gift which God makes to us in Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit", "Thanksgiving to
the Father", "Anamnesis or Memorial of Christ", "the sacrament of the unique sacrifice of Christ, who ever lives to
make intercession for us", "the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, the sacrament of his real presence",
"Invocation of the Spirit", "Communion of the Faithful", and "Meal of the Kingdom".

Fig. 5.). The Austrian nun Agnes Blannbekin claimed to taste Christ while eating the Eucharist & described drinking
a “refreshing spiritual drink” from his spear wound. She would have orgasms whenever Jesus appeared to her. She
was obsessed with the Holy Prepuce & claimed to have felt the foreskin of Jesus in her mouth and to have
swallowed it over 100 times. Drawing done by Milo Manara
The Catholic Church teaches that once consecrated in the Eucharist, the elements cease to be bread and
wine and become the "Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity" of Christ, "whole and entire" indeed under the species of
bread, and of wine, via a conversion called transubstantiation. Each of which is accompanied by the other and by
Christ's soul and divinity, as long as the Eucharistic species subsist, that is, until the Eucharist is digested, physically
destroyed, or decays by some natural process (at which point Aquinas argued that the substance of the bread and
wine cannot return). The empirical appearance and physical properties (called the species or accidents) are not
changed, but in the view of Catholics, the reality (called the substance) indeed is; hence the term
transubstantiation to describe the phenomenon. The consecration of the bread (known as the Host) and wine
represents the separation of Jesus' Body from his Blood at Calvary. However, since he has risen, the Church
teaches that his Body and Blood can no longer be truly separated. Where one is, the other must be. Therefore,
although the priest (or extraordinary minister of Holy Communion) says "The Body of Christ" when administering
the Host and "The Blood of Christ" when presenting the chalice, the communicant who receives either one
receives Christ, whole and entire.

64
 The Catholic Church sees as the main basis for this belief the words of Jesus himself at his Last Supper: the
Synoptic Gospels (Matthew 26:26 28; Mark 14:22 24; Luke 22:19 20) and Saint Paul's 1 Cor. 11:23 25) recount that
in that context Jesus said of what to all appearances were bread and wine: "This is my body … this is my blood."
The Catholic understanding of these words, from the Patristic authors onward, has emphasized their roots in the
covenantal history of the Old Testament. The interpretation of Christ's words against this Old Testament
background coheres with and supports belief in the Real presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
In 1551, the Council of Trent definitively declared, "Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his
body that he was offering under the species of bread,[Jn. 6:51] it has always been the conviction of the Church of
God, and this holy Council now declares again that by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a
change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole
substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and
properly called transubstantiation." The Fourth Council of the Lateran in 1215 had spoken of "Jesus Christ, whose
body and blood are truly contained in the sacrament of the altar under the forms of bread and wine, the bread
being changed (transsubstantiatis) by divine power into the body and the wine into the blood." The attempt by
some twentieth century Catholic theologians to present the Eucharistic change as an alteration of significance
(transignification rather than transubstantiation) was rejected by Pope Paul VI in his 1965 encyclical letter
Mysterium fidei. In his 1968 Credo of the People of God, he reiterated that any theological explanation of the
doctrine must hold to the twofold claim that, after the consecration, 1) Christ's body and blood are really present;
and 2) bread and wine are really absent; and this presence and absence is real and not merely something in the
mind of the believer.
On entering a church, Latin Church Catholics genuflect to the tabernacle that holds the consecrated host in
order to respectfully acknowledge the presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, a presence signalled by a
sanctuary lamp or votive candle kept burning close to such a tabernacle. (If there is no such burning light, it
indicates that the tabernacle is empty of the special presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.) Catholics will also often
kneel or sit before the tabernacle, when the sanctuary light is lit, to pray directly to Jesus, materially present in the
form of the Eucharist. Similarly, the consecrated Eucharistic host—the unleavened bread—is sometimes exposed
on the altar, usually in an ornamental fixture called a Monstrance, so that Catholics may pray or contemplate in
the direct presence and in direct view of Jesus in the Eucharist; this is sometimes called "exposition of the Blessed
Sacrament", and the prayer and contemplation in front of the exposed Eucharist are often called "adoration of the
Blessed Sacrament" or just "adoration". All of these practices stem from belief in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ
in the Eucharist, which is an essential Article of Faith of the Catholic Church.[18]
The Eucharist, also called the Blessed Sacrament, is the sacrament (the third of Christian initiation, the one
that the Catechism of the Catholic Church says "completes Christian initiation") by which Catholics partake of the
Body and Blood of Jesus Christ and participate in his one sacrifice. The first of these two aspects of the sacrament
is also called Holy Communion. The bread (which must be wheaten, and which is unleavened in the Latin,
Armenian and Ethiopic Rites, but is leavened in most Eastern Rites) and wine (which must be from grapes) used in
the Eucharistic rite are, in Catholic faith, transformed in its inner reality, though not in appearance, into the Body
and Blood of Christ, a change that is called transubstantiation. "The minister who is able to confect the sacrament
of the Eucharist in the person of Christ is a validly ordained priest alone." The word "priest" here (in Latin
sacerdos) includes both bishops and those priests who are also called presbyters. Deacons as well as priests
(sacerdotes) are ordinary ministers of Holy Communion, and lay people may be authorized in limited
circumstances to act as extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion. The Eucharist is seen as "the source and
summit" of Christian living, the high point of God's sanctifying action on the faithful and of their worship of God,

65
the point of contact between them and the liturgy of heaven. So important is it that participation in the Eucharistic
celebration (see Mass) is seen as obligatory on every Sunday and holy day of obligation and is recommended on
other days. Also recommended for those who participate in the Mass is reception, with the proper dispositions, of
Holy Communion. This is seen as obligatory at least once a year, during Eastertide.[ 19]

Fig. 6.). Eucharistic Miracle of Ludbreg 1411

Fig. 7.). Eucharistic Miracle of Siena, Italy 1730
Fig. 8.). Eucharistic Miracle of Erding 1417 A peasant thought by stealing a host during communion
The Eucharist: This urgency to actualize the body’s anima after death also sustains the Roman Catholic faith in the
salvific power of the consumed body of Christ contained in the sacrament of the Eucharist. Through a divine act,
the elements of the bread and wine are miraculously transubstantiated into the real flesh and blood of Christ, in
which the supreme substance the awesome potency of God is infinitely preserved. Of course, the therapeutic
efficacy of the human corpse as a drug takes on superhuman dimensions, constituting a different form of salvific
swallowing, when the corpse in question is God:
Doctors acknowledge that dead mans parts and members can be put to the same parts and
member of incurable patients, head to head, mouth to mouth, hand to hand, and will have the
power to heal them…. Now, if the body of a dead man can possess such virtue, how much more
powerful the body of God who is all virtue.
The flesh and the blood of Christ are both medicine and food for the devout the divine manna that heals
and nourishes not only the ailing spirit but also the ailing body of the communicant. With his power to restore well
being “through confession, the Eucharist and extreme unction,” Christ was seen as the supreme, all curing
physician, and the consecrated host was ascribed with extraordinary therapeutic powers. The practice of
administering holy wafers to the sick was common in the Middle Ages. St. Francis de Sales (1567 1622) offers a
recipe for medicina sacramentalis, a consecrated “cordial wafer…composed of the rarest powder’ which had to be
taken “ at least an hour before the meal.” In his research on the pharmacological use of the holy wafer, a drug
with the power to “expel the physical ills of the body,” Hymen Saye describes a prescription for consecrated
wafers given with an apple for the treatment of quartan fever both the wafers and the apple were formulaically
inscribed in Latin to promote healing. Consecrated wafers were stored and carried in a pyx when ministering to
the sick, thus constituting a portable medical chest of divine flesh. Furthermore, viaticum, the Eucharistic food for
lifes last journey, was administered as a final meal to those believed to be dying. For Protestant Reformers, the
use of the Eucharist as a “sale for all diseases” formed part of the catalogue of of Catholic Eucharistic abuses; in an
attempt to eliminate such Catholic superstitions, the 1552 Prayer Book specified that ordinary bread be used in the
communion service, in contrast to the Catholic tradition of using unleavened wafers. [20]

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 The institution of the Eucharist, the major mystery of Christianity, is recalled during every celebration of
the Mass. During the last supper he shared with his disciples, Christ took bread, blessed it broke it, and gave it to
his followers, saying “take this and eat, for this is my body.” Then, taking a chalice, he blessed the wine and gave it
to his disciples, saying, “This is the chalice of my blood.” The Christian Communion instituted around Easter
therefore corresponds to the ritual consumption of the body and the blood of God in other words, a theophagy
(from theos, meaning “God,” and phagein, meaning “eat”). Yet this theophagy also presents itself as
anthropophagy, beause God has been made human by his Incarnation. When taking Communion at Mass, the
Christian is therefore eating the flesh both of man and of God.
It is therefore not possible to disassociate the Eucharist meal from a cannibal ritual, if we understand
cannibalism to imply the simultaneously real and symbolic consumption of sacred flesh. Mythology offers us
numerous examples of such practices, from the cult of Dionysus, which served as a pretext for eating human flesh,
to that of Thyestes’ feasted on his own children. Yet with respect to this subject it is the figure of Cronos who is
the most suggestive. After marrying his own sister and making himself master of the world, Cronos learns that he
will be dethroned by one of his own children. This leads to his custom of eating them at birth. The wordplay (in
ancient Greek) between Cronos and chronos (time) immediately encourages a temporal interpretation of the
myth. The devouring activity of the ogre god Cronos offers an image of the destructive power of time (chronos). In
other words, all consumption of human flesh signifies the wearing away, even the death, of the world. [21]
720: I was raised Baptist Christian. A lot of things relative to religion didn’t make sense to me as a child. I’m pretty
sure this is the same with many people. I never questioned “Communion” which is the same practice as the
Eucharist. I was just happy we got a little wafer and some grape juice. The pastor would say the hymn for the
ceremony and we would carry out with the practice. To go so far as to say a human’s flesh and blood has been
transferred to bread and wine in the literal sense is ridiculous. I should say the western sense, because all other
peoples of the planet will probably understand and accept the concept of the transfer due to a culturally accepted
spirituality. An understanding of spirituality where there is no shame in its public practice and has been embedded
into their perception of reality. Metaphysically speaking which I understand as the scientific form of spirituality,
this is sound. The only thing that would bring further question to the practice is its true origins. In which, could be
lost in rituals of old. With proper research of all peoples of the planet you will find cannibalistic practices. Usually
these practices were reserved for either the witch doctors or the higher echelon of the community. The practice
was also used as the confirmation of conquering other peoples whether that be soldiers eating their dead enemies
or bringing the carcasses back to homeland for the people to celebrate their victory with consumption of the
enemy. To be one with or to be like God or Jesus is the basis of Christianity. The mental acception of a piece of
bread being Jesus body and his blood as wine will allow the spirit to envelope said practice as truth when
consumed. In the occult world of witches and werewolves as well as the deepest roots of religion the definition of
cannibalism at its bottom line is to separate the human from the human and supposedly to have superior human
capability. As it is the extremity of arcane. Cannibalism metaphysically divides a person from the majority rule
spirituality of man. In essence you will be different and also secretly unified with others of the same practice.
So in conclusion the Eucharist/Communion is indirectly fulfilling a preset ancient schema embedded in the mind of
the perception of all human beings. All cultures on the earth have a recognition of the practice whether they
accept it or label it as taboo, it is recognized as a possibility of our existence. Therefore, the Eucharist and
communion suffice the questionable void, so in our modern world it is not practiced. Our subconscious mind
accepts the activity when presented thru an avenue of divinity, but denies the activity in the physical/reality sense,
the conscious mind. This type of thinking may encode a deep level on insanity since all levels of the mind are not
in agreeance.

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 Sacraments
There are seven sacraments of the Catholic Church, which according to Catholic theology were instituted
by Jesus and entrusted to the Church. Sacraments are visible rites seen as signs and efficacious channels of the
grace of God to all those who receive them with the proper disposition. The sevenfold list of sacraments is often
organized into three groups: the sacraments of initiation (into the Church, the body of Christ), consisting of
Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist; the sacraments of healing, consisting of Penance and Anointing of the
Sick; and the sacraments of service: Holy Orders and Matrimony.

Enumeration
The Catechism of the Catholic Church lists the sacraments as follows: "The whole liturgical life of the
Church revolves around the Eucharistic sacrifice and the sacraments. There are seven sacraments in the Church:
Baptism, Confirmation or Chrismation, Eucharist, Penance, Anointing of the Sick, Holy Orders, and Matrimony."
These seven sacraments were codified in the documents of the Council of Trent (1545–1563), which stated:
CANON I. If any one saith, that the sacraments of the New Law were not all instituted by Jesus Christ, our Lord; or
that they are more, or less, than seven, to wit, Baptism, Confirmation, the Eucharist, Penance, Extreme Unction,
Order, and Matrimony; or even that any one of these seven is not truly and properly a sacrament; let him be
anathema.
CANON IV. If any one saith, that the sacraments of the New Law are not necessary unto salvation, but
superfluous; and that, without them, or without the desire thereof, men obtain of God, through faith alone, the
grace of justification; though all (the sacraments) are not necessary for every individual; let him be anathema.

Faith and Grace

The Catholic Church teaches that the sacraments are "efficacious signs of grace, instituted by Christ and
entrusted to the Church, by which divine life is dispensed to us. The visible rites by which the sacraments are
celebrated signify and make present the graces proper to each sacrament. They bear fruit in those who receive
them with the required dispositions."
While the Church itself is the universal sacrament of salvation, the sacraments of the Catholic Church in
the strict sense are seven sacraments that "touch all the stages and all the important moments of Christian life:
they give birth and increase, healing and mission to the Christian's life of faith". "The Church affirms that for
believers the sacraments of the New Covenant are necessary for salvation", although not all are necessary for
every individual, and has placed under anathema those who deny it: "If any one saith, that the sacraments of the
New Law are not necessary unto salvation, but superfluous; and that, without them, or without the desire thereof,
men obtain of God, through faith alone, the grace of justification; though all (the sacraments) are not indeed
necessary for every individual; let him be anathema."
The Church further teaches that the effect of a sacrament comes ex opere operato, by the very fact of
being administered, regardless of the personal holiness of the minister administering it. However, a recipient's
own lack of proper disposition to receive the grace conveyed can block the effectiveness of the sacrament in that
person. The sacraments presuppose faith and through their words and ritual elements, nourish, strengthen and
give expression to faith.

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 Sacraments of initiation
The Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church states: "Christian initiation is accomplished by
means of the sacraments which establish the foundations of Christian life. The faithful born anew by Baptism are
strengthened by Confirmation and are then nourished by the Eucharist."

Baptism
The Catholic Church sees baptism as the first and basic sacrament of Christian initiation. In the Western or
Latin Church, baptism is usually conferred today by pouring water three times on the recipient's head, while
reciting the baptismal formula: "I baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (cf.
Matthew 28:19). In the Eastern Catholic Churches of Byzantine Rite immersion or submersion is used, and the
formula is: "The servant of God, N., is baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."
Though sprinkling is not normally used, its validity is accepted, provided that the water flows over the skin, since
otherwise it is not a washing.

Confirmation
Confirmation or Chrismation is the second sacrament of Christian initiation. "It is called Chrismation (in
the Eastern Churches: anointing with holy myron or chrism) because the essential rite of the sacrament is
anointing with chrism. It is called Confirmation because it confirms and strengthens baptismal grace." It is
conferred by "the anointing with Sacred Chrism (oil mixed with balsam and consecrated by the bishop), which is
done by the laying on of the hand of the minister who pronounces the sacramental words proper to the rite."
These words, in both their Western and Eastern variants, refer to a gift of the Holy Spirit that marks the recipient
as with a seal. Through the sacrament the grace given in baptism is "strengthened and deepened." Like baptism,
confirmation may be received only once, and the recipient must be in a state of grace (meaning free from any
known unconfessed mortal sin) in order to receive its effects. The "originating" minister of the sacrament is a
validly consecrated bishop; if a priest (a "presbyter") confers the sacrament — as is done ordinarily in the Eastern
Churches and in special cases (such as the baptism of an adult or in danger of the death of a young child) in the
Latin Church (CCC 1312–1313) — the link with the higher order is indicated by the use of oil (known as "chrism" or
"myron") blessed by the bishop on Holy Thursday itself or on a day close to it. In the East, which retains the ancient
practice, the sacrament is administered by the parish priest immediately after baptism. In the West, where the
sacrament is normally reserved for those who can understand its significance, it came to be postponed until the
recipient's early adulthood; in the 20th century, after Pope Pius X introduced first Communion for children on
reaching the age of discretion, the practice of receiving Confirmation later than the Eucharist became widespread;
but the traditional order, with Confirmation administered before First Communion, is being increasingly restored.

Sacraments of healing
Penance and Reconciliation (Confession)
The Sacrament of Penance is the first of two sacraments of healing. The Catechism of the Catholic Church
mentions in the following order and capitalization different names of the sacrament, calling it the sacrament of
conversion, Penance, confession, forgiveness and Reconciliation. It is the sacrament of spiritual healing of a

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baptized person from the distancing from God resulting from sins committed. When people sin after baptism, they
cannot have baptism as a remedy; Baptism, which is a spiritual regeneration, cannot be given a second time.
The sacrament involves four elements: (1) Contrition (the penitent's sincere remorse for wrongdoing or
sin, repentance, without which the rite has no effect); (2) Confession to a priest who has the faculty to hear
confessions (Canon 966.1) – while it may be spiritually helpful to confess to another, only a priest has the power to
administer the sacrament; (3) Absolution by the priest; and, (4) Satisfaction or penance.
"Many sins wrong our neighbour. One must do what is possible in order to repair the harm (e.g., return
stolen goods, restore the reputation of someone slandered, pay compensation for injuries). Simple justice requires
as much. But sin also injures and weakens the sinner himself, as well as his relationships with God and neighbour.
Absolution takes away sin, but it does not remedy all the disorders sin has caused. Raised up from sin, the sinner
must still recover his full spiritual health by doing something more to make amends for the sin: he must 'make
satisfaction for' or 'expiate' his sins. This satisfaction is also called 'penance'" (CCC 1459). In early Christian
centuries, this element of satisfaction was quite onerous and generally preceded absolution, but now it usually
involves a simple task for the penitent to perform later, in order to make some reparation and as a medicinal
means of strengthening against further temptation.
The priest is bound by the "seal of confession", which is inviolable. "Accordingly, it is absolutely wrong for
a confessor in any way to betray the penitent, for any reason whatsoever, whether by word or in any other
fashion." A confessor who directly violates the sacramental seal incurs an automatic excommunication whose
lifting is reserved to the Holy See.
In some dioceses, certain sins are "reserved" which means only certain confessors can absolve them. Some
sins, such as violation of the sacramental seal, consecration of bishops without authorization by the Holy See,
direct physical attacks on the Pope, and intentional desecration of the Eucharist are reserved to the Holy See. A
special case by case faculty from the Sacred Penitentiary is normally required to absolve these sins.

Anointing of the Sick

Anointing of the Sick is the second sacrament of healing. In this sacrament a priest anoints the sick with oil
blessed specifically for that purpose. "The anointing of the sick can be administered to any member of the faithful
who, having reached the use of reason, begins to be in danger by reason of illness or old age" (canon 1004; cf. CCC
1514). A new illness or a worsening of health enables a person to receive the sacrament a further time.
When, in the Western Church, the sacrament was conferred only on those in immediate danger of death, it
came to be known as "Extreme Unction", i.e. "Final Anointing", administered as one of the Last Rites. The other
Last Rites are Confession (if the dying person is physically unable to confess, at least absolution, conditional on the
existence of contrition, is given), and the Eucharist, which when administered to the dying is known as "Viaticum",
a word whose original meaning in Latin was "provision for a journey".

Sacraments of Service
Holy Orders
Holy Orders is the sacrament by which a man is made a bishop, a priest, or a deacon, and thus dedicated to
be an image of Christ. The three degrees are referred to as the episcopate, the presbyterate and the diaconate. A
bishop is the minister of this sacrament. Ordination as a bishop confers the fullness of the sacrament, making the
bishop a member of the body of successors of the Apostles, and giving him the mission to teach, sanctify, and

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govern, along with the care of all the Churches. Ordination as a priest configures the priest to Christ the Head of
the Church and the one essential High Priest, and conferring on him the power, as the bishops' assistant, to
celebrate the sacraments and other liturgical acts, especially the Eucharist. Ordination as a deacon configures the
deacon to Christ the Servant of All, placing him at the service of the bishop, especially in the Church's exercising of
Christian charity towards the poor and preaching of the word of God.
Aspirants to the priesthood are required by canon law (canon 1032 of the Code of Canon Law) to go
through a seminary program that includes, as well as graduate level philosophical and theological studies, a
formation program that includes spiritual direction, retreats, apostolate experience, Latin training, etc. The course
of studies in preparation for ordination as a permanent deacon is decided by the episcopal conference concerned.

Matrimony
Matrimony, or Marriage, is another sacrament that consecrates for a particular mission in building up the
Church, and that provides grace for accomplishing that mission. This sacrament, seen as a sign of the love uniting
Christ and the Church, establishes between the spouses a permanent and exclusive bond, sealed by God.
Accordingly, a marriage between baptized people, validly entered into and consummated, cannot be dissolved.
The sacrament confers on them the grace they need for attaining holiness in their married life and for responsible
acceptance and upbringing of their children. As a condition for validity, the sacrament is celebrated in the presence
of the local Ordinary or Parish Priest or of a cleric delegated by them (or in certain limited circumstances a lay
person delegated by the diocesan Bishop with the approval of the Episcopal Conference and the permission of the
Holy See) and at least two other witnesses, though in the theological tradition of the Latin Church the ministers of
the sacrament are the couple themselves. For a valid marriage, a man and a woman must express their conscious
and free consent to a definitive self giving to the other, excluding none of the essential properties and aims of
marriage. If one of the two is a non Catholic Christian, their marriage is licit only if the permission of the competent
authority of the Catholic Church is obtained. If one of the two is not a Christian (i.e. has not been baptized), the
competent authority's dispensation is necessary for validity.

Validity and liceity

As stated above, the effect of the sacraments comes ex opere operato (by the very fact of being
administered). Since it is Christ who works through them, their effectiveness does not depend on the worthiness of
the minister. The belief that the validity of the sacrament is dependent upon the holiness of the administrator was
rejected in the Donatist crisis.
However, an apparent administration of a sacrament is invalid, if the person acting as minister does not
have the necessary power (as if a deacon were to celebrate Mass). They are also invalid if the required "matter" or
"form" is lacking. The matter is the perceptible material object, such as water in baptism or wheaten bread and
grape wine for the Eucharist, or the visible action. The form is the verbal statement that specifies the signification
of the matter, such as, (in the Western Church), "N., I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of
the Holy Spirit". Furthermore, if the minister positively excludes some essential aspect of the sacrament, the
sacrament is invalid. This last condition lies behind the 1896 judgement of the Holy See denying the validity of
Anglican Orders.
A sacrament may be administered validly, but illicitly, if a condition imposed by canon law is not observed.
Obvious cases are administration of a sacrament by a priest under a penalty of excommunication or suspension,
and an episcopal ordination without a mandate from the Pope.

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 Impediments (Canon Law)
Canon law specifies impediments to reception of the sacraments of orders and marriage. Those concerning
the first of these two sacraments only concern liceity, but "a diriment impediment renders a person incapable of
validly contracting a marriage" (canon 1073).
In the Latin Church, only the Holy See can authentically declare when divine law prohibits or invalidates a
marriage, and only the Holy See has the right to establish for those who are baptised other impediments to
marriage (canon 1075). But individual Eastern Catholic Churches, after having fulfilled certain requirements that
include consulting (but not necessarily obtaining approval from) the Holy See, may establish impediments.[33]
If an impediment is imposed by merely ecclesiastical law, rather than being a matter of divine law, the
Church may grant a dispensation from the impediment.
Conditions for validity of marriage such as sufficient use of reason (canon 1095) and freedom from
coercion (canon 1103), and the requirement that, normally, a marriage be contracted in the presence of the local
Ordinary or parish priest or of the priest or deacon delegated by either of them, and in the presence of two
witnesses (canon 1108), are not classified in the Code of Canon Law as impediments, but have much the same
effect.

Conditional conferral
Three of the sacraments may not be repeated: Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Orders: their effect is
permanent. This teaching has been expressed by the images of, in the West, an indelible character or mark and of,
in the East, a seal (CCC 698). However, if there is doubt about the validity of the administration of one or more of
these sacraments, a conditional form of conferral may be used, such as: "If you are not already baptized, I baptize
you …"
In the recent past, it was common practice in the Catholic Church to baptize conditionally almost every
convert from Protestantism because of a perceived difficulty in judging about the validity in any concrete instance.
In the case of the major Protestant denominations, agreements involving assurances about the manner in which
they administer baptism has ended this practice, which sometimes continues for other groups of Protestant
tradition. The Catholic Church has always recognized the validity of baptism in the Eastern Orthodox Church, but it
has explicitly denied the validity of the baptism conferred in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. It does
not recognize a baptismal ceremony in which the names of the three divine persons (or hypostases) of the
Trinity—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—are replaced by descriptors such as Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, or
Creator, Liberator, and Sustainer, and requires that the conditional form should not be used when baptizing those
who have received this kind of baptism.[22]
720: So they say being married is a Holy Sacrament. For who? The women? Marriage is the mans workload and
burden. Hence the word being married (Mary). These sacraments are spiritual gifts given to the people thru the
church but from God. They are what you want to refer as priveleges of the righteous. Today, Im pretty sure
Christians and Catholics alike don’t pay attention to the indepthness and significance of these practices. Because
we all have to work lame jobs. That do not allow one his own personal time to discover who he isin the past,
present, or future.

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 Chapter 4
Beyond Belief
Religious Mania
Charles de Blois was an ascetic of exaggerated piety who sought spirituality by mortifying the flesh. He
wore unwashed clothes crawling with lice; he put pebbles in his shoes, slept on straw on the floor next to his wifes
bed, and after his death was found to have worn a coarse shirt of horsehair under his armor, and cords wound so
tightly around his body that the knots dugs into his flesh. By these practices a seeker of holiness expressed
contempt for the world, self abasement, and humility, although he often found himself guilty of perverse pride in
his excesses. Charles confessed every night so that he might not go to sleep in a state of sin.[23]
In a Methodist chapel at Redruth, a man, during divine service, cried out with a loud voice, “What shall I do
to be saved?” at the same time manifesting the greatest uneasiness and solicitude respecting the condition of his
soul. Some other members of the congregation, following his example, cried out in the same form of words, and
seemed shortly after to suffer the most excruciating bodily pain. This strange occurnce was soon publicly known,
and hundreds of people, who had come thither, either attracted by curiosity, or a desire, from other motives, to
see the sufferers, fell into the same state. The chapel remained open for some days and nights, and from that
point the new disorder spread itself, with the rapidity of lightning, over the neighboring town of Camborne,
Helston, Truro, Penryn, and Falmouth, as well as over the villages in the vicinity. While thus advancing, it
decreased in some measure at the place where it had first appeared, and it confined itself throughout to the
Methodist chapels. It was only by the words which have been mentioned that it was excited, and it seized none
but people of the lowest education. Those who were attacked betrayed the greatest anguish, and feel into
convulsions; others cried out, like persons possessed, that the Almighty would straightway pour out his wrath
upon them, that the wailings of tormented spirits rang in their ears, and that they saw hell open to receive them.
The clergy, when, in the course of their sermons, they perceived that persons were thus seized, earnestly exhorted
them to confess their sins, and zealously endeavored to convince them that they were by nature enemies to Christ;
that the anger of God had therefore fallen upon them; and that if death should surprise them in the midst of their
sins, the eternal torments of hell would bye their portion. The over excited congregation upon this repeated their
words, which naturally must have increased the fury of their convulsive attacks. When the discourse had produced
its full effect, the preacher changed his subject; reminded those who were suffering of the power of the Saviour, as
well as of the grace of God, and represented to them in glowing colors the joys of heaven. Upon this a remarkable
reaction sooner or later took place. Those who were in convulsions felt themselves raised from the lowest depths
of misery and despair to the most exalted bliss, and triumphantly shouted out that their bonds were loosed, their
sins were forgiven, and that they were translated to the wonderful freedom of the children of God. In the mean
time their convulsions continued, and they remained, during this condition, so abstracted from every earthly
thought,. That they stayed 2 and sometimes 3 days and nights together in the chapels, agitated all the time by
spasmodic movements, and taking neither repose nor nourishment. According to a moderate computation, 4000
people were, within a very short time, affected with this convulsive malady.

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 The course and symptoms of the attacks were in general as follows: there came on at first a feeling of
faintness, with rigor and a sense of weight at the pit of the stomach, soon after which, the patient cried out, as if in
the agonies of death or the pains of labor. The convulsions then began, first showing themselves in the muscles of
the eyelids, though the eyes themselves were fixed and staring. The most frightful contortions of the countenance
followed, and the convulsions now took their course downwards, so that the muscles of the neck and trunk were
affected, causing a sobbing respiration which was performed with great effort. Tremors and agitation ensued and
the patients screamed out violently, and tossed their heads about from side to side. As the complaint increased, it
seized the arms, and its victims beat their breasts, clasped their hands, and made all sorts of strange gestures. The
observer who gives this account remarked that the lower extremities were in no instance affected. In some cases,
exhaustion came on in a very few minutes, but the attack usually lasted much longer, and there were even cases in
which it was known to continue for 60 or 70 hours. Many of those who happened to be seated when the attack
commenced, bent their bodies rapidly backward and forward during its continuance, making a corresponding
motion with their arms, like persons sawing wood. Others shouted aloud, leaped about, and threw their bodies
into every possible posture, until they had exhausted their strength.
An epileptic woman had a fit in church, and whether it was that the minds of the congregation were
excited by devotion, or that, being overcome at the sight of the strong convulsions, their sympathy was called
forth, certain it is, that many adult women, and even children, some of whom were of the male sex, and not more
than sex years old, began to complain forthwith of palpitation, followed by faintness, which passed into a
motionless and apparently cataleptic condition. These symptoms lasted more than an hour, and probably recurred
frequently. In the course of time, however, this malady is said to have undergone a modification, such as it
exhibits at the present day. Women whom it has attacked will suddenly fall down, toss their arms about, writhe
their bodies into various shapes, move their heads suddenly from side to side, and with eyes fixed and staring,
utter the most dismal cries. If the fit happen on any occasion of public diversion, they will, as soon as it has
ceased, mix with their companions, and continue their amusement as if nothing had happened.[24]
In the uncontrollable weeping of English Margery Kempe there is a poignancy that speaks for many. She
began to weep while on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem when “she had such a great compassion and such great pain at
seeing the place of Our Lords pain.” Thereafter her fits of “crying and roaring” and falling on the ground continued
for many years, once a month or a week, sometimes daily or many times a day, sometimes in church or in the
street or in her chamber or in the fields. The sight of a crucifix might set her off, “or if she saw a man or beast with
a wound, or if a man beat a child before her, or smote a horse of other beast with a whip, if she saw it or heard it,
she thought she saw our lord being beaten or wounded.” She would try to “keep it in as much as she could, that
people might nor hear it to their annoyance, for some said that a wicked spirit vexed her or that she had drunk too
much wine. Some banned her, some wished her in the sea in a bottomless boat.” Margery Kempe was obviously
an uncomfortable neighbor to have, Like all those who cannot conceal the painfulness of life. [24A]

Castrati
1560: The first children are castrated for use in the Sistine Chapel Choir. 1589: Pope Sixtus V issues a papal Bull
approving the recruitment of castrati By 1625 all sopranos in the Sistine Chapel choir are castrati. During the 17th
and 18th centuries in Italy, some 4,000 5,000 boys aged between 7 and 9 are castrated annually for the Church.
For readers unfamiliar with this term, castrati were male singers castrated in childhood to preserve their
high singing voices into adulthood. Castrated males have existed for a variety of reasons since antiquity, but the
castrati were a peculiar creation of the Christian church. For much of its history, the Catholic Church believed that

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the New Testament prohibition of women speaking in churches (see 1 Corinthians 14:34 and 2 Timothy 2:12)
extended to singing, meaning that the soprano and alto parts in church music needed to be sung by young boys or
adult male falsettists. However, neither of these options was considered ideal, especially for the complex
polyphonic music that emerged in the sixteenth century. Boy sopranos by nature had short careers, because the
inevitable effects of puberty changed the timbre of their voices, and their small larynxes made it difficult for them
to project their voices in large cathedrals and chapels—a not insignificant problem in the centuries before
electronic amplification. Falsettists had the vocal prowess that boy sopranos lacked but produced an inferior sound
that lacked sonorous depth.

Fig. 9.). Castration Tool. Taken at Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum , Hollywood California and A drawing for
instructions on circumcision.
Fig. 10.). “Altar of Castration” For 350 years, the Catholic Church castrated young boys to stop their voices
breaking, instead of simply letting women sing in their choirs. The lives and testicles of hundreds of thousands of
boys were sacrificed to a single passage from the Bible. Art Piece by Marc Leviton
The castrati combined the pure sound of the boy soprano with the lung capacity of the adult male to
create a unique sound that has no equivalent in the singing voice of the intact male or the adult female. However,
producing a castrato required parents to have their sons forcibly castrated, usually between the ages of six and
nine. A boy who survived the crude operation (many died from blood loss or overdosed on the opium or cheap
alcohol that was used to sedate them) was then placed in a music school, where he would endure a brutal regime
of music instruction that would last until he was in his middle to late teens. Those students who succeeded at their
studies were placed in choirs in churches, cathedrals, and chapels; failures faced a life of penury and loneliness, as
there was no place for the castrati outside of a musical setting.
The first castrati entered the Sistine Chapel Choir in the late sixteenth century. They quickly became a
staple of church choirs throughout Italy, particularly in the Papal States. The Catholic Church’s employment of
castrati ran counter to canon law, which forbade the deliberate amputation of body parts except in the case of
medical emergencies, but the popularity and skill of castrati singers was such that their existence was rationalized
as a means of glorifying God through music. The peculiar charm of the castrati voice soon found a home in the new
art form of opera, and some superstar castrati such as Farinelli (born Carlo Broschi, 1705–1782) and Caffarelli
(born Gaetano Majorano, 1710–1783) were the object of hysterical devotion by fans across Europe. Since it was
considered unseemly for women to appear on stage in many countries during the Baroque era, castrati often

75
played male and female roles in opera performances, as the intense musical education the castrati received made
them more technically versatile than normal adult singers of either sex. Famous classical composers including
Handel, Mozart, and Johann Christian Bach wrote music specifically with the castrati voice in mind; Philip V of
Spain so loved the voice of Farinelli that he kept the famous castrato as his personal performer for twenty two
years. Far from being fringe characters, the castrati were a vital part of sacred and popular culture for hundreds of
years.

Fig. 11.). 'Berenstat, Cuzzoni and Senesino' c1725. The Italian opera singers Gaetano Berenstadt (c1687 1735),
Francesca Cuzzoni Sandoni (1700 1770) and Francesco Bernardi, known as 'Senesino' (c1686 1758) performing
Handel's opera 'Flavio'.
The castrati had a peculiar “in between” status in European society, in that they were biologically male but
weren’t considered men in the social or psychological sense. Canon law forbade them from getting married
(though some did anyway under false pretenses), which prevented them from enjoying normal family life.
Although most castrati worked in ecclesiastical settings, they were forbidden from becoming priests because their
incomplete anatomy disqualified them from being acceptable as an “other Christ” in the Mass. Castrati were also
forbidden from serving in governmental posts or in the military. The effects of prepubescent castration caused the
castrati to develop unusual physical features, including excessive height, stoutness, unusually long limbs, and
hairlessness, particularly as they aged. Some castrati had more feminine features and were subject to accusations
that they led “honest men” into homosexuality with their sexual ambiguity. Run ins with pretty androgynous
castrati pepper the memoirs of noted sexual adventurer Giancomo Casanova, including this one: “In the middle of
the confusion, I saw a priest with a very attractive countenance come in. The size of his hips made me take him for

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a woman dressed in men’s clothes, and I said so to Gama, who told me that he was the celebrated castrato,
Beppino della mamana. The abbe called him to us, and told him with a laugh that I had taken him for a girl. The
impudent fellow looked me in the face, and said that, if I liked, he would shew me whether I had been right or
wrong.”
As Casanova’s anecdote implies, it was not unusual for some castrati to become the sexual favorites of
high ranking prelates in the Church, much to the indignation of Christian moralists and social reformers. The
association of the castrati with homosexuality and effeminacy, combined with the widespread distaste in which
performers in general were held by “respectable” people, meant that even the richest and most famous castrati
were viewed as freakish musical adepts at best and degenerate monstrosities at worst.
Despite the immense popularity of the castrati during the Baroque and Classical periods, changing musical
tastes—as well as the gradual inclusion of women on the dramatic and musical stage—caused them to fall out of
favor with audiences by the late eighteenth century. The “heroic tenor” became the preferred singing voice for
leading male roles in the opera, and composers ceased writing music for the castrati. However, only the most
skilled castrati ever worked in opera, as most of them were produced and employed for the purposes of singing in
Catholic institutions. A more serious threat to the future of the castrati was the French Enlightenment, which
considered the practice of forced child castration to be a perversion of the duty for parents to care for and protect
their young. Rousseau, for example, accused the fathers of boys sent to be castrated of being little better than
pimps, deploring the existence of “fathers so cruel as to sacrifice nature to fortune, and . . . submit their children to
this operation that they may gratify the pleasure of the voluptuous and the inhuman.” Aside from the savagery
inherent in the mass mutilation of children, the Enlightenment philosophes also believed that the castrati were
“against nature” because they had been deprived of their manhood in every sense of the word and socialized to
exist in a sort of sexual no man’s land between male and female. Noticing the sexual dimorphism that existed in
many nonhuman animal species, Enlightenment thinkers regarded the sexually ambiguous castrati to be a
violation of the natural order that seemed to decree a clear delineation between the sexes.
By the time of the French Revolution, castrati were considered a symbol of ancien regime excess and
degeneracy that had no place in a modern republic based on reason and secular values. The Napoleonic Code,
which outlawed castration for musical purposes, spread the French distaste for the castrati throughout Europe
during the Napoleonic Wars. Thus, by the nineteenth century, the Catholic Church in general and the Papal States
in particular constituted the only source of demand for the services of the castrati.
The Enlightenment critique of the castrati and the subsequent loss of France, the so called “Eldest
Daughter of the Church,” to revolutionary anti clericalism and republicanism caused many in the Catholic hierarchy
to regard any criticism of castration as an attack on the Church itself. Consequently, the castrati were still a
presence in the Papal States, including the Sistine Chapel Choir, when the temporal kingdom of the pope was
absorbed into the Republic of Italy in 1870. In fact, the only thing that finally ended the production of castrati in
the former Papal States was the Republic of Italy imposing its law against castration on the areas in question.
Although Leo XIII began phasing out the castrati from the Sistine Chapel Choir in 1878, I suspect his decision was
based on the realization that Italy’s anti castration laws would make it impossible to obtain replacements for
retiring castrati, not because he thought that castrating children to sing in church was inherently wrong. Indeed,
the last castrato, Alessandro Moreschi, didn’t leave the Sistine Chapel Choir until 1902.
Given the Vatican’s long, sordid history as a castrati provider, it begs the question of why is it permissible
to alter one’s genitals to sing in the Sistine Chapel Choir, as the castrati did for hundreds of years, but not okay to
alter one’s genitals because one is transgender. Were the castrati mocking God when they took advantage of their
artificially high voices to sing Allegri’s Miserere Mei during Easter? What about the thousands of people who

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profited from the castrati, ranging from the back alley surgeons who performed the operations right up to the
popes who employed them, most of whom probably considered themselves to be good, even orthodox Catholics?
As with many of the Catholic Church’s more dubious actions, the existence of the castrati depended on hundreds
of years of institutional support at the highest level, so the Church’s use of them cannot be blamed on the actions
of a few misguided people.
The castrati issue needs to be raised more as a reminder that in the not so distant past, the Catholic
Church didn’t have a problem with certain people modifying their bodies in ways that it would now consider to be
“against nature.” In fact, the current Church teaching that a person’s birth sex should never be altered or blurred
has more in common with the eighteenth century Enlightenment view that the Church once found so threatening
than its own previous opinion that considered the existence of a perpetual eunuch class to be essential to the
operation of the Church. The Catholic Church of the Baroque and Classical eras could appreciate and exploit the
sense of the grotesque and the uncanny that castrati evoked, whereas the contemporary Church must defend a
rigid gender binary to justify its reactionary teachings on the all male priesthood, LGBT rights, and the role of
women. The production of the castrati also happened within a Catholic context that the hierarchy was able to
control and from which it could benefit, where as transgenderism is a secular phenomenon based on modern ideas
about the ability of the individual to craft one’s own identity free from traditional constraints such as religious
dogma, family pressures, or biology. At least modern transgender people are deciding of their own volition as to
whether they want to change their gender, rather than being forced into it by some combination of parental
greed, poverty, or the Church, and they are slowly receiving the respect that the castrati never received from their
own societies.[25]
A castrato is a male singer with a soprano, mezzo soprano, or alto voice. From about 1550 CE to the late
19th century, most were created by castrating boys before they reached puberty. This prevented their vocal cords
from lengthening and their voice from deepening. With the lung capacity and muscular strength of an adult male
and the vocal range of a prepubescent boy:
"... his voice develops a range, power and flexibility quite different from the singing voice of the adult
female, but also markedly different from the higher vocal ranges of the uncastrated adult male. Some castratos
were males who were born with an endoctrinological condition that prevented them from sexually maturing."
"The term castrato was often used to indicate the high register created by the young men who sang the
castrato style. The typical register of a castrato was above that of a 'normal' soprano or alto voice, resulting in the
creation of a temporary range in Italian music."
In Italy, where most of the castrations occurred, boys were generally drugged with opium. They were
soaked in a hot tub until barely conscious before the operation. One source estimates that the fatality rate due to
the amputation procedure was about 80%. Another estimates a death rate of 10 to 80% depending upon the skill
of the practitioner. Among the survivors, the vast majority did not become professional singers because their voice
was not of sufficiently high quality.
J.S. Jenkins writes:
"Boys were castrated between the ages of 7 and 9 years, and underwent a long period of voice training. A
small number became international opera stars, of whom the most famous was Farinelli, whose voice ranged over
three octaves. By the end of the 18th century, fashions in opera had changed so that the castrati declined except in
the Vatican, where the Sistine Chapel continued to employ castrati until 1903. The last of the castrati was
Alessandro Moreschi, who died in 1924 and made gramophone recordings that provide the only direct evidence of
a castrato's singing voice."
Obviously, all of the boys who were castrated were not sufficiently mature to give their informed consent.

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History:
The European practice of employing castrated boys in the Catholic church's choirs started in the mid 16th century.
Castrati were first used during:
• Late 1550s in the chapel choir of the Duke of Ferrara.
• 1574 in the court chapel at Munich, Germany.
• 1599 in the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican.
• 1610 in Württemberg, Germany.
• 1637 in Vienna, Austria.
• 1640's in Dresden, Germany.
Pope Sixtus V issued a papal Bull in 1589 which approved the recruitment of castrati for the choir of St. Peter's
Basilica in Rome. Castrati were later widely employed by opera companies.
According to Wikipedia:
"The practice reached its peak in 17th and 18th century opera. In Naples it is said that several barbershops
had a sign that castration was performed there. However, this cannot be confirmed. The male heroic lead would
often be written for a castrato singer (in the operas of Handel for example). When such operas are performed
today, a woman (possibly cross dressing as a man in a so called trouser role) or a countertenor takes these roles.
However, some Baroque operas with parts for castrati are so complex and difficult that they cannot be performed
today."
"Castration was by no means a guarantee of a promising career. During the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries,
only approximately 1% of fully or partially castrated boys developed into successful singers."
"Probably the most famous castrato was the 18th century singer Carlo Broschi, known as Farinelli. In 1994,
a film was made about him, Farinelli Il Castrato. In the 17th century, Queen Christina of Sweden was so enamored
of the voices of the castrati that she temporarily halted a war between her country and Poland so that she could
borrow the castrato Ferri from the Polish king for a two week command performance."
The Catholic Church's position on castrati:
According to Rotten.com, in the late 16th century,
"Pope Clement VIII became smitten with the sweetness and flexibility of their voices. ... While some
Church officials suggested it would be preferable to lift the ban on women singers than to continue endorsing the
castration of little boys, the Pope disagreed, quoting Saint Paul, 'Let women be silent in the assemblies, for it is not
permitted to them to speak.' ... since it was illegal to perform castrations, ... all castrati presenting themselves for
the choir claimed to have lost their genitals through tragic 'accident'."
"After the Pope’s official acknowledgement and acceptance of castrati, the number of these "accidents"
increased dramatically. Parents seeking upward mobility towed their little lads down to a barber or butcher who
separated them from their testicles for a fee.
One source estimates that, during the 17th and 18th centuries, three to five thousand boys per year in
Italy were castrated . Castration was forbidden under canon law. The church condemned the practice and
occasionally excommunicated the person responsible for the surgery. But the church simultaneously created a
market for castrati by hiring them for its church choirs. By about 1789, there were more than 200 castrati in
Rome's chapel choirs alone.
The number of castrati declined during the 19th century. In 1870, castrations were banned in the Papal
States the last political jurisdiction to do so. In 1878, Pope Leo XIII prohibited the hiring of new castrati by the
church. 10 By 1900 there were only 16 castrati singing in the Sistine Chapel and other Catholic choirs in Europe. In
1902, Pope Leo XIII ruled that new castrati would not be admitted to the Sistine Chapel. 7 In 1903, Pope Pius X

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formally banned adult male sopranos from the Vatican. 9 The Church's last castrati, Alessandro Moreschi, died in
1922.
The castrati and 1 Corinthians and 1 Timothy in the Bible:
Part of the market for castrati was due to the apostle Paul's famous dictum "Mulier taceat in ecclesia" (women are
to be silent in church). This instruction is found in two passages in the Christian Scriptures (New Testament):
• I Corinthians 14:34 35: "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to
speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they will learn any thing, let
them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church. 11

• I Timothy 2:11 12: "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach,
nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence."
Until the 17th century, the Catholic church interpreted these passages literally. Women were prohibited from
speaking or singing in church. 10 Castrati, were the obvious replacement.

These passages are largely rejected by religious liberals today. One theologian suggests that verses 34b to
36 in 1 Corinthians 14 are a crude forgery. If they are simply deleted, the chapter flows smoothly from verse 34a to
37. More info. Many liberal Christians believe that 1 Timothy is a forgery and is written circa 100 to 150 CE, up to
85 years after Paul's execution. This text refers shows how the second century church reinstated the oppression of
women in opposition to the teachings of Paul. More info.
The castrati and Matthew 19 in the Bible:
The author of the Gospel of Matthew describes a conversation by Jesus to his disciples in which he bans divorce,
except in those instances where the wife commits a sexual indiscretion. The disciples respond:
• Matthew 19:10: "His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to
marry."
Jesus responds:
• Matthew 19:11 12: "But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is
given. For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there are some
eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs
for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it."
Origen (c. 185 c 254 CE), an early church father from the Alexandrian school, interpreted this passage
literally and allegedly castrated himself "for the kingdom of heaven's sake." Some Catholic church leaders,
centuries ago, interpreted the same passage as providing justification for the use of castrati so that they could
contribute their powerful singing ability to church choirs.[26]
720: By now it definetly seems as if in Old Europe there was an affixation with castration. In vol. 1 castration was
done on those who committed sexual offences . In vol. 2 the witches are castrating the men, putting their penises
in trees and keeping them alive. Now in the 3rd volume we have the castration of boys so they can sing in the
choir. There was much castration during the African slave trade. Metaphysically this is the ownership of
masculinity. By both male and female. Of course the male is the one committing the act but the act is dedicated
to the church. The feminine principle demands sexless males. We will discuss this later. Obviously we can see
that there were large numbers of children sacrifices which supports the purity energy carried by the church coming
from the innocence of children.

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 The Holy Blood & Organ Relics

Fig. 12.). This is the blood relic of St. Gennaro, the patron saint of Naples, Italy. According to legend, St. Gennaro's
blood
Fig. 13.). The Bizarrely Beautiful World of Relics in Religious History The blood miraculously re liquifies three times
a year If this doesn't happen, bad things come including the bombing during WWII, an earthquake, and the
eruption of Mount Vesuvius. San Gennaro is patron saint of Naples, in whose cathedral two ampoules are
preserved with a liquid in the solid state, which tradition says was the saint's blood, and that melts three times a
year.
The Church of the Holy Cross in Montefalco, Italy, possesses some remarkable relics of St. Clare of
Montefalco (d. 1308), including her miraculous heart with its symbols of the Passion, three pellets which in a
unique manner represent the Holy Trinity, and the incorrupt body of the Saint. The church also has a reliquary of
the Saints blood that liquefied at various times during the centuries.
The Saint had once mentioned to her Sisters in the Augustinian community, “If you seek the Cross of
Christ, take my heart; there you will find the suffering Lord.”
Again on her deathbed she repeatedly murmured, “Know that in my very heart I have and hold Christ
crucified.” Soon after her death, the community, as though inspired to do this, decided to extract the heart. While
they did so, the blood which rushed out was collected in a large vial which had been previously washed and
purified. On opening the heart and seeing the symbols of the Passion clearly defined, the Sisters realized that this
extraordinary phenomenon should be witnessed and verified by others. They then locked the heart and the vial of
blood in a box and carefully secured it. The next morning the box was opened in the presence of the Chief
Magistrate, Gentile di Gilberti, together with the leading physician of the town, Messer Simone da Spello, and a
public notary named Angelo di Montefalco. Also attending was Fr. Guardian of the Franciscan house at Foligno.
After viewing the phenomenon, they prepared a report for the Bishop of Spoleto. The heart and the blood of St.
Clare were later examined carefully by other church and political dignitaries.
300 years later, in the year 1608, when it became necessary temporarily to remove the incorrupt body of
St. Clare from its shrine, the nuns noticed that the vessel leaked and began carefully to wipe it when, despite all
her efforts at handling the vial with utmost caution, it nevertheless slipped from her fingers and crashed on the
floor. Sobbing bitterly, the distraught nuns picked up every particle of the blood and every shard of glass. All of this
was placed in a larger crystal vessel. At some point during the years a crack in this vessel was noticed, and it was
placed in a third vessel. The blood and the shards of glass, together with the second cracked vessel and the third
crystal covering, are all perfectly transparent. The coagulated blood can be clearly viewed.

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 It has been noticed through the years that this blood of St. Clare of Montefalco, which is normally dry and
coagulated, has been known not only to liquefy, but also to boil and bubble. Many of these ebullitions have been
historically recorded and attested. These phenomena seem to have preceded “untoward and serious events,” as,
for instanced, the liquefaction of October, 1495, when the combined forces of the Baglioni and of the Orsini
swopped down and for 2 months pillaged and harassed the countryside. When the dreaded Duke Valentino
(Cesare Borgia) established himself and his 1100 coldiers in Montefalco in 1500, the blood of the Saint remained in
a liquid state, bubbling and frothing in its vial until he left. Other liquefactions connected to unfortunate political
disturbances took place in 1508, 1560 and 1570. And still other notable liquefactions took place in 1601, 1608 and
1618.
During the 17th century a commission was established to study the mystery surrounding the blood of St.
Clare. Again in 1880 the phenomenon was scrutinized by experts. Their reports stated that there was something
unexplainable which was outside and beyond the ordinary causes of natural law.[27]
St. Andrew Avellino (d. 1608) became a doctor of law and was ordained at Naples, where he pleaded cases
in the ecclesiastical courts. He eventually renounced the profession for that of saving souls and entered the
Theatine Order, which he served as novice master and founder of houses in Piacenza and Milan. He refused a
bishopric offered him bvy Gregory XIV and returned to Naples. There he became known for his preaching and
miracles.
During his 88th year, on November 10, he approached the altar to begin Mass when he was suddenly struck
with an attack of apoplexy. Later that afternoon he died.
While his body lay in state in the Church of St. Paul, crowds of people visited the remains, with many of
them snipping off locks of his hair as relics. Because of this, some cuts were accidentally made in the skin of his
face. The next morning, 36 hours after death, these cuts began to exude fresh, red blood. It was naturally
assumed that the Saint was not really dead. When death was confirmed by physicians, a few more incisions were
made and for another 36 hours the blood that continued to trickle from them was carefully collected.
Four days later it was seen to bubble in its vial while being held by a professor of medicine. 3 years later,
on the anniversary of his death, the blood, by that time hard, is said to have liquefied when exposed for
veneration. Again, it frothed and boiled in the presence of 8 religious of the Theatine Order, who signed a formal
deposition to what they had witnessed. Since then, records tell us that the solidified blood liquefied every year on
the anniversary of St. Andrews death.[28]
The mutilated body of St. Josaphat (d. 1623) remains marvelously incorrupt in the Church of St. Sophia in
his native Poland. When a costly reliquary was crafted of precious metals and engraved with mother of pearl
pictures depicting scenes of his martyrdom, the body was exhumed for the 3rd time. While the incorrupt body of
the marytyr was being prepared for its enshrinement, the mortal wound on the forehad of the Saint opened and
discharged fresh red blood. This amazed the witnesses, since St. Josaphat had been dead 27 years.[29]
A very unusual blood miracle, and one drastically different from those mentioned above, involved Pope St.
Pius V (d. 1572), who is regarded as one of the greatest Popes of all times. The miracle of blood took place when
the Polish ambassador, while speaking with the Pope, asked for a relic to take back with him to his country. Pope
Pius V stooped down and gathered a little dust from the ground. He put the dust in a piece of clean linen and gave
it to the ambassador was somewhat surprised and shocked by the Popes actions, and was also disappointed at not
receiving a precious relic for his country. But on arriving home he found the cloth stained with blood, which was
recognized as that of the holy martyrs blood that had sanctified the Roman terrain.[30]
Another unusual incident related to the prophetic warnings of a death revolved around the incorrupt body
of Bl. Matthia Nazarei of Matelica (d. 1319). Throughout the years a miraculous flow of “blood –fluid” was seen

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proceeding from her corpse, to the amazement of many witnesses, physicians and ecclesiastical authorities.
Known as “manna”, the liquid began flowing in December of 1758 and commenced and stopped at various times,
until it was realized that it flowed as a warning before the outbreak of wars, plagues, events of epic proportions or
just prior to the death of members of the community. The mysterious formation of the “blood fluid,” which
flowed intermittently for over 200 years, stopped when the condition of the incorrupt body deteriorated. In
recent years the relics have been enclosed in a plastic form representing the Saints body.[31]
In Eichstatt, located in southern Germany, a similar event thkes place involving the remains of St.
Walburga (d.779), an Englishwoman who belonged to a family of Saints. St. Walburga governed a Benedictine
convent at Heideheim, in the diocese of Eichstatt, for almost 25 years until her death on February 25, 799. The
remains were transferred to Eichstatt between 870 and 879 and were place beside those of her brother, St.
Wunibald, in the Holy Cross church, where the Church of St. Walburga stands today. At this time the bones of St.
Walburga began secreting “pearls,” according to the record kept by Wolfhard of Herrieden dated 983. When Holy
Cross Church fell into decayu and a new structure was built around 1035, the remains were exhumed and placed in
a shrine situated in a chapel directly behing the main altar. At this time another historian from herrieden wrote
that:
A clear liquid like fresh water flows today from the tomb containing her revered remains,l much in the
same manner as the flow of oil from St. Nicholas’ tomb in Bari. It is a continuous flow wonderfully effective and a
cure for many ills.
The relics of the Saint are kept in a reliquary resembling a tabernacle, but one with 2 compartments that
are separated by a shelf. A shell of silver is kept on the bottom. Attached to the bottom of the top bowl are silver
pipes which pass through the shelf to the silver shell. In this way the oil that collects on the bones drips through
the silver pipes into the silver shell, and there it is collected by the Benedicitine nuns. The manna is then placed in
tiny ampules that are distributed to the faithful who believe in its effectiveness.
Because the manna of St. Walburga develops slowly it has been identified as an oil. It is also called an oil
because so many of the faithful use it as a medicinal ointment. Since the fluid has no color, taste or odor it more
accurately resembles water, although it is much more precious.
There is still a more phenomenal element to the flow of manna from the bones of the Saint who died
1,200 years ago. According to records carefully kept, the oil flows each year from October 12, the day St.
Walburga’s remains were transferred to the present location, until February 25, the anniversary of the Saint’s
death, when the flow abruptly stops. This 4 month activity has been carefully observed for several centuries.[32]
For the facts concerning the unusual miracles that took place after the death of the Dominican nun St.
Agnes of Montepulciano (d. 1317) we turn to Bl. Raymond of Capua (d. 1399), her biographer, who was also the
confessor of St. Catherine of Siena. As the confessor of the monastery in which the incorrupt body of St. Agnes
was conserved, Bl. Raymond was able to study at length the documents in the archives relating to the phenomena
surrounding her. Based on these documents and the testimony of eyewitnesses, Bl. Raymond wrote of the Saint’s
miracles and prodigies.
He tells us that the body of the Saint was meant to be embalmed, but a wonderful miracle took place that
prevented it because,
From the extremities of her feet and hands a precious liquor issued drop by drop. The convent sisterhood
collected it in a vase of crystal and still preserve it. This liquor is similar to balm in color, but it is without doubt
more precious. God deigned thereby to show that the Saint’s pure flesh that distilled the balm of grace had no
need of earthly embalmment.

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 BL. MATTHIA NAZZAREI OF MATELICA (d. 1319) fled to the Poor Clare convent when her father insisted
that she marry. She became a valued member of the order and served her community as abbess for forty years.
Having predicted the date of her death, she died on December 28, the day she had specified, surrounded by a
heavenly fragrance and a mysteriously bright light. Interment was in an elegant urn deposited near the major
altar. 217 years later the incorrupt body that was never embalmed was exhumed and carefully examined. The
community was astonished at that time to see the body sweat profusely; in fact, the moisture was so abundant
that it became necessary to dry the body with linen towels, an incident that was carefully recorded in the
documents pertaining to the history of the Beata.
The tomb was once again disturbed, this time in 1756 when repairs were being made in the chapel. The
bishop seized the opportunity to examine the relic. Again it was found perfectly incorrupt, flexible and emitting a
sweet fragrance. 2 years later, in December 1758, an extraordinary condition was noticed when a “blood fluid”
was seen proceeding from the corpse, to the amazement of the witnesses and the physicians called to the scene.
Other men of science and renowned ecclesiastical authorities have witnessed and affirmed the miraculous
formation and nature of the liquid throughout the years.
Another mysterious aspect of this”blood fluid” is the fact that it commences at various times, especially
prior to the death of members of the community or before the outbreak of wars, plagues, or events of epic
proportions.
The linens kept under the Beata’s hands and feet were changed in 1920. In 1969 the shrine of the Beata
affirmed that then linens were still saturated with this miraculous existed for over 650 years.[33]

Fig. 14.). The Basilica of Santa Maria Assunta in Bagno di Romagna guards the Holy Corporal
Fig. 15.). Two drops of the precious blood collected by St. Louis, and displayed in a reliquary in the Basilica of the
Precious Blood of Neuvy Saint Sepulchre.
Fig. 16.). This reliquary contains pieces of heart tissue, organs, and skin of St. Anthony.

Fig. 17.). This is kept at Basilica of the Holy Blood in Bruges, Belgium.

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Fig. 18.). Reliquary vial of the blood of St Lawrence to be brought to Gozo
Fig. 19.). Relic of Saint Anthony at Shrine (his skin)
Fig. 20.). FIRST CLASS RELIC OF SAINT JOHN PAUL II
Fig. 21.). The Holy Tooth of Saint Apollonia Cathedral of Porto, Portugal St Apollonia is the special intercessor for
those with tooth troubles ie; you pray to her and she asks God to stop your tooth hurting.

Fig. 22.). Reliquary of Thomas Becket. Copper and enamel, 13th century. Museo della Cattedrale di Anagni, Anagni,
Italy
Fig. 23.). The head of St. John Chrysostom, the Archbishop of Constantinople in the late 4th and early 5th century
Fig. 24.). The church of Sant'Agnese in Agone in Rome's Piazza Navona has the head

Fig. 25.). Heart relic of St Charles in Rome's Church of Saint Ambrose and of Saint Charles Borromeo
Fig. 26.). The heart of Saint Camillus de Lellis, founder of the Order Of Camilians in the late 16th century1
Fig. 27.). The tissue of the 16th century Italian priest Philip Neri, The Apostle of Rome surrounding his expanding
heart

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Fig. 28.). Reliquary Bust of a Female Saint, 17th Century (Vander Kelen Mertens Museum Leuven, Belgium)
Fig. 29.). Reliquary of the Jaw of St. Anthony, 1349
Fig. 30.). Antique Reliquary with A RARE Relic of St Martin...his tooth

The Religious Relics

In 1206 the citizens of Amiens, Picardy’s proud and prosperous capital, already a commune for a hundred
years, acquired a piece of John the Baptists head. As a fitting shrine for the relic, thyey determined to build the
largest church in France, “higher than all the saints, higher then all the Kings.”[34]
Like the pardoner, they bilked the villagers, selling them relics of inspired imagination. Boccacios Friar
Cipolla sold one of the angel Gabriels Feathers which he said had fallen in the Virgins chamber during the
Annunciation. As satire, this did not overreach the real friar who sold a piece of the bush from which the Lord
spoke to Moses. Some sold drafts on the Treasury of Merit supposed to be stored in heaven by the Order of St.
Francis. Wyclif, on being asked what the parchments were good for, replied: “To covere mustard pottis.” The
friars because they might, after all, have the key to salvation.[35]
King Charles V collected precious objects and gem studded reliquaries to house the piece of Moses’ rod,
the top of John the Baptists head, the flask of Virgins Milk, Christs swaddling clothes, and bits and pieces of various
instruments of the crucifixion including the crown of thorns and a fragment of the True Cross, all of which the royal
chapel possessed. At his death he was to own 47 jeweled gold crowns and 63 complete sets of chapel furnishings
including vestments, altarpieces, chalices, liturgical books, and gold crucifixes.[36]
In Catholic theology, sacred relics must not be worshipped, because only God is worshipped and adored.
Instead, the veneration given to them was "dulia". Saint Jerome declared, "We do not worship, we do not adore,
for fear that we should bow down to the creature rather than to the Creator, but we venerate the relics of the
martyrs in order the better to adore Him whose martyrs they are."
The Catholic church divides relics into three classes:
• First Class Relics: items directly associated with the events of Christ's life (manger, cross, etc.) or the
physical remains of a saint (a bone, a hair, skull, a limb, etc.). Traditionally, a martyr's relics are often more
prized than the relics of other saints. Parts of the saint that were significant to that saint's life are more
prized relics. For instance, King St. Stephen of Hungary's right forearm is especially important because of
his status as a ruler. A famous theologian's head may be his most important relic. (The head of St. Thomas
Aquinas was removed by the monks at the Cistercian abbey at Fossanova where he died.) If a saint did a lot
of traveling, then the bones of his feet may be prized. Catholic teaching prohibits relics to be divided up

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 into small, unrecognizable parts if they are to be used in liturgy (i.e., as in an altar; see the rubrics listed in
Rite of Dedication of a Church and an Altar).
• Second Class Relics: items that the saint owned or frequently used, for example, a crucifix, rosary, book,
etc. Again, an item more important in the saint's life is thus a more important relic. Sometimes a second
class relic is a part of an item that the saint wore (a shirt, a glove, etc.) and is known as ex indumentis
("from the clothing").
[38]
• Third Class Relics: any object that is touched to a first or second class relic. Most third class relics are
small pieces of cloth, though in the first millennium oil was popular; the Monza ampullae contained oil
collected from lamps burning before the major sites of Christ's life, and some reliquaries had holes for oil
to be poured in and out again. Many people call the cloth touched to the bones of saints "ex brandea". But
ex brandea strictly refers to pieces of clothing that were touched to the body or tombs of the apostles. It is
a term that is used only for such; it is not a synonym for a third class relic.
The sale or disposal by other means of relics without the permission of the Apostolic See is nowadays strictly
forbidden by canon 1190 of the Code of Canon Law.[39] Relics may not be placed upon the altar for public
veneration, as that is reserved for the display of the Blessed Sacrament (host or prosphora and Eucharistic wine
after consecration in the sacrament of the Eucharist).
List of Important Relics, Not a List Associated with the Relics in this book:
• The Sandals of Jesus Christ were donated to Prüm Abbey, Germany, by Pope Zachary (741 752) and Pope
Stephen II (752 757).
• St Peter's Basilica in the Vatican contains Saint Peter's relics
[44]
• The Apostle Paul's relics are allegedly contained in the Basilica of Saint Paul.
• St John the Evangelist's tomb is purported to be in the Basilica of St. John at Ephesus in Turkey
• St Mark's relics are held at St Mark's Basilica in Venice
• St James' relics are reputedly held at the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in North West Spain
• St Andrew's relics are contained in the Basilica of St Andrew in Patras, Greece
• Relics claimed to be those of John the Baptist were discovered in a Bulgarian monastery in 2010. Other
countries claiming to have remains of St John include Turkey, Montenegro, Greece, Italy and Egypt.[45]
• Saint Thomas Aquinas relics are contained in the Church of the Jacobins, Toulouse, France.
• Saint Catherine of Siena's head is stored in San Domenico church, Siena, with her body in Santa Maria
sopra Minerva Church in Rome.
• The arm of Saint George in Lod.
• Blessed Mary of the Divine Heart relics and incorrupt body are exposed in the Church of the Sacred Heart
of Jesus in Ermesinde, Portugal.[37]

Fig. 31.). The Roman Catholics bows down before a bone of Francis Xavier, and pray.
Fig. 32.). The Incorruptible “La sacra testa” (the sacred head)—the actual head of Catherine of Siena
Fig. 33.). A blue eyed skeleton in a box, with the moth region and teeth covered with jewels.

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Fig. 34.). Incorrupt Heart of St John Vianney Visiting the United States Catholic Pilgrimage Sites
Fig. 35.). Crypt Relic of St. Blaise Late 17th century
Fig. 36.). Relics of St. Theodore of Tyro (known as St. Theodore of Amasea in the West)

Fig. 37.). A dismembered holy head stares out from her beautiful reliquary at the St. Dominic Basilica
Fig. 38.). Medieval Skull of Saint Vitalis of Assisi, Obscure Catholic Saint from the 14C
Fig. 39.). Around 1450 1500. Origin Church of St. Justus, Flums, Canton of St. Gallen.

Fig. 40.). Relic heart of St John Berchmans

Fig. 41.). The burnt head of St. Lawrence, displayed at the Vatican
Fig. 42.). Below is the small reliquary upon the altar in San Antonio de Belen parish. This reliquary contains a piece
of the rib of Antonio.

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Fig. 43.). Venezia San Geremia Saint Lucy relics feet
Fig. 44.). Basel (BS), Cathedral Treasury, ca. 1450, The National Swiss Museum
Fig. 45.). Alleged relics of Saint Séverin in Paris.

Fig. 46.). The Holy Right Hand Of King Saint Stephen

Fig. 47.). Reliquary hand, Belgium, 1250
Fig. 48.). The hand bones of St. John the Baptist Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, Turkey. SKULL OF JOHN THE BAPTIST
Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, Turkey

Fig. 49.). Relic holder of a part of the skulls of St. John the Baptist,
Fig. 50.). Relic of the heart of saint Clare of Montefalco
Fig. 51.). The hand of a 16th century Jesuit missionary, St. Francis Xavier (Il Gesu, Rome), His right hand was cut off
the mummified corpse located in Old Goa, India in 1614 and kept in Rome. Shortly after the first exhibition of the
corpse, a Portugese woman bit off one of the Saint's big toes. The toe is now in a silver reliquary in another
cathedral in Goa. One of St. Francis Xavier's (diamond encrusted) fingernails is on display in a nearby village and his
left hand is in Japan.

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Fig. 52.). Bone of Giselle of Bavaria
Fig. 53.). Feet of St. Gervasius or Protasius, 3rd cent.,
Fig. 54.). Saint Clare's Fingernails And Hair Clippings

Fig. 55.). Saint Peter's Basilica, Rome.

Fig. 56.). Reliquary of Saint Andrew, 17th century, tooled silver, St. Andrew’s Cathedral
Fig. 57.). Reliquary bust of St. Ladislas from Várad cathedral Győr, Cathedral Treasure

Fig. 58.). Reliquary Head of Saint Eustace, c. 1210.

Fig. 59.). Facing difficulty in continuing his monastic existence as bishop, St. Martin fled to live in a cabin made of
branches. Head reliquary of Saint Martin, from the second quarter of the 14th centuy. (C) RMN Grand Palais
(musée du Louvre) / Droits réservés
Fig. 60.). A reliquary for one of St. Ursula's virgin's at at El Escorial palace.

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720: When I embarked on the journey of the Catholic church, I didn’t expect nor did I ever phathom that this type
of activity was going on. Once again, with a magician understanding the root element here is to give an inanimate
object animation. The animation is not necessarily one that you can see. It is of a aura nature/principle, where you
can feel it and your eyes do not literally see anything out of character. The eyes will identify the essence of the
difference in ones stature in comparisons with others. This essence is defined by the spirituality/aura mechanism
that is gained from experiences which may differ from the majority populace. Basically you’re a rose in a
dandlelion field and everybody sees you as a physical dandelion but give you the respect of a rose. This is what the
relics are. The relics are a representation of divine spirituality which was compiled from the miracles and the
totality of the character of the saints. The different spiritualities in which the relics represent are fragmented
amongst many saints & martyrs and then fragmented from there into body parts and bones. All the stories of
saints, martyrs and other religious massacres are embodied into these relics. Supposedly, the saints that these
relics represent were miracle workers. Because of this it is told to the catholic church members that they may also
receive miracles and blessings when praying infront of a relic and invoking the saint, but there is an understanding
that there is no guarantee that they will receive blessings. Popes, Bishops and Priests all pray to and infront of
relics and it is their duty to protect them. Some of these bones have been tested and proven not to even be
human.

Chapter 5
The Holy See
Popes, Bishops & Saints
The Preachers Sermon
The orthodox Christianity of today gives over the earth entirely to the sovereignty of Satan, the
successful usurper of Eden, and instead of bidding the righteous to look forward to the final reenthronement and
absolute supremacy of truth and goodness in this world as the “One far off divine event, To which the whole
creation moves,” consoles them with the vague promise of compensation in a future state of being. Even this
remote prospect of redemption is confined to a select few; not only is the earth destined to be burned with fire on
account of its utter corruption, but the great majority of its inhabitants are doomed to eternal torments in the
abode of evil spirits.[38]
Sermons and popular tales, too, brought him to the same warning. In the pious literature of the trecento
no subject was more popular than that of the rich usurer’s or merchant’s deathbed. There was the tale of the
money lender who was denied Christian burial because he was so proud of his ill gotten gains that “when he was
eating, he kept upon the table a golden cart with golden oxen and ploughmen…and he made his servants rattle
upon the table purses containing 14,000 golden ducats; and he would say that one of these was Jesus Christ and
one the Virgin Mary, and the others the 12 Apostles.” Another story described the deathbed of a usurer who, as
he lay dying, saw “a fiend with a sharp pointed hat’ (for a conical hat was a mark of infamy, worn only by the
owners of gambling houses) “who leaped upon his bed and then threw himself face downward upon him, caught

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him by the throat and strangled him.” There was the tale of the wandering ghost of a usurer who appeared to his
son “a black smoke, as it were the shadow of a man” to tell him that he had been condemned to eternal torment.
And in yet another story the usurer was carried off to Hell by “an innumerable multitude men, black as negroes of
Ethiopia, dark and terrible beyond all human imagining…biting and smiting and rending and tearing.” So often,
indeed, did preachers harp upon this theme that Sacchetti describes an occasion when a member of a very poor
congregation at last cried out in protest: “But here there is none that has a single groat to lend!” whereupon the
preacher passed on to a more appropriate text, “Blessed be the poor.”
If we wish to know what these preachers said, we have only to read the sermons of the greatest of them,
San Bernardino da Siena. Though a fine classical scholar, he never made a show of his learning. He wished his
hearers to go away “contented and illuminated, not confused”; he delighted in the lively phrase the concrete,
familiar image. If he had to describe a vain man, he called him “tutto pieno di chicchirichi” (“full of cock a doodle
doo”); he would make his congregation laugh by imitating the croaking of a frog. “Know you how the frog talks?
He says qua qua qua.” No device was left unused to hold the attention of his hearers. If a woman’s eye was
wandering, he interrupted the sermon to call out to her: “Lo! I see a woman there who, if she were watching me,
would not be looking where she is. Pay heed to me, I say!” Once a tired housewife dropped asleep while he was
talking of the pit into which Lucifer fell. “You sleepy woman, there! Look to it, that you fall not into the same pit!”
And on one occasion, when the attention of the whole congregation seemed to be flaggin, the preacher drew out a
letter: “Hark to this letter, which I received this morning.” His hearers leaned forward eagerly. “Lo, you heed an
unread letter, more than the word of God!”[39]
A 13th century anecdote that was from a collection to be used by preachers to moral lessons to the people
presents a charming image of how easily one might lose ones humanity through the appetites:
A man who had sinned in a bestial manner wished to do penance in like manner and so ate grass
frequently every day. After a time, he began to wonder to what order of angels one would belong who had done
such penance. An angel answered him: “By such a life you do not deserve to belong to the order of the angels, but
rather to the order of the asses.[40]
For pastors, the prostitute was thus both an auxiliary and a witness. She was poor and humiliated, but in a
certain sense she took part in the struggle against vice. She was also its victim. She stood witness to the misery of
the human condition. [41]
All preachers, Olivier Maillard and Michel Menot included, were obliged to explain that lust was illicit,
contrary to what many people thought, would lead to many woes, and would weaken a mans energies and shorten
his days. Menot’s attacks include shades of difference, however, and, like his predecessors, he distinguishes four
sorts of lust: simple fornication, incest, sacrilege, and sodomy. In other words, when the sermon had ended, the
hearer might have understood and remembered that lust was much more of a danger for the woman than for the
man or for the clergy that for the laity; that fornication was not one of the gravest dangers and that God judged
fornication much less severely than pride or avarice; and that it was excusable if it were not too frequently
indulged in. And this during a period of moral reaction.
This is why intellectuals made such wide use of Augustine’s opinion: “Remove prostitutes from human
affairs, and you will unsettle everything on account of lusts….This class of people is by its own mode of life most
unchaste in its morals; and by the law of order, it is most vile in social condition.’ Furthermore, it is because the
common good implies the existence of evil that Thomas Aquinas develops the principle of tolerance in his Summa.
Thomas’s confessor, Ptolomy of Lucca, goes a good deal further: he popularizes the principle of the lesser evil by
referring conjointly to Aristotle and to a gloss of Augustine. According to Aristotle, ‘if soldiers have no women,
they abuse men’. The interlinear gloss of Augustine, which appeared during the 13th century and was often cited

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subsequently, says, ‘the sea and the sewer pit in a palace. Remove this sewer and the entire palace will be
contaminated.’ This provided an authoritative reference of capital importance for anyone charged with the
governance of a city. It justified public prostitution – vile as it was – allowed it to be established and to function,
and promoted its practice to the status of a trade (ministerium).
The first mention of fornication in Thomas is in Ia IIAe. Quest. 10 art. 11; ‘God permits evils to be produced
in the universe; he lets them remain for fear that if they were eliminated, greater goods would be [eliminated] as
well, or worst evil might ensue.’[42]
Conjointly, an increasing number of voices were raised even in the bosom of the Church in favour of the
marriage of priests, who were thought to be incapable of respecting their vow to chastity. The hierarchy resisted:
however, since it was fully aware of the risks of celibacy and equally firm in its opposition to marriage for the
clergy, concubinage, and unnatural acts, it admitted that clerical fornication with public prostitutes represented a
lesser evil for ecclesiastical discipline.[43]
After Gerson, theologians and moralists either used great discretion in their attacks in this domain or they
denounced sexual desire in terms so general that their condemnation lost its thrust. It is apparently paradoxical,
but in the long run totally logical, to hear Bernardino of Siena thunder against marriages ‘pledged to the Devil’ but
say not a word about Siena’s and Florence’s recently opened municipal brothels. The flamboyant preachers may
have castigated female vanities and luxury with extreme violence, but they were a good deal less loquacious about
prostitutes, saving their attacks for the procuresses. Furthermore, faithful to a set of priorities discernible as early
as the 13th century, they devote entire sermons to pride and to avarice, but not to lasciviousness (in the male, at
any event), provided that it is renounced in this world. The lustful man had time for contrition in his old age –
unless of course he met a sudden or accidental death – where as the miser was pictured in his final hour still
refusing to disclose where he had hidden his treasure.[44]
Fear of the Parousia grew: from the 1390s on, eschatological anxieties were spread everywhere by zealots
of popular preaching. Jean de Varennes, Vincent Ferrier, Manfred of Verceil, Thomas Conette, Friar Richard and
their imitators who ranged the western world between 1390 and 1430, preached before millions, and on their
rostrums there appeared the disquieting silhouettes of the messiah and the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse. As
late as 1431, the Dominican inquisitor who had come to Paris for a public justification of the execution of Joan of
Arc took pains to specify to his auditors that the 4 demons in female form who had recently appeared were really 4
horse women in male dress.[45]
The young men frequented the brothel and bathouses seemed, in fact, proof of their normality. Not only
their companions, but their parents as well egged them on to fornication: ‘You give your sons money and
permission to go to the brothel, to the bathhouses, and to the taverns’, Oliver Maillard and Michel Menot thunder,
but they do not seem really shocked, and they also reprimand young artisans for exhorting their friends to
accompany them to the brothel of a Sunday. These 2 men preached, for the most part, in the north and the west
of France, so we can conclude that social practices among the young (and the less young) were the same in the Ile
de France, the cities of Normandy and Artois as they were in Dijon at the very end of the century.
‘You Young artisans who on Sunday incite your companions to accompany you to the brothel’; ‘you give
your sons money and freedom to go to the brothel to the baths and to the taverns’; ‘drunken husbands who strike
your wives when you return from the brothel’, and so forth. Michael Menot repeats what he hears people say:
lust is not a very infamous sin; young blades interested in seducing a girl say that simple fornication is not
distasteful to God’. God’s assent seemed to some so sure that they portrayed paradise as a place of more than
spiritual delights. Menot reprimands those who wallow in voluptuous pleasures in this world and fully expect
Paradise to be a continuation of their way of life. ‘May malediction fall on their heads!’ he exclaims Was Menot

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exaggerating? This is what a Dijon weaver had to say in 1528 on his return from his daughter in law’s funeral: ‘She
was a real goer [avait besoigne] in this world and is doing the same in the other world, for the angels of paradise
give it to women there’. We can deduce from these words that women who have bien besoigne in this world are
admitted to Paradise and that our Dijon weaver wasted no time on subtle arguments about the sex of angels: they
are bisexual, for his is also sure that men will not lack partners in their heavenly abode. Sermons on resurrection
of the flesh or on the glorious bodies of the just, admitted to Paradise at their prime and without their physical
deformities, are related to this image. The Dijon weaver merely translates this teaching into its ‘naturalist’ and
perhaps socially humbler form.[46]
In real life, hatred is discernible only regarding concubinary clergy or preaching friars, as the examples
from Dijon show. In my opinion, these violent feelings were consciously encouraged after 1470 by the reformers
(Oliver Maillard and Michel Nemot, for example), and were perhaps less intense between 1430 and 1470. In one
telling incident in 1434, a priest attached to the collegial church of St. Paul in Lyons had his illegitimate son
baptized publicly and even boasted about it, inviting passers by to join him for a drink at the tavern, ‘to the great
scandal of all’, as the Actes capitulaires of the church report. This seems questionable, as the act is scarcely
comprehensible without the complicity of the parish. Other writings, on the other hand, were intentionally
savage. They were aimed at concubinary clergy, who could on another occasion seduce someones wife or
daughter, or at maistres freres foutards and their jacobines (lecherous friars and their doxies), portrayed as having
a ready store of money and as lascivious, hypocritical and – the last straw – pious moralizers.
It is for reasons such as these that it would be imprudent to take too seriously the attacks on conjugal
mores of certain preachers who hammered away at marriages ‘consecrated to the devil’ or berated couples
‘plunged into a dismal ignorance like pigs in a trough of mud’. Were these allusions to contraceptive practices or
unnatural acts? More simply, conjugal relations were pictured as consecrated to the devil because they were not
reported to the confessor. Was it not Bernardino of Siena who said that sermons on marriage were ‘as rare as a
bird on the barrens’? The best of the bishops urged parish priests to extreme caution on these treacherous paths.
When some of them inveighed against marital sex, they aimed at instilling a sense of guilt in couples who indulged
in carefree intercourse and who had no intention of telling the cure about it.
It is true that Bernadino denounces husbands who have ‘unnatural’ relations with their wives. He also
cites the example of one beautiful young wife who remained a virgin for 6 years after her marriage, living in a most
grave state of sin against nature. I could also cite the sermons of Fra Cherubino in which he denounces, in explicit
terms, husbands who practice coitus interruptus (they ‘sow their seed on stone and not in the earth’). But the very
fact that Fra Cherubino repeats Bernadinos example of the lovely young bride sodomized for six years leads me to
think that his discourse is out of touch with reality. Guillaume Saignet has already condemned ‘those who sow
their seed on stone ‘ in nearly the same terms in his Lamentatio. And one hundred years earlier, the Pisan
preacher, Giordano da Rivalto said, “out of 100 persons there was not one” who acted in marriage “according to
nature, as God wishes”.
The refusal of faithful to report on their sexual behaviour is explicitly in one of Bernardino’s sermons:
‘Often a foolish woman will say to her husband, in order to seem modest, “the priest interrogated me on that
disgusting thing, and he wanted to know what I do with you”’ and the foolish husband will be scandalized by the
priest’s question.’ Bernardino adds, ‘They have become like mute hounds’. Jean Gerson shows discretion in this
domain: he advises women to confess their husband’s sins only to a priest unacquantied with him. Gerson
intended by this to mitigate hostile reactions that he knew to be widespread. Such reactions were not a recent
phenomenon. Georges Duby notes the rancor of 12th century husbands towards directors of conscience who
challenged the husband’s power over his wife and who ‘encourage their wives to be frigid’. He further notes that

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at that time ‘many ecclesiastics on the fringes of orthodoxy were always saying how unseemly it was for clerics to
concern themselves with such essentially carnal matters’. This attitude must have persisted into the succeeding
centuries. On the other hand, there were probably even more priests who did not probably even more priests
who did not care to venture into this dangerous domain in confession, either out of connivance or, more often, out
of prudence.[47]
In France, the Cent nouvelles nouvelles and the Quinze joies de marriage, the works of Antoine de La Sale,
and, even more, songs bear the mark of this spirit and this inclination for pornography. Even Francois Garin takes
delight in recounting how in olden times, when the Sultan of Egypt cut off only the testicles of his harem guards,
they still managed to fourgonner (‘poke up the fire’) with what remained.
Which is why the law ordained
To cut off everything and leave not a thing
This movement was so sweeping and this language seemed so nearly natural that somewhat later even the
severest preachers – men such as Olivier Maillard and Michel Menot – made concessiones to it.[48]
In a Lenten Sermon given in Tours, Menot first condemns punitive excommunications and then goes on to
enumerate the criminals who, since their sin was mortal and public, must of necessity be condemned. They are
procuresses ‘who public, must of necessity be condemned. They are the procuresses ‘who have led 20, 30, or 40
girls into perdition and have no other trade’; gallants ‘who maintain meretrices with board and lodging (a pain et a
pot’); married men who keep a concubine; and all who abandon their legitimate spouse or are public adulterers or
blasphemers.
The preachers (and the other sermons follow this model) did not attack prostitution itself, but only the
abuses to which it led. Women who were ‘vile’ the poor, lepers or prostitutes – did not risk exclusion from the
spiritual community. Moreover, since prostitution was a public function, prostitutes were rarely ridiculed or taken
to task for their conduct. Although Olivier Maillard calls the brothels ‘the most ignoble and filthy places there
could be’, he does not demand they be closed. What they all clamour for is a clear delineation between the
prostitutes and the temporal community through a revival of the old prohibitions modelled on the edicts of St.
Louis. In the meantime, prostitution should not be advertised in the heart of the city, near schools and churches,
and prostitutes must not join in the life of the neighbourhood or attend family festivities.
Thus Maillard exclaims, ‘there are more whores in Paris than there are honest women and more usurers
than merchants of probity’. But perhaps Maillard himself did not feel he was stretching the truth, since he
includes under the category of ribaudes elegant women who permitted themselves laughter in public. If the
veracity of these preachers’ testimony has been doubted, it is because their critics were insufficiently versed – on
occasion, by choice – in urban mores of the 1470s. As we shall soon see, these men did their utmost to transform
those mores.[49]
In Florence, the preachers explained the corruption of women by the influence of the prostitutes; in
France, they continually drew parallels between female moves in general and prostitution. In spite of his
exaggerations, Bernadino still maintained some sense of humour when he lashed out at the finery of the women of
Siena, but Michel Menot and Olivier Maillard write with a poisoned pen. Beauty is dangerous, and pretty young
women are proud, inclined to lust, and ‘dishonest’ in act of intention. ‘It is better to see the Devil than view a
finely dressed woman’, ‘Golden Tongue’ tells the good people of Tours. If a woman has an elegant bearing, she
must be a procuress. If she wears the latest fashions, they are the unspeakably filthy signs of wantonness. As for
women who ‘paint their faces’ or beautify their daughters (who are compared to painted idols), they are criminals
who are fabricating whores.*

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 How, the preachers continue, can such women be invited to the banquets amd dances that have now
become so scandalous? In the carolles and moresques that they dance (inventions of the Devil), women use
lascivious and provocative gestures gestures to tempt, not only the other dancers, but onlookers as well to the sin
of lust. Their arms raised, they deride Christ’s passion as they whirl about. Even worse, now burghers’ wives, their
daughters, and their servant women can be seen going to the bathhouse, walking through the streets with head
held high and conversing with their gallants. Other women a a thing most extraordinaty and abominable – go
about in men’s clothing, their faces masked, and they attend sporting contest and mummers’ plays. Do not
ancient prophecies foretell that the antichrist will be born of the Devil when lust and pride have prompted all the
young, men and women, to dress in disguises.?
Examples of such statements can be found in Maillard: Young ladies who wear split tunics, your husbands
are cuckolds’). On mothers, see Maillard: A mother who turns her daughter into an ‘idol’ or a ‘temple’ is
compared to the adulterers, the sacrilegious, and the concubinary. ‘Young ladies, do you take as much pains to
praise God as to paint your faces? Surely I think not, and if it is as I say, may you be damned’.
Comparing elegant women to public prostitutes was a time tested formula among the sermoners:
Bernardino of Siena used it, and without compunction held up women’s rouged cheeks to comparison with the
face of Christ at the Passion: ‘Brother club, brother stick,’ he exclaims, ‘come purify the sin of women who want to
be taken for prostitutes.’ On the other hand, Bernadinos criticisms are often interspersed with amusing or
indulgent remarks. No race of hatred can be found in Gerson, who well understands womens need for elegance
and playfulness.
Our preachers miss no opportunity to criticize all forms of female gatherings, including childbirths. Such
hostile statements are quite clearly addressed to the men, who were excluded from gatherings this sort, which
occurred frequently and in which women had total sway.[50]
When they called elegantly dressed young women trollops and their mother’s criminals, Menot and
Maillard were carefully gauging their effect. Non repentant ‘whores’ would be damned; until that day, disobedient
women should leave the city or be shut up at home, just as the meretrices should be confined to the brothels. It is
in the course of a sermon on finery that Maillard cites what he considers an excellent custom: in southern
Germany, a girl’s ribaud (her lover) is hanged on the gallows and his mstress buried alive. Is this merely an
example that he is citing? When the friar then urges the crowd before him to take up the hunt for concubinary
priests, he knows full well what will take place one fine night. The priest had little to fear, for priest beating was a
hanging crime, but raping his concubine was one of the favourite sports of the rowdies of Dijon.
Maillard exclaims: “You burghers’ wives, young ladies or virgins, who wear beautiful gloves, it would be
better if you left the city like Abrahams cousin to go to distant lands’. ‘Rapacious [widows], who bed like bitches’,
are compared to the Devils handmaids.[51]
One remedy suggested was inculcating fear in unfaithful wives, following the tried and true methods used
against recalcitrant prostitutes. In all the tales of adultery repeated by Olivier Maillard and Michel Menot, the
wives who consent to such an adventure end up infamy, as was right and proper, in the public brothel. More
precisely, since it is Olivier Maillard regrets that France does not follow the Spanish custom concerning adulterous
wives: in that country the husband takes his fallen spouse to the city gates, where he tears off her headdress,
which he then drops at her family’s doorstep. He thus condemns his guilty wife to a life of vagabondage and
prostitution and he displays the sign of her dishonor before he r paternal dwelling.
The exempla of Michel Menot include: (1) a woman who had been mistreated by her husband and fell into
adultery. Victim of blackmail, she was forced into prostitution when her lover threatened to put her into the
public brothel; (2) a merchant from Tours seduces a beautiful married woman, has sexual intercourse with her,

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and orders her to the public brothel, where she is found later. These 2 examples illustrate the principal causes of
adultery: in the first case, the woman is poor, and perhaps even beaten. (In Dijon, poverty and mistreatment.)
The second case is simply a case of infatuation.[52]
At the same Synod a period of 12 days was set for the clergy to get rid of their concubines, though these
women, as the bishop himself proclaimed in so many words, constituted the least of the evils to be dealt with. In
Paris, if a whore accosted a monk or priest and he did not immediately join her, he had to endure a flood of abuse
as a sodomite. Again, the penal code of the German Order of Marienburg reveals the knightly members of this
military corporation in a dubious a light as the priests. Satiated with their’women’s quarters’, they felt no shame,
on occasion, in approaching honest housewives and virgins with libidinous intent or even in seducing children.[53]
During a Lenten course preached at Strassburg in 1508 by a famous pulpiteer, Dr. Johann Geiler von
Kaisersberg, stirring discourses taken down by the Guardian of the Fransicans of the Strict Observance in that city,
Father Johann Paul, who first published the collection in 1517 as Die Emeis, is a sermon delivered on the third
Sunday in Lent, with rubric, “Am dritten sontag den fasten, Occuli, predigt den doctor vor den Werwolffen.” The
good doctor discusses lycanthropy, apparently regarding werewolves as wolves of uncommon ferocity, who having
tasted human flesh find it far more delicate than any other and desire it always. Hence they lie in wait to devour
men. He certainly says that the Demon often appears in the shape of a wolf, and in his sermon on wild men of the
woods he speaks of lycanthropes in Spain.[54]
720: Its pretty obvious that prostitution was a daily issue. The brothel, bathhouses and the street walkers were all
a hard part of the financial institiution of a kingdom. It was a necessary evil that the church wanted to demean but
also had their hands in the cookie jar. Therefore the vagina still rules. To fight or control the natural impulses one
feels is a skill only humans have. To try to justify it by a religious means that’s aligned with a holy/perfect principle
is also something only humans can do. To have free sex with anyone at any time is of the animal which is nature.
When its presented this then its safe to say that currently we live in an unnatural condition, unless humans really
have no nature at all. The evidence is this is found with the fact that humans have lived in 1000’s of different ways
and 1000’s of different languages over time and all forms of survival have been correct because we have survived.
Prostitution and accessible vagina has to be available, this is recorded in all civilizations and even tribes
had a thing westerners called sexual hospitality. The feeling of being “horny” races adrenaline, testosterone and
blood through your body to produce an external aggression. Meaning when men get horny they want the pussy
now. But women want to play games like cats and be chased around with the nonsense which will make the man
want to achieve the goal or go elsewhere for quicker satisfaction of his pains but of a lower quality woman.
Nonetheless, the goal was achieved. Men and women can become violent and there wil definetly be medical
issues if they aren’t allowed to release their orgasms. They knew this then. As repetitive orgasms are congruent
with the consistent flow of the humours in the body. The whore fat, greasy, drunk, hairy, porcelain doll, magdelen,
Madonna, smelling like lilly flowers had to be available at all times. Lust is the gateway to all sins. If it is our nature
then how is it a sin. It is a sin when it is overindulged which will stagnate work and production. When work and
production is null and void the community fails. When this occurs men will fall from grace of upholding the
god/jesus position amongst all women of a community. It is a indirect form of demanding respect.
Due to the fact that prostitution was a public act in the Medieval times far greater proportions then what it
is today, it was heavily discussed by the preachers. Most likely it was the meat of what they discussed. The
majority of the other vices fell underneath the cloak of gaming and sport as did sex. One thing about European
mentality is they all know what they are doing and theyre going to do it any way. Its good to talk shit at eachother
only to find eachothers faults and enforce perfection. The preachers were fucking women, its all in the fabliauxs.
The teenagers were out fucking the preachers concubines. Priests had concubines, this clarifies what im stating.

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Humans are mammals and mammals are polygamous, if not polygamous they aren’t family oriented at all. We can
listen to the face painting women all we want as they try to enforce backwardness, to ensure their slavery and
worship and get nowhere. Or we can continue as men and fuck women as nature intends, god wills, impulses
enforce and desires whisper.

The Bishops:
There is, in truth, no controversialist of the day who exceeds Jewel in the reckless violence of his abuse.
His impudence, profanity, unblushing mendacity, and downright forgery are beyond belief. There are, moreover,
to be discerned in the cold concentration of his hate a bitter cynicism and a mocking impiety which one can only
stigmatize as devilish, and which go far to prove that the man held no faith at all. Constructive ideas he has none,
he is essentially Mephistopheles, “the Spirit that Denies.” When he has to speak of Holy Mass he blasphemes like
a maniac, as in a letter to Peter Martyr, probably to be dated May, 1559, where he writes: “This it is to have once
tasted of the Mass! He who drinks is made mad by it. Depart from it, all ye who value sound mind; who drinks is
made mad by it. They perceive that when that palladium is removed every thing else will be imperiled.” Again
describing the state of England on his return he says: “No part of religion was yet restored; the country was still
everywherefouled with the mass,” a phrase which seems to me the extreme of criminal blasphemy. The
insincerity of the man is frankly appaling. 10 years after his death Blessed Edmund Campion wrote: “When I was
young John Jewell, the Calvanist leader in England, was impudent enough to challenge the Catholics to a proof of
their respective tenets from the works of the Fathers of the first 6 centuries. The challenge was accepted by some
well known men then in exile and poverty at Louvain. I venture to say that Jewell’s craft, ignorance, roguery, and
impudence, as exposed by these writers, did more good to the Catholic cause than anything within my
remembrance. A proclamation was immediately posted on the doors that none of the answers should be read or
kept, though they had been squeezed out by a direct challenge.’ It is important that we should appreciate a just
character of the man to whom the witch trials in England are largely due, not that he acted from any hatred to
Witchcraft and Satanists, but solely from political motives.
As early as the summer of 1559, just before his western cirguit, Jewel had been nominated Bishop of
Salisbury, and although his masque of narrow Calvinism demurred, or at any rate pretended to demur for bare
form’s sake, against the prescribed episcopal dress which he had erstwhile harshly denounced, he conveniently
allowed his scruples to be overcome and was consecrated in January, 1560. His discourse against witches seems to
have been delivered some time between November, 1559, and 17 March, 1560 probably in February of the latter
year. At this time the ecclesiastical and civil authorities were in close touch, and no doubt the way was being laid
for drastic legislation on the subject of sorcery. A sermon delivered by a famous court preacher, a newly made
Bishop, would carry great weight. And jewel vehemently urged immediate action. It was, he told the Queen, “the
horrible using of your poor subjects” that forced him to be round and plain. “This kind of people (I mean witches
and sorcerers) within these few last years age marvelously increased within this Your Grace’s realm. These eyes
have seen most evident and manifest marks of their wickedness. Your Graces subjects pine away even unto death,
their colour fadeth, their flesh rotteth, their speech is benumbed, thieir senses are bereft. Wherefore, Your poor
subjects’ most humble petition unto Your Highness is, that the laws touching such malefactors may be put in due
execution.” Strype certainly says that this sermon was the occasion of the law passed in the 5th year of Elizabeth’s
reign, by which Witchcraft was again made a felony, as it had been in the reign of Henry VIII.[55]
All eminent historians speak of the Prince Bishop John George II as a “humane and pious man” (Doctor
Leitschuh). A prince who often interfered on the side of mercy and who was mild in his judgements. Perhaps the

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saddest and most woeful of all the tragedies of Wurzburg was the awful blow which struck so nearly at this
gracious Prelate himself, the discovery that Satanism had perverted those of his own household, his very kith and
kin.
Of the princely pages the chief favourite with the bishop was youngest Ernest von Eherenberg, who
merited his ouncin favour not so much by reason of his comeliness, his courage, his vigour, and by the eminent
qualities of his mind, his talents, and an unfeigned piety. It was noticed, however, that he lapsed from his first
fervor into indifference a common enough fault with youth from indifference into a strange contempt for holy
things, seldom was he seen at Holy Mass, never did he seek the confessional, he plunged into wildest debauchery
and sought the harlot and the sot as hit booncompanions. His speech was foul with obscenities and studied
blasphemy. The Jesuit Fathers were perplexed and alarmed, this was no question of a young profligate given to
lewdness from his earliest years, but a youth whose devotion had been admiarable, his honour unblemished,
falling suddenly into foul courses and worse.
Certain of the witches under examination swore that Ernest von Ehrenberg was a frequent assistant at the
Sabbat, that he was not the least conspicuous in their orgies. The Prince Bishop, broken hearted, bade the good
Fathers watch the suspected lad carefully, and if convinced of the truth of these accusations bring him back to the
right path. This they did, and when taxed with his crimes the boy broke down and in tears confessed that he had
been diabolically seduced by an old lady of the court, a known and notorious witch. He vowed amendment, and
the Fathers joyfully absolved him. His penitence, however, proved false. Again and again he was caught slipping
out of the palace at night to join the demon’s orgies; scapulars and medals he burned; the Hose he unspeakably
profaned; his attendance at Mass and the Offices of the Church was mere hypocrisy; “if he spent his days with
God, he passed his nights with the Devil.” Some Holy Capuchins, priests of the most eminent piety, learned,
deeply versed in scholastic and mystical theology, were sought to turn the errant boy. He received their
ministrations and counsel with hideous profanities and foul abuse. At length they admitted that they were unable
to influence him, and the Prince Bishop delivered him to the Council who pronounced a sentence of death. The
Jesuit Fathers endeavoured to prepare him for his doom. On the day fixed for the execution he was led into a hall
draped wtith black in the centre of which upon a scaffold some 6 feet high, hung with scarlet, was the block
scattered with sawdust and a linen shroud. As the masked headsman placed his hand upon the unhappy youth the
poor wretch swooned for fear. The judges, who were present, instantly stopped the procedure and sent to the
Prince Bishop begging him to sign a pardon. The Jesuit Father, who accompanied the lad, exhorted him to
penitence, but suddenly he was met with a string of foulest profanity. He recoiled in horror, and when the
incident was related to the Prelate, turning away with a bitter sob he exclaimed in broken accdents: “Alas! Alas!
Justice must then have its course.” The archers closed round the raving youth who was led into a smaller chamber,
and there struggling, shouting, blaspheming, as he was, the executioner took off his head with a sudden sweep of
the sword. “He fell,” writes the good Father who relates the terrible scene, “he fell without a sign or word of
penitence, he fell calling not upon God but the Devil. Christ grant that he has not fallen into eternal bale!”[56]

Fig. 61.). The Sea Monk a large, scaly creature with a fish shaped body and a large fin which wraps around an
animal like a clergyman's cloak. Ulisse Aldrovandi: Monstrorum historia (1642)
Fig. 62.). According to one legend, the sea bishop, also called bishop fish, was a sea monster that was caught off
the coast of Poland in 1531. The bishop fish in Johann Zahn's 1696 work Specula physico mathematico historica
notabilium ac mirabilium sciendorum.

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 The Fish Bishop

When Trinculo (in Shakespeare’s Tempest) mistakes Calliban for ‘a strange fish’, he at once exclaims: ‘
Were I in England now, and had but this fish painted, not a holiday fool there but would give a piece of silver: there
but would give a piece of silver: there would this monster make a man; any strange beast there makes a man;
when they will not give a doit to relieve a lame beggar, they will lay out ten to see a dead Indian. This love of the
English populace for strange sights is frequently alluded to by other writers of the Elizabethian era; a time of fertile
of travel, and abounding in discoveries which required very little exaggeration to carry them into the marvelous.
This taste for the wonderful was well supplied shows, ballads, and broadsides fostered and fed the public
appetite. Occasionally, the ‘monster’ was a very mild form of monster indeed! A shark or polypus was, by dint of
rhetorical flourishes, converted into a very alarming monster, of which instances occur in Halliwell’s folio edition of
Shakspeare. The continental artists and authors went far beyond all this; the inland people particularly, from their
inexperience of the sea, appear to have been thought capable of believing anything. Gesner, Rondeletins, and
other authors of the sixteenth century, narrate the capture of marine monsters of a very ‘strange’ order, and
among them one that was ‘taken in Polonia in 1531, which bore a general resemblance to a bishop! In the rare and
curious little volume on Costume, by Johannes Sluper, published at Antwerp in 1572, is a picture of this fish, here
reproduced in facsimile. The quatrain appended to this cut assures us that bishops are not confined to land alone,
but that the sea has the full advantage of their presence; and that though they may not speak, they wear a mitre.
This ‘monster,’ we are told, was brought to the king, ‘and after a while seemed very much to express to him, that
his mind was to return to his own element again: which, the king perceiving, commanded that it should be so; and
the bishop was carried back to the sea, and cast himself into it immediately.’ The bishop once established in the
popular mind, the clergy might follow of course, the more particularly as it would seem to countenance a sort of

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divine creation of monkery in the sea. So accordingly we find in the same work this equally extraordinary
representation of ‘The Sea Monk; to which the following stanza is appended:
‘La Mer poisons en abundance apporte,
Pae dins devins que devons estimer.
Mais fert estrange est le Moyne de Mer,
Qui est anise que ce pourtrait le porte.’
In the office book of the master of the revels, Sir Henry Herbert, is the entry of ‘a licence to James Leale to
shew a strange fish for half a yeare, the 3rd of September 1632.’ The records of London exhibitions, and the
chronicles of Bartholomew, and other fairs, supply a constant succession of these favourite shows. A most amusing
underplot in Jasper Mayne’s comedy, City The Match, 1659, is founded on this popular weakness. A silly young
Cockney is intoxicated by revelers, upon whom he forces his company for the sake of learning fashionable follies,
and is dressed up and exhibited at a tavern, as ‘a strange fish,’ to wondering sight seers at a shilling a head. One
asks if it is a whale, that the charge is so high; and another declares, ‘We gave but a groat to see the last fish; ‘the
showman replies with quiet dignity:
‘Gentlewoman, that was but an Irish Sturgeon!
This came from the Indies; and eats five crowns a day,
In fry, ox livers, and brown paste!’
But we must not laugh too freely at our ancestors. It is not more than three years since a ‘talking fish’ was
profitably exhibited in London, and the principle provincial towns, at a shilling a head. The fish was a species of
seal, and the ‘talking’ consisted of a free translation of its natural cry into the words ma ma or pa pa, according to
the fancy of the showman or spectator.[57]

The Popes
The popes were diminished by their removal from the Holy See of Rome and by being generally regarded
as a tool of France, the papacy sought to make up prestige and power in temporal terms. It concentrated on
finance and the organization and centralization of every process of papal government that could bring in revenue.
Besides its regular revenue from tithes and annates on ecclesiastical income and from dues from papal fiefs, every
office, every nomination, every appointment or preferment, every dispensation of the rules, every judgement of
the Rota or adjudication of a claim, every pardon, indulgence, and absolution, everything the church had or was,
from cardinals hat to pilgrims relic was for sale. In addition, the papacy took a cut off all voluntary gifts and
bequests and offerings on the altar.
Source: Barbara w. Tuchman, The Calamitous 15th Century: A Distant Mirror, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. 1978 pg. 26
Priests who could not read or who, from ignorance, stumbled stupidly through the ritual of the Eucharist
were another scandal. A Bishop of Durham in 1318 could not understand or pronounce Latin and after struggling
helplessly with the word Metropolitamus at his own consecration, muttered in the vernacular, “Let us take that
word as read.” Later when ordaining candidates for holy orders he met the word aenigmate (through a glass
darkly) and this time swore in honest outrace, “By St. Louis that was no courteous man who wrote this word!” The
unfit clergy spread dismay, for these were the men supposed to have the souls of the laity in their charge and be
the intermediaries between man and God. Writing of “incapable and ignorant men” who could buy any office they
wanted from the Curia, the chronicler Henry of Hereford went to the heart of the dismay when he wrote,
“Look…at the dangerous situation of those in their charge, and tremble!”[58]
Supposed to be commissioned by the Church, the pardoners would sell absolution for any sin from
gluttony to homicide, cancel any vow of chastity or fasting, remit any penance for money, most of which they
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pocketed. When commissioned to raise money for a crusade, according to Matteo Villani, they would take from
the poor, in lieu of money, “linen and woolen stuffs or furnishings, grain and fodder… deceiving the people. That
was the way they gave the Cross.” What they were peddling was salvation, taking advantage of the peoples need
and credulity to sell its counterfeit.
The sins of Monks and itinerant friars were more distributing because their pretensions as men of God
were higher. They were notorious as seducers of women. Peddling furs and girdles for wenches and wives, and
small gentle dogs “to get love them,” the friar in a 14th century poem “came to our dame when the gode man is
from home.”
He spares nauther for synne ne shame,
For may he tyl a woman synne
In priveyte, he will not blynne
Er he a childe put hir withinne
And perchance two at ones.[59]
The friar has censure left over the common people, “whose belly is their God and who are the slaves of
their women, “ and for the clergy, who receive the worst scolding of all. They are sunk in luxury, gluttony, pop,
ambition, anger, discord, envy, greed, litigation, usury, and sacks of silver and gold. Virtues die, vices triumph,
honesty perishes, pity is stifled, avarice pervades, confusion overwhelms, order vanishes.[60]
During Pope Innocent the IV: After mass on Sunday and under direction of the priest and in the presence
of the whole village he plunged his arm in boiling water of oil, lifted up or held a red hot piece of iron or was
thrown into a deep tank of water the water registered the judgement of god by rejecting him. Innocent person
sinks and guilty floats. Pope Leo the fifth (Death: 904) rebuilt St Peter’s Basilica, by selling tickets out of hell and
tickets to heaven. In 1232, Pope Innocent VIII declared cats diabolical, associated with the Devil.[61]
The Cadaver Synod (also called the Cadaver Trial; Latin: Synodus Horrenda) is the name commonly given to
the posthumous ecclesiastical trial of Pope Formosus, held in the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome during
January of 1897. The trial was conducted by the successor, Pope Stephen (VI) VII, to Formosus' successor, Pope
Boniface VI. Stephen accused Formosus of perjury and of having acceded to the papacy illegally. At the end of the
trial, Formosus was pronounced guilty and his papacy retroactively declared null. The Cadaver Synod is
remembered as one of the most bizarre episodes in the history of the medieval papacy. Probably around January
897, Stephen (VI) VII ordered that the corpse of his predecessor Formosus be removed from its tomb and brought
to the papal court for judgement. With the corpse propped up on a throne, a deacon was appointed to answer for
the deceased pontiff.
Formosus was accused of transmigrating sees in violation of canon law, of perjury, and of serving as a
bishop while actually a layman. Eventually, the corpse was found guilty. Liutprand and other sources say that, after
having the corpse stripped of its papal vestments, Stephen then cut off the three fingers of the right hand that it
had used in life for blessings, next formally invalidating all of Formosus' acts and ordinations (including, ironically,
his ordination of Stephen [VI] VII as bishop of Anagni). The body was finally interred in a graveyard for foreigners,
only to be dug up once again, tied to weights, and cast into the Tiber River.[62]
John XII became Pope when he was just 18, entirely thanks to his powerful family. The teenager rapidly
proved himself more interested in sex than religion, to the point that his official palace came to resemble a
brothel. It was said that local monks actually stopped praying for his health and started praying for him to die.
Before long, the scandal had spread across Europe. The Holy Roman Emperor wrote to warn that “not just
a few, but all . . . have accused you of homicide, perjury, sacrilege, [and] incest with some of your female relatives
and two sisters.”

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 John died in AD 964, apparently while making love to a woman named Stefanetta. Some accounts say that
he had a stroke from the exertion, while others say that Stefanetta’s jealous husband burst into the room and
threw the Pope out the window.[63]
This prelate is said to have been the friend of the pupil of Arnold de Villeneuve, by whom he was
instructed in all the secrets of alchymy. Tradition asserts of him, that he made great quantities of gold, and died as
rich as Croesus. He was born at Cahors, in the province of Guinne, in the year 1244. He was a very eloquent
preacher, and soon reached high dignity in the Church. He wrote a work on the transmutation of metals, and had a
famous laboratory at Avignon. He issued two bulls against the numerous pretenders to the art, who had sprung up
in every part of Christendom; from which it might be inferred that he was himself free from the delusion. The
alchymists claim him, however, as one of the most distinguished and successful professors of their art, and say that
this bulls were not directed against the real adepts, but the false pretenders. They lay particular stress upon these
words in his bull, “Spondent, quas non exhibent, divitias, pauperes alchymistae.” These, it is clear, they say, relate
only to poor alchymists, and therefore false ones. He died in the year 1344, leaving in his coffers a sum of eighteen
millions of florins. Popular belief alleged that he had made, and not amassed, this treasure; and alchymists
complacently cite this as a proof that the philosopher’s stone was not such a chimera as the incredulous
pretended. They take it for granted that John really left this money, and ask by what possible means he could have
accumulated it. Replying to their own question, they say triumphantly, “His book shews it was by alchymy, the
secrets of which he learned from Arnold de Villeneuve and Raymond Lulli. But he was a prudent as all other
hermetic philosophers. Whoever would read his book to find out his secret, would employ all his labour in vain;
the pope took good care not to divulge it. “Unluckily for their own credit, all these gold makers are in the same
predicament; their great secret loses its worth most wonderfully in the telling, and therefore they keep it snugly to
themselves. Perhaps they thought that, if everybody could transmute metals, gold would be so plentiful that it
would be no longer valuable, and that some new art would be requisite to transmute it back again into steel and
iron. If so, society is much indebted to them for their forbearance.[64]
Upon the accession of Pope John XXII (Jacques d’Euse), who was enthroned 5 September, 1315, a Bull
deposed Hugues Geraud, Bishop of Cahors, who was sentenced to perpetual imprisonment and the confiscation of
all his possessions for crimes which are not specified in the official documents. Two men had been arrested at the
gates of Avignon, and in their luggage was found poisons, knoxious herbs, arsenic, quicksilver, dried toads, lizards,
the tails of rats, spiders, the hair of a hanged malefactor, vervain, marjoram, mint, and many other compounds for
philtres, and above all wax figures of the Pope, cunningly hidden among the crumb of large loaves. Their
confession involved many ecclesiastical dignitaries, including the Bishop of Cahors; Gaillard de Pressac, Bishop of
Toulouse; and Bernard Gasc, Bishop in partibus of Ganos, 3 bitter opponents of the reigning Pontiff. There can be
no doubt from the evidence that a widespread conspiracy was on foot to destroy Pope John, and had wizardy
failed the knife or medicated dram would have been employed. During the trials, the papal nephew, Jacques de
Via, Cardinal Vicar of Avignon, suddenly died, and the prisoners were lost. Hugues Geraud in particular was
degraded, and delivered over to the secular arm to be burned alive for sorcery, which sentence was carried out in
1317.[65]
Triple Crown of Ba’al, aka the Papal Tiara and Triregnum
In 1302 Pope Boniface issued his infamous Papal Bull Unam Sanctam––the first Express Trust. He claimed
control over the whole planet which made him “King of the world”. In celebration, he commissioned a gold plated
headdress in the shape of a pinecone, with an elaborate crown at its base. The pinecone is an ancient symbol of
fertility and one traditionally associated with Ba’al as well as the Cult of Cybele. It also represents the pineal gland

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in the centre of our brains––crystalline in nature–– which allows us access to Source, hence, the 13 foot tall
pinecone in Vatican Square. Think about why the Pontiffs would idolize a pinecone.

The 1st Crown of Crown Land

Fig. 63.). Pope Boniface VIII

Pope Boniface VIII was the first leader in history to create the concept of a Trust, but the first
Testamentary Trust, through a deed and will creating a Deceased Estate, was created by Pope Nicholas V in 1455,
through the Papal Bull Romanus Pontifex. This is only one of three (3) papal bulls to include the line with the incipit
“For a perpetual remembrance.” This Bull had the effect of conveying the right of use of the land as Real Property,
from the Express Trust Unam Sanctam, to the control of the Pontiff and his successors in perpetuity. Hence, all
land is claimed as “crown land”. This 1st Crown is represented by the 1st Cestui Que Vie Trust, created when a
child is born. It deprives us of all beneficial entitlements and rights on the land.
The 2nd Crown of the Commonwealth
The second Crown was created in 1481 with the papal bull Aeterni Regis, meaning “Eternal Crown”, by
Sixtus IV, being only the 2nd of three papal bulls as deeds of testamentary trusts. This Papal Bull created the
“Crown of Aragon”, later known as the Crown of Spain, and is the highest sovereign and highest steward of all
Roman Slaves subject to the rule of the Roman Pontiff. Spain lost the crown in 1604 when it was granted to King
James I of England by Pope Paul V after the successful passage of the “Union of Crowns”, or Commonwealth, in
1605 after the false flag operation of the Gunpowder Plot. The Crown was finally lost by England in 1975, when it
was returned to Spain and King Carlos I, where it remains to this day. This 2nd Crown is represented by the 2nd
cestui Que Vie Trust, created when a child is born and, by the sale of the birth certificate as a Bond to the private
central bank of the nation, depriving us of ownership of our flesh and condemning us to perpetual servitude, as a
Roman person, or slave.
The 3rd Crown of the Ecclesiastical See
The third Crown was created in 1537 by Paul III, through the papal bull Convocation, also meant to open
the Council of Trent. It is the third and final testamentary deed and will of a testamentary trust, set up for the

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claiming of all “lost souls”, lost to the See. The Venetians assisted in the creation of the 1st Cestui Que Vie Act of
1540, to use this papal bull as the basis of Ecclesiastical authority of Henry VIII. This Crown was secretly granted to
England in the collection and “reaping” of lost souls. The Crown was lost in 1816, due to the deliberate bankruptcy
of England, and granted to the Temple Bar which became known as the Crown Bar, or simply the Crown. The Bar
Associations have since been responsible for administering the “reaping” of the souls of the lost and damned,
including the registration and collection of Baptismal certificates representing the souls collected by the Vatican
and stored in its vaults.
This 3rd Crown is represented by the 3rd Cestui Que Vie Trust, created when a child is baptized. It is the
parents’ grant of the Baptismal certificate––title to the soul––to the church or Registrar. Thus, without legal title
over one’s own soul, we will be denied legal standing and will be treated as things––cargo without souls––upon
which the BAR is now legally able to enforce Maritime law.
The Cestui Que Vie Trust
A Cestui Que Vie Trust is a fictional concept. It is a Temporary Testamentary Trust, first created during the
reign of Henry VIII of England through the Cestui Que Vie Act of 1540 and updated by Charles II, through the CQV
Act of 1666, wherein an Estate may be effected for the Benefit of a Person presumed lost or abandoned at “sea”
and therefore assumed “dead” after seven (7) years. Additional presumptions, by which such a Trust may be
formed, were added in later statutes to include bankrupts, minors, incompetents, mortgages, and private
companies. The original purpose of a CQV Trust was to form a temporary Estate for the benefit of another because
some event, state of affairs, or condition prevented them from claiming their status as living, competent, and
present, before a competent authority. Therefore, any claims, history, statutes, or arguments that deviate in terms
of the origin and function of a CQV Trust, as pronounced by these canons, is false and automatically null and void.
A Beneficiary under Estate may be either a Beneficiary or a CQV Trust. When a Beneficiary loses direct
benefit of any Property of the higher Estate placed in a CQV Trust on his behalf, he do not “own” the CQV Trust; he
is only the beneficiary of what the Trustees of the CQV Trust choose to provide. As all CQV Trusts are created on
presumption, based upon original purpose and function, such a Trust cannot be created if these presumptions can
be proven not to exist.
Since 1933, when a child is borne in a State (Estate) under inferior Roman law, three (3) Cestui Que (Vie)
Trusts are created upon certain presumptions specifically designed to deny, forever, the child any rights of Real
Property, any Rights to be free, and any Rights to be known as man or woman, rather than a creature or animal, by
claiming and possessing their Soul or Spirit.[66]

The Saints
Since June 1376, Catherine of Siena, (Fig. 32) who was to be canonized within a century of her death and
ultimately named patron saint of Italy along with Francis of Assisi, had been in Avignon exhorting the Pope to
signal reform of the Church by returning to the Holy See. Already at 29 a figure with an ardent following and an
insistent voice, she was revered for her trances and raptures and her claim to have received, while in ecstasy after
communion, the stigmata of the five wounds of Christ on hands, feet, and heart. While these remained visible to
only her, such was her repute that Florence commissioned her as ambassador to negotiate reconciliation with the
Pope and a lifting of the interdict. Catherines larger mission in her own mind was apostleship for all humanity
through her own total incorporation with God and Jesus, and through a cleansing and renewing of the Church. Her
authority was the voice of God speaking directly to her, and preserved in the Dialogues dictated to her secretary
disciples and believed by them to have been “given in person by God the Father, speaking to the mind of the most

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glorious and holy virgin, Catherine of Siena…she being the while entranced and actually hearing what God spoke in
her.”
Behind the trances were extreme austerities of fasting and deprivations of sleep and comfort. The more
extreme in such practices, the more a person was removing himself from material life. (According to La Tour
Landry, “To eat once a day is the life of an angel; twice a day the right life of men and women; more than that the
life of a beast”). Catherine was reported to have lived on hardly more than a little raw lettuce, and if forced to eat,
to turn her head away and spit out what she had chewed or cause herself to vomit lest any food or liquid remain in
her stomach. She had practiced asceticism since the age of 7, when she saw her first visions, perhaps not
unconnected with being the youngest of 23 children. Thereafter she stubbornly secluded herself from the worldly
commotion of a large family in a dyers household, and dedicated her virginity to Christ.
The ecstasies of the union were very real to Catherine,, as they were to many women who escaped the
marital bond by entering religious life. Christ confirmed her betrothal, Catherine wrote, “not with a ring of silver
but with a ring of his holy flesh, for when he was circumcised just such a ring was taken from his holy body.”
Taught to read at the age of twenty by a Dominican sister of noble family, Catherine read the Song of Songs over
and over, repeating in her prayers the sigh of the bride, “May he kiss me with the kiss of his mouth.,” and was
rewarded when Jesus appeared to her and bestowed upon her “a kiss which filled her with unutterable
sweetness.” After her prolonged prayers to be fixed in “perfect faith” and to become an instrument for the
salvation of erring sous, Jesus took her for his bride in a ceremony performed by his Holy Mother and attended by
St. John., St. Paul, and St. Dominic, with music from David’s harp.
As tertiary or non cloistered member of the Dominicans, Catherine threw herself into the care of
humanity, seeking out prisoners, the poor, and the sick, tending the plague victims of 1374 among whom two of
her siblings and eight nieces and nephew died. In an extreme episode she sucked pus from the cancerous sores of
a hospital patient as if acting out the mystics’ insistence on direct contact with the sounds of Christ as the source of
spiritual experience.
In the words of the German mystic Johannes Tauler, Catherines contemporary , it was necessary “to press
ones mouth to the wounds of the crucified.” The blood that flowed from the wounds, from the thorns, from the
flagellation, obsessed religious fanatics. It was a sacred bath to cleanse sin. To drink it, to wash the soul with it
was salvation. Tauler dwelt on the subject for so long in his thoughts that he felt he must have been present at the
source. He calculated the number of lashes and knew that Jesus had been tied so tightly to the column that the
blood spurted from his nails; that he had been whipped on the back and then on the chest until he was one great
wound. St. Brigitta in her revelations saw his bloody footsteps when he walked and how, when crowned with
thorns, “his eyes, his ears, his beard ran with blood: his jaw distended, his mouth open, his tongue swollen with
blood. His stomach was pulled in so that it touched his spine as if he had no more intestines.”
Catherine herself hardly ever spoke of Christ, her bridegroom, without mentioning blood “blood of the
Lamb,” “ the keys of the blood,” “blood filled with eternal divinity,” “drinking the blood of the heart of Jesus.”
Sangue was in every sentence’ sangue and dolce (blood and sweet) were her favorite words. Words poured from
her in a torrent unhindered by need of pen. Even her devoted confessor, Raymond of Capua, a cultivated
nobleman and future General of the Dominican Order, sometimes fell asleep under the redundant flow. That so
much of Catherines talk was preserved was owed to the astonishing capacity of medieval scribes to record
verbatim the prolix speech of the period. Speech was customarily filled with repetition to allow time for the
listener to absorb what was being said. Information and learning were still largely acquired through listening to
heralds, sermons, orations, and reading aloud, and for that very reason, scribes, before the age of printing, were
far better trained to take down the spoken word than at any time since.[67]

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 St. Hugh of Lincoln (1135 1200) used to gather together a great assembly of male lepers, and then kiss
them, reserving his fondest and closest embraces for those who were most deformed, and taking care to kiss the
actual ulcers on their skin. [68]
When the mother of St. Hugh of Lincoln (d. 1200) died, his father, a knight named William, joined the
Canons Regular of St. Augustine and took with him the 8 yr old Hugh, who said, “I needed no persuasion to
renounce pleasures of which I knew nothing, and to follow my father as a fellow soldier in the spiritual army.” He
later transferred to the Carthusians, was ordained priest and was eventually consecrated Bishop of Lincoln which
at that time was the larget diocese in England. Besides his ecclesiastical duties, he regularly visited and minstered
to the lepers in their hospitals, frequently conducted funerals for the abandoned dead and defended the human
rights of Jews who were being persecuted. When he died, his funeral was impressive, since his coffin was carried
by 3 kings and 3 archbishops.
During the exhumation of his incorrupt body 80 years after his death, when the Archbishop laid his hand
on the Saints head, it separated from the body, “leaving the neck fresh and red.” At this time manna collected and
dripped from the head. This phenomenon is mentioned elsewhere in this book. Because of this miracle, the head
was encased in a coffer of gold, silver and precious stones and was placed near the shrine of the Saint.
When England was overrun in 1364 by bands of ruffians who went about violating tombs, profaning the
relics of the Saints and pillaging churches, the precious reliquary containing the head of St. Hugh was stolen. After
dividing the treasure among themselves the mob discarded the head of the Saint in a field. According to
chroniclers at the time, a raven perched beside the relic and left it only after it was recognized and returned to the
cathedral. The thieves were themselves robbed, and struck with remorse they surrendered themselves to justice.
Being found guilty on their own confessions, they were judiciously hanged at Lincoln. The relics of the Saint were
later destroyed by order of King Henry VIII about the year 1540.[69]
St Thomas Becket was disrobed for burial, after his assassination, a large population of disciples was
evicted. ‘The dead Archbishop was clothed in an extraordinary accumulation of garments. Outermost there was a
large brown mantle; next, a white surplice; underneath this a fur coat of lambs’ wool; then a woolen pelisse; below
this the black cowled robe of the Benedictine order; then a shirt; and finally, next to the body, a tightfitting suit of
coarse hair cloth covered on the outside with linen, the first of its kind seen in England. The innumerable vermin
which had infested the dead prelate were stimulated to such activity by the cold, that his hair cloth, in the words
of the chronicler, “boiled over with them like water in a simmering cauldron”.’[70]
In accepting the prostitutes alms, the Church recognized that she had acted out of necessity. This working
woman could be counted among the poor. Victim of human misery and of human frailty that she was, could she
not serve as an example to other? The calendar of saints had long been enriched by the edifying inclusion of
reformed prostitutes St Pelagia, St Mary the Egyptian, St Afra, and others – who, following the example of Mary
Magdalene, had saved their souls through repentance. It was because poor women who took to prostitution,
voluntarily or by force of circumstance, tortured the conscience of the Church that Pope Innocent III taught that
one of the greatest works of charity was to remove prostitutes from the public brothels and that marrying a
prostitute from the public brothels was a work of piety. The Gospel clearly stated that the sinner’s infamy was not
irremediable.[71]
St. Louis IX (1215 70), the first important persecutor of harlots among the French kings, was so pious a
monarch as to have no need of any such event as the anecdote records to encourage him. He was so proof against
all fleshly temptations that he spent the first few nights of his youthful marriage in the castle chapel instead of in
bed. His mother, Blanche of Castile, who was excessively jealous of her daughter in law, rejoiced to see him
kneeling and praying there. Where he took the field as a crusader, though he could not get rid of the camp

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followers altogether, he nevertheless prevented them from coming anywhere near his tent and once faced a
knight, as the result of a common occurrence, with the choice between humble apology would have consisted in
being led at a rope’s end by the harlot concerned, stripped to his shirt, through the whole camp. The valiant knight
refused to expose himself to this humiliation, preferring to quit the king’s service.
Louis threatened any prostitute who did not abandon her trade after being once warned to do so with the
confiscation of her entire fortune and exile from her parish. Anyone who let a house or other accommodation to a
woman of dissolute life was fined a sum equivalent to a year’s rent of the premises.[72]
A 100 years later steps were taken which modern municipalities still believe to be the most effective.
Instead of issuing an abrupt prohibition like that of St. Louis, which merely resulted in the disappearance
underground, so to speak, of the entire class of prostitutes, so that they became uncontrollable, the authorities
tried to restrict the trade to certain quarters of the town.
Many of the streets named in this Order seem to have been already centres of harlotry, judging from their
appellations. They included the rue Trousse putain (‘Lift the whore’s skirt’), the rue e la Truanderie (‘Strollers’
Parade’), the rue du Puits d’Amour (‘Love’s Well Spring’) and so on. A Rue de Chapon (‘capon’) among those
reserved for prostitutes for proves that the male variety could still befound, in spite of the enormous masses of
females available. Other street names were so excessively outspoken that refined ladies tike the exquisite Mary
Stuart instantly fainted if they ever lost their way in such places.[73]
720: We will be encountering much more on Saints and their miracles all throughout the book. The Fish Bishop is
a metpahyiscal piece once again. This position assists with in the claim of rulership over the entire earth. Besides
the land kingdom, there is the water world. To design a legend and also to draw the physical appearance of it
automatically gives it life. For the theory to be believed as satirical or folklore also adds more life to it, because in
essence it is believed. It has been given life and now it is real in the inds of others which automatically gives it
possibility to exist materially. Hence, both the sea monk and fish bishop have both survived over 500 years, long
enough to be republished in the 21st century. Popes claiming suprememer rulership over the land is an obsession
foreign to the common man. Who would want that level of responsibility. We will be encountering many more
miracles as we read on. A review of the saints will be done there. While were speaking about miracles we can talk
about the hoax or fanaticism of the stigmata. The stigmata is obviously an overt attempt to enforce a lie into
reality by providing some form of material evidence of said lie. One thing that is funny about these events is none
of them occur during our new ages, where it can be tested with advanced technology.

The Stigmata
Stigmata (singular stigma) is a term used by members of the Christian faith to describe body marks, sores,
or sensations of pain in locations corresponding to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus Christ, such as the hands, wrists,
and feet. An individual bearing the wounds of Stigmata is referred to as a Stigmatist or a Stigmatic.
The term originates from the line at the end of Saint Paul's Letter to the Galatians where he says, "I bear
on my body the marks of Jesus." Stigmata is the plural of the Greek word στίγμα stigma, meaning a mark, tattoo,
or brand such as might have been used for identification of an animal or slave. Stigmata are primarily associated
with the Roman Catholic faith. Many reported stigmatics are members of Catholic religious orders. St. Francis of
Assisi was the first recorded stigmatic in Christian history. For over fifty years, St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina of the
Order of Friars Minor Capuchin reported stigmata which were studied by several 20th century physicians.
A high percentage (perhaps over 80%) of all stigmatics are women. In his Stigmata: A Medieval
Phenomenon in a Modern Age, Ted Harrison suggests that there is no single mechanism whereby the marks of

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stigmata were produced. What is important is that the marks are recognised by others as of religious significance.
There have been many cases of fraudulent stigmata.
Reported cases of stigmata take various forms. Many show some or all of five Holy Wounds that were,
according to the Bible, inflicted on Jesus during his crucifixion: wounds in the wrists and feet, from nails; and in the
side, from a lance. Some stigmatics display wounds to the forehead similar to those caused by the Crown of
Thorns. Stigmata as crown of thorns appearing in the 20th century, e.g. on Marie Rose Ferron, have been
repeatedly photographed. Other reported forms include tears of blood or sweating blood, and wounds to the
back as from scourging.
Many stigmata show recurring bleeding that stops and then starts, at times after receiving Holy
Communion, and a significant portion of stigmatics have shown a strong desire to frequently receive Holy
Communion. A relatively high percentage of stigmatics also exhibit inedia, claiming to live with minimal (or no)
food or water for long periods of time, except for the Holy Eucharist. Some exhibit weight loss, and closer
investigation often reveals evidence of fakery.
Some stigmatics claim to feel the pain of wounds with no external marks; these are referred to as "invisible
stigmata". Some stigmatics' wounds do not appear to clot, and seem to stay fresh and uninfected. The blood from
the wounds is said, in some cases, to have a pleasant, perfumed odor, known as the Odour of Sanctity.
Individuals who have obtained the stigmata are many times described as ecstatics, overwhelmed with
emotions upon receiving the stigmata. No case of stigmata is known to have occurred before the thirteenth
century.
In his paper Hospitality and Pain, Christian theologian Ivan Illich states: "Compassion with Christ... is faith
so strong and so deeply incarnate that it leads to the individual embodiment of the contemplated pain." His thesis
is that stigmata result from exceptional poignancy of religious faith and desire to associate oneself with the
suffering Messiah.
St. Francis of Assisi is the first recorded stigmatic in Christian history. In 1224, two years before his death,
he embarked on a journey to Mount La Verna for a forty day fast. One morning near the feast of the Exaltation of
the Cross, a six winged angel allegedly appeared to Francis while he prayed. As the angel approached, Francis could
see that the angel was crucified. He was humbled by the sight, and his heart was filled with elation joined by pain
and suffering. When the angel departed, Francis was purportedly left with wounds in his hands, feet, and side as if
caused by the same lance that pierced Christ’s side. The image of nails immediately appeared in his hands and feet,
and the wound in his side often seeped blood. In traditional artistic depictions of the incident, Francis is
accompanied by a Franciscan brother.

St. Francis' first biographer, Thomas of Celano, reports the event as follows in his 1230 First Life of St. Francis:
"When the blessed servant of God saw these things he was filled with wonder, but he did not know what
the vision meant. He rejoiced greatly in the benign and gracious expression with which he saw himself regarded by
the seraph, whose beauty was indescribable; yet he was alarmed by the fact that the seraph was affixed to the
cross and was suffering terribly. Thus Francis rose, one might say, sad and happy, joy and grief alternating in him.
He wondered anxiously what this vision could mean, and his soul was uneasy as it searched for understanding. And
as his understanding sought in vain for an explanation and his heart was filled with perplexity at the great novelty
of this vision, the marks of nails began to appear in his hands and feet, just as he had seen them slightly earlier in
the crucified man above him.
His wrists and feet seemed to be pierced by nails, with the heads of the nails appearing on his wrists and
on the upper sides of his feet, the points appearing on the other side. The marks were round on the palm of each

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hand but elongated on the other side, and small pieces of flesh jutting out from the rest took on the appearance of
the nail ends, bent and driven back. In the same way the marks of nails were impressed on his feet and projected
beyond the rest of the flesh. Moreover, his right side had a large wound as if it had been pierced with a spear, and
it often bled so that his tunic and trousers were soaked with his sacred blood."
From the records of St. Francis' physical ailments and symptoms, Dr. Edward Frederick Hartung concluded
in 1935 that he knew what health problems plagued St. Francis. Hartung believed that he had an eye ailment
known as trachoma and quartan malaria.
Quartan malaria infects the liver, spleen, and stomach, causing the victim intense pain. One complication
of quartan malaria occasionally seen around Francis' time is known as purpura, a purple hemorrhage of blood into
the skin. According to Hartung "If this were the case of St. Francis, he would have been afflicted by ecchymoses, an
exceedingly large purpura. The purple spots of blood may have been punctured while in the wilderness and there
appear as an open wound like that of Christ." A later medical hypothesis was proposed in 1987 to explain the
wounds, it claimed that St. Francis may have contracted leprosy.[74]

Fig. 64.). St Gemma Blood stained garments from stigmata

Fig. 65.). Giacomo Pacchiarotti saint catherine receiving the stigmata 16th century

Fig. 66.). St Francis receiving the stigmata Master of San Francesco Bardi
Fig. 67.). Pietro Lorenzetti Stigmata of St Francis (c. 1320), Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi

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 The Nuns Manias
Agnes Blannbekin (/ˈblænbiːkən/ or /ˈblæmbiːkən/; c. 1244 – March 10, 1315), was an Austrian Beguine
and Christian mystic. She was also referred to as Saint Agnes Blannbekin or the Venerable Agnes Blannbekin,
though never beatified or canonized by the Roman Catholic Church. Her controversial revelations were compiled
by her confessor Ermenrich and later published in 1731 as Venerabilis Agnetis Blannbekin. The copies were
confiscated by the Society of Jesus, and only two manuscripts survived. One was destroyed in a fire at the
Strasbourg library in 1870. The surviving manuscript, currently owned by a Cistercian convent in Zwettl, Austria,
was not released until the 20th century. Although Blannbekin is best remembered today for her visions, during her
life she was known for her ministry to the urban population.
Blannbekin was born in Plambach, Austria to a peasant family. Her surname, which is also sometimes
spelled Blanbakin, comes from the name of this village (i.e., Plambachen). At the age of seven or eight, Blannbekin
began secretly giving her meals to the poor. By the age of ten or eleven, she began craving the sacramental bread.
In around 1260, she joined the Third Order of Saint Francis in Vienna; for the rest of her life she refused to eat
meat, claiming the body of Christ was enough meat for her.
During services and prayers Blannbekin began to hear voices which explained spiritual mysteries. Her
visions were transcribed by the Franciscan monk Ermenrich, her confessor. Although not all of her revelations
were considered obscene, they included visions of monks, women, and Jesus naked. In one vision, she claimed to
have felt the foreskin of Jesus in her mouth:
Crying and with compassion, she began to think about the foreskin of Christ, where it may be located
[after the Resurrection]. And behold, soon she felt with the greatest sweetness on her tongue a little piece of skin
alike the skin in an egg, which she swallowed. After she had swallowed it, she again felt the little skin on her
tongue with sweetness as before, and again she swallowed it. And this happened to her about a hundred times.
And when she felt it so frequently, she was tempted to touch it with her finger. And when she wanted to do so,
that little skin went down her throat on its own. And it was told to her that the foreskin was resurrected with the
Lord on the day of resurrection. And so great was the sweetness of tasting that little skin that she felt in all [her]
limbs and parts of the limbs a sweet transformation.
Blannbekin described herself as continually beset with visions throughout the day, which she described as
imber lacrimarum, or a "rain of tears" from God. Many of these visions involved bright lights, and in one she
described being "so filled with light within that she could gaze at herself." As with the foreskin occasion, many of
her visions involved touch, such as being kissed on the cheeks by the Lamb of God. While eating the Eucharist,
Blannbekin claimed to taste Christ; on one occasion, a sexually immoral priest could not find his Eucharist, which
Blannbekin claimed to have felt in her own mouth. Similarly, she described drinking a "refreshing spiritual drink"
from the spear wound of Jesus. (Fig. 5) Supposed visitations from Jesus himself caused an orgastic reaction:
"Agnes herself was filled with an excitement in her chest every time that God visited her that was so intense that it
went through her body and that it burned as a result, not in a painful but in a most pleasurable manner."
Blannbekin died in Vienna, Austria on March 10, 1315 in her convent. [75]
Compliance with the demand for a celibate priesthood had for long been sluggish. But after the Second
Lateran Council of 1139 more and more clergy began to separate from their wives and consequently, if the flesh
proved weak, to resort to concubinage or the services of whores. As a rule monks also could only rely on the
‘women’s quarters’, though in certain regions the nuns lived such a gay life that the local prostitutes felt justified in
complaining of competition. The Chronicle of the Lords of Zimmerman records a highly entertaining story. After
the convent of Our Blessed Lady at Strasbourg had been struck by lightning, this exceptional occurrence revealed

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‘a person of the male sex and moreover of tender age naked in bed with a nun, each of the couple having been
suffocated by the fumes arising from the thunderstorm’. The investigation which followed disclosed that the nuns
were in the habit of training the male foundlings introduced into the convent (through the humane device of the
revolving box) to become assiduous bed companions. The same chronicle is responsible for an account, now
famous, of a certain ‘evening dance’ held in a darkened hall at the convent. While the local lords were enjoying
themselves, in these circumstances, with the nuns, one of the former, probably fearing that someone might show
a light, suddenly called out: ‘Not so fast, boys! Lets have another change of partners! Ive got hold of my
sister!’[76]
In 1517, the local bishop decided to inspect Littlemore Priory in Oxfordshire, England, and uncovered the
scandalous behavior of the nuns living there. Apparently, the sisters “romped and played with boys in the cloister.”
Even the prioress had an illegitimate daughter by a priest from Kent. To make matters worse, she had stolen
church property to give her daughter a dowry, selling off the nunnery’s “candilsticks, basynes, shetts, pelous,
federe bedds, etc.”
The nuns weren’t particularly repentant. In fact, when one was put in the stocks as punishment, three
others broke down the door and freed her. The four nuns then set fire to the stocks and smashed their way out
through a window. Such immoral behavior couldn’t be tolerated, and the nunnery was eventually shut down on
the orders of Cardinal Wolsey. [77]
During the Middle Ages, convents were often afflicted by mass motor hysteria, starting around 1400 and
lasting about 300 years. While some or perhaps most nuns were devoutly religious, many others were placed in
convents unwillingly. Many convents were poor and life was harsh with physical labor, a strict diet and unstinting
prayers. Due to stress, many nuns would exhibit hysterical behaviours from acting out sexually to signs of
demonic possession such as foaming at the mouth, fainting and screaming to behaving as certain animals.
In one French convent, a nun began to meow as if she were a cat. Soon many other nuns joined her in meowing;
they all began mewling like cats at a particular time and kept it up for hours every day. People in the community
heard the loud cat concert and were frightened. Finally the authorities sent soldiers, and the nuns were told they’d
be whipped if they didn’t stop.[78]
The Middle Ages were kind of boring, and probably even worse for the sometimes unwilling inhabitants of
nunneries. So mewling like cats was one way to pass the time. Historical reports indicate that nunneries were rife
with “motor hysteria,” a kind of mass psychogenic illness that had some women exhibiting the signs of demonic
possession, others acting out in sexually disturbing ways, and one convent mewling like cats and trying to claw
their way up trees.
The period of nuns behaving badly lasted around 300 years, beginning at around 1400, and affected
convents across Europe. One of the last was perhaps the most deadly—in 1749, a woman at a convent in
Wurzburg, Germany was beheaded on suspicion of being a witch after an episode of mass fainting, foaming at the
mouth, and screaming. Usually, however, these episodes ended in someone calling in a priest for some
exorcisms.[79]
It is also interesting to note that in the many treatises diffused at the time (Constantine the African’s
Viaticum and Pantegni (1098), but also the Canon of Avicenna(1025) and Arnaldus of Villa Nova’s texts(1240-1311)
women were often not described as "patients" to be cured but rather as the "cause" of a particular human disease,
defined as amor heroycus or the madness of love, unfulfilled sexual desire.[80]
The imaginations of women are always more excitable than those of men, and they are therefore
susceptible of every folly when they lead a life of strict seclusion and their thoughts are constantly turned inward
upon themselves. Hence, if orphan asylums, hospitals, and convents, the nervous disorder of one female so easily

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and quickly becomes the disorder of all. I have read in a good medical work that a nun, in a very largeconvent in
France, began to mew like a cat; shortly afterward other nuns also mewed. At last all the nuns mewed together
every day at a certain time for several hours together. The whole surrounding Christian neighborhood heard, with
equal chagrin and astonishment, this daily cat concert, which did not cease until all the nuns were informed that a
company of soldiers were placed by the police before the entrance of the covent, and that they were provided
with rods, and would continue whipping them until they promised not to mew any more.
But of all the epidemics of females which I myself have seen in Germany, or of which the history is known
to me, the most remarkable is the celebrated Convent epidemic of the 15th century, which Cardan describes, and
which peculiarly proves what I would here enforce. A nun in a German nunnery fell to biting all her companions.
In the course of a short time all the nuns of this convent began biting eachother. The news of this infatuation
among the nuns soon spread, and it now passed from convent to convent throughout a great part of Germany,
principally Saxony and Brandenburg. It afterward visited the nunneries of Holland, and at last the nuns had the
biting mania even as far as Rome.” –Zimmerman on solitude, Vol. II. Leipsig. 1784 Transl. note.
Oddly, one does not find plague ascribed to witches in the inferior documents, though this also would be a
crime against society in general. Probably the closest approximation to this notion is a charge against witches in or
near Savoy: that they formed a powder from the innards of murdered children and the bodies of venomous
animals, and scattered the concoction through the air during a mist. Those towns to which the deadly substance
was carried by the wind would suffer heavy mortality, while neighboring areas would be spared. From the very
onset of the plague in the mid fourteenth century, however, this disease had been widely attributed not to
maleficent action of witches but to the malice of Jews or to the wrath of God. These alternative explanations
evidently preempted the suggestion that outbreaks of the affliction could be blamed on devil worshippers. To be
sure, there were two incidents in which the populace held sorceresses responsible for epidemics, but the diseases
in these cases do not appear to have been plague (particularly not in the case of Boucoiran, where the disease
affected animals and children specifically).[81]
Witchcraft hysteria produced a number of bizarre by products in the early 17th century, among them cases
of diabolism in convents, notably at Aix En Provence in 1611, Loudun in 1630, and Louviers in 1647. Not typical of
witchcraft, these cases nonetheless illustrate the obsession of society with witchcraft and diabolism. And how
under certain conditions frightened and suggestible people readily believed themselves to be in communion with
Satan.
The story of the nuns of Loudon, made infamous by the novel of Aldous Huxley and the film of Ken Russell,
requires little embroidery. It began as a plot by the enemies of Father Urbain Grandier, confessor at the Ursuline
covent of Loudun. The mother superior and several of the nuns pretended to be possessed and accused Father
Grandier of bewitching them. They feigned convulsions, rolled and gibbered on the ground, and accused Grandier
of numerous indecencies. Grandier was no exemplary priest, but the evidence that he was a witch was
deliberately and cleverly faked, including a silly alleged pact written right to left in Latin and signed by Satan,
Beelzebub, Lucifer, Levithan, and other evil spirits, (Vol. II, Fig. 192A pg. 585) one of whom marked his name with a
drawing of a pitchfork. In spite of such ridiculous subterfuges, and despite the fact that many of the nuns who had
accused the priest publicly recanted, Grandiers enemies were not to be deterred. He was tortured lengthily and
denied even the small grace of strangulation before being placed in the flames.
But now events took an odd turn. The original plot having succeeded, no reasons remained for the nuns to
feign possession. Yet their symptoms only grew worse. One nun fell to the ground, blaspheming, in convulsions,
lifting up her petticoats and chemise, displaying her privy parts without any shame, and uttering filthy wrods. Her
gestures became so indecent that the audience averted its eyes. She cried out again and again, abusing herself

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with her hands, “Come on, then, fuck me!’ [At other times the nuns] struck their chests and backs with their heads,
as if they had their necks broken, and with inconceivable rapidity…. Their faces became so frightful one could not
bear to look at them; thier eyes remained open without winking. Their tongues issued suddenly from their
mouths, horribly swollen, black, hard, and covered with pimples…. They threw themselves back till their heads
touched their feet, and walked in this position with wonderful rapidity, and for a long time. They uttered cries so
horrible and so loud that nothing like it was ever heard before. They made use of expressions so indecent as to
shame the most debauched of men….
From pretending to be possessed, the nuns had in fact come to believe themselves possessed. Delusion
had bred psychosis. Such events indicate the degree to which the social mania of witchcraft produced insanity in
individuals.
But the fever was already past its peak. In 1687 Louis XIV issued an edict against sorcellerie. It was
refreshingly moderate; condemning sorcery, it ignored black cats, sex crazed nuns, and other lurid fantasies of the
witch mania. The worst was over. After 1700, the number of witches accused, tried and condemned fell off
rapidly. The decline of the witch craze is as interesting as its rise, but before we lay it to rest we will want to look
at its course in Britain and the American colonies.[82]
There occurred in 1491 a case of possession in a convent, a singularly rare happening at so early a date,
although unhappily far more common some hundred and 30 years later. Among the Augustinian nuns of the
Reform at Quesnoy le Comete, near Cambrai, was a young, ardent, and emotional sister, named Jeanne Potier.
Although always of most exemplary character and strictest observance she was suddenly seized with a burning
passion for the confessor, who upon understanding the situation at once withdrew from the place, his duties being
undertaken by a venerable religious of extraordinary sanctity and wisdom. But the nymphomaniac burst out into
the wildest ravings; she shrieked blasphemies and obscenities; sang bawdy songs such as it was humanly
impossible she should ever have heard; displayed the utmost lubricity in gesture and imagination; evinced an
almost supernatural strength when it was attempted to restrain her; and, what was worse, in some mysterious
way communicated her malady to other religious, until the peaceful cloister became a very bedlams of riot and
impurity. Monks and friars came from all parts to exorcize the demons who were thus afflicting the house, and
who gave their names as Tahu, Gron, and Gorgias. At length the Bisho or Cambrai, Monsignor Henry de Bughes,
visited the convent with much state and ceremony. On the Second Sunday after Easter he assisted at High mass,
and solemnly blessed the whole cloister. He then proceeded to exorcize the possessed nuns, and having expelled
the diabolic influences ordered Sister Jeanne Potier to be kept in strictest seclusion until she had shown
unmistakable signs of recovery. Order was thus restored to those walls where pandemonium had reigned for no
less than 7 months.
So immense a literature has gathered round the name of S. Joan of Arc that it is impossible here even to
touch upon her long and intricate trial in any useful or satisfactory detail. I will merely content myself with
drawing attention to Father Herbert Thurstons ample ande complete refutation of the ignoble fatuities, so
seriously yet so idly, put forward by Miss M. Murray in her The Witch Cult in Western Europe (pp. 270 6). It will
hardly be believed that, obsessed with her figment of an ancient religion which she terms the “Dianic cult,” Miss
Murray not merely declares S. Joan to have been a member of this “Dianic cult” but “actually the Incarnate God.”
The monstrous extravagance of such imagings, which it is superfluous to add have not a very show of foundation in
fact, almost renders it impossible to treat them as worthy of any consideration. They fall owing to their own
nightmare impossibility. Even the 2 Saints who appeared from heaven to S. Joan, S. Katherine of Alexandira and S.
Margaret of Antioch, are witches.[83]

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 The case of the possessions at Loudon has often been told, and famous as it is hardly offers any new
details which call for a lengthy investigation. In 1617 Urbain Grandier, a young and gallant priest, good looking,
witty, elegant and eloquent in the pulpit, was appointed vicar of Saint Pierre manners, and silvery tongue found
him many friends, whilst an overweening pride and intellectual contemptuousness of his colleagues made him not
a few enemies. He was vulnerable too; stories of his amours began soon to circulate. Hit intrigue with Philippe
Tringant, daughter of the procureur of the King at Loudun, resulted in the birth of a child. His relations with
several of his penitents were extremely improper, and a young girl Madeleine de Brou, whom he had seduced, was
so openly his mistress that considerable scandal ensued to the great chagrin of certain holy Carmelites and
Capuchins, belonging to the houses of those orders at Loudon. With fatal imprudence in 1617 Grandier refused to
allow the Bishop due precedence in a solemn procession; another story has it that somewhat later he published a
satire, La Cordonniere de Loudon, attacking the might minister; however that may be, upon his return to power
Richelieu neither forgot nor forgave. In 1630 the opponents of Grandier laid a complaint before Louis de la
Rocheposay, Bishop of Poitiers, accusing him of immorality, and after an inquiry a penance was imposed, and the
guilty priest was inhibited a rebus diuinis for 5 years in the diocese and in Loudun itself in perpetuum. The
following year, however, Henri de Soublis, Archbishop of Bordeaux, quashed the whole proceedings.
Reports were now current that several of the Sisers of the Ursuline convent at Loudyn were possessed.
The superior, Sister Jeanne des Anges (in the world Madame de Beleiel), had been seized with a succession of
alarming fits which shortly communicated themselves to other religious. It was whispered that phantoms had
been seen in the cloister, and strangely hollow voices heard to mutter and gibber during the still night watches.
The director of the nuns, Mignon, called in several Carmelite Fathers to help him in exorcising the afflicted, and
presently they had resource to the vicar of Saint Jacques at Chinon, Pierre Barre, a priest of Austere and severely
simple life. After long preparation the superior and a lay sister Jeanne Dumagnoux were exorcised according to
paroxysms, her face seemed to alter to that of a grinning fiend, a circumstance which filled the bystanders with no
ordinary fear; her tongue, black and swollen, was thrust from her parched and cracking lips; her skin dripped with
sweat; her limbs which seemed endued with an unnatural elasticity writhed and twisted in all directions; her body
ballooned to an immense size; whilst a harsh mocking voice growled out that 2 devils, Asmodeys and Zabulon,
possessed her. Again and again were the exorcisms renewed, and the patients began loudly to accuse Grandier of
having bewitched them. After a while 2 magistrates, messier Guillaume Cerisay de la Gueriniere, seneschal of the
distric, and Messire Louis Chauvet, lieutenant civil, attended to take the depositions of the possessed. The
proceedings now dragged on for several months and made a great noise. Grandier was warned of his peril, but
seemed to despise the danger. Several new exorcists were summoned, notably Father Lactance, a well known
Franciscan of spotless integrity, and Father Tranquille of Saint Remi, a Capuchin. The possessed nuns were
exorcised in the church , which was crowded with people and reiterated their charges against Grandier, who had,
they asserted, entered into a close compact with the lords of hell. It so happened that the all powerful Jean de
Laubardemont was at Loudon to superintend the destruction of the castle of that town. He was thrown into prison
on the 30 November, 1633. The evidence of the exorcists, the Carmelites and Capuchins, was carefully taken; the
court examined the sisters again and again; divines and phsysicains attended the exorcisms and watched the
possessed Ursulines night and day; Grandier, at whose house a heretical document of the most incriminating
nature was discovered, was interrogated with unwearied patience. The surgeon Mannouri was charged to search
the prisoner for the Devil’s mark, and reported that he had found 2 places on his body insensible to any probe,
although a needle had been inserted some inches into the flesh. At length, on the 18th August, 1634, the tribunal
condemned grandier to the stake. The unfortunate wretch was declared to have injuries and possessions practised
upon the persons of several Ursuline nuns of this town of Loudun, as well as upon other seculars,” whereupon

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after having made public confession of his faults “before the principal door of the church of Saint Pierre du
Marche, and before that of Sainte Ursule of this town” he was to be taken “to the public place of Sainte Croix, and
fastened to a stake upon a scaffold, which shall be erected upon the said place, and there to be burnt alive,
together with all the compacts and magical characters used by him, as well as the manuscript book composed by
him against the celibacy of priests; and his ashes scattered to the wind.”
Before this sentence was carried out Grandier was put to the question, ordinary and extraordinary. He
was then conveyed to the various churches, where the public acts of reparation were to be performed in a low
cart, and thence to the place of execution. All this was done on the same day, the sentence having been
pronounced as early as 5 o’clock, and the burning being accomplished about 4 in the afternoon. It is noteworthy
that the possession of the nuns did not cease at Grandiers death, but that they were tormented for several years
more. The famous Jesuit, Jean Jospeh Surin (1600-1665), celebrated as a mystical director, a true saint “consumed
with spirituality,” is Bossuet’s phrase was so horrified at the terrible sacrileges intended for three desecrated Hosts
that a physical breakdown of health and a long continued psychic obsession resulted, but with heroic charity he
persevered in his task and after 3 years, in 1637, the unhappy victims were freed. From that time sister Jeanne des
Anges, who had been so grievously tormented, was rewarded with heavenly consolations and died a holy death in
1665.[84]
In 1616 at Louviers, a busy little old world town of Normandy situate on the river Eure, some 7 and 20
miles from Rouen, was founded the convent of S. Louis IX and S. Elizabeth of Hungary, for a community of Regular
Tertiaries of the Third Franciscan Order. Their first director was an old priest named David, shortly to be
succeeded by Mathurin picard, the vicar of Mesnil jourdain, whose curate, Thomas Boulle, assisted him and upon
his death in 1642 was installed with full responsibility in his room. By some unhappy fate it was more than mere
chance without design all 3 were adherents of the Manichees, concealing their Satanism under a guise of orthodox
sanctity. From the commencement they set to work to corrupt the hapless religious whose faithful pastors and
guardians they should have been, and instead of lifting their souls to heaven they dragged them down to the
nethermost inferno. As early as 1634 there were indications that something was seriously amiss. 2 or 3 Sisters
were seized with fits of an abnormal nature, now standing rigid in some paralytic trance, now foaming on the
ground in an epilepsy and writhing as some boneless contortionist of the circus arena. Matters however seem to
have been hushed up for a while, although the infamous Picard ran some danger of being exposed. He was, in
truth, the Chief Officer and Grand Master of all the witches and devil worshippers troughout the district. Having
seduced and entirely subjected to his will an unfortunate nun, Madeleine Bavent, he used her as his instrument,
his associate, and intermediary. There can be no doubt, I think, that Picard must have possessed extraordinary
hypnotic powers, and Madeleine Bavent is probably not to be accounted morally responsible for the orgy of crime
into which she was plunged. The details are known from the confession which she wrote in prison at the instance
of the Abbe de marets, and oratorian, who helped and counselled her in those hours of penitence and remorse.
Several nights a week she was awakened just before Matins, that is to say about midnight, by one of the nuns, and
conducted to the sabbat. It is clear that Picard had provided himself with with false keys so that he could gain
admission to any part of the cloister at any hour. She declared that she never used any ointment or recited any
spell, but that she was conveyed to the sabbat by the power of Picard without knowing how she arrved there,
obviously in a state of trance. The exact place where the Sabbat took place she could not identify, but it was
presumably in some house not far from the convent. It was a long and narrow room, lighted by flares and the
candles upon the Devil’s altar which had been erected there. This certainly suggests a cellar. A number of persons
dressed as priests were present, and some in grotesque masking habits, half animal, half human. She never
assisted at any adoration of the demon in the form of a he goat, and the rites were seldom followed by a banquet.

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The Black Mass of Satan was continually said at the altar. The host appeared to be of a red colour, and communion
was given to the worshippers. The liturgy was read from a book of blasphemie, which was also carried in
procession. It contained the most hideous maledictions against all things sacred and divine, and seems to have
been a manuscript rather than a printed book. There was also a register or roll of the Satanists in which her name
had been inscribed by David. This was kept with the utmost care and Madeleine was never told the names of any
who were present. She recognized 4 religious from her own house, Catherine of the Cross, Catherine of S.
Genevieve, Elizabeth of the Nativity, and Anne Barre, also Thomas Boulle and several others priests whom she
knew only by sight, probably as having served the convent chapel. Prominent among the assistants were an
elderly man with iron grey hair, who was generally richly dressed in a purple velvet suit, and a matron, said to be
Mother Frances of the Cross (in the world Simonne Gangain), a co foundress of the Louviers convent, who
ordinarily resided at Paris. It is impossible to relate certain abominations and unnatural defilements of the Blessed
Sacrament which these evil priests practised. The details are frankly too monstrous for reproduction. The
wretched woman further related: “On the Good Friday night of one Picard and Boulle brought with them four
hosts; 2 of these they put in their own mouths, and the other 2 into Mother Simonne’s mouth and mine; then they
exchanged theirs for ours in order to cement for ever the union connexion between us. One night, after the book
of blasphemies had been carried in procession, a little crucifix was brought in and large Hoses were nailed to the
hands and feet of the figure of Christ, and each one present stabbed the Hosts with a sharp knife. There fell 2 or 3
drops of blood, which were gathered up carefully and preserved with the Hosts to confect a charm.” “I cannot but
believe,” she cried in tones of utter despair, “that this is a renewal of the Crucifixion of Our Lord.” On one occasion
a priest brought a chalice half filled with the Precious Blood, which they poured out over the floor. One Holy
Saturday a woman handed over to these men devils her newly born child. The babe was crucified on a rough
cross, its little hands and feet being fastened to the wood with nails which pierced large Hosts. 2 men, who had
ventured to the sabbat out of curiosity, filled with horror at the spectacle refused to take part in the orgies of lust
and murder. They were not allowed to leave the house alive. Picard used to delight to subject the miserable
Madeleine to the most infamous sexual connexions, to prostitute her publicly before the fiendish assembly. In
fine, the pages of de Sade contain nothing fouler than the confessions of this wretched woman; the most cruel and
obscene episodes of Justine or Juliette pale before the sworn statement of this demoniac nun.
Mathurin Picard died in 1642, and was buried in the chapel of the Franciscans, near the choir grille. No
doubt Boulle, who succeeded him, could not maintain the same magnetic influence over the Sisters as their late
director, and the mastermind removed conscience began to make itself heard. Several religious sickened of a
strange malady, and were driven almost to madness by their guilt and the pangs of remorse . They uttered piercing
cries, accusing themselves of hideous crimes. Fear fell upon them, and before long some 20 inmates of the house
were in the last stages of nervous disorder, broken in spirit and body. The thing could not be hid, and early in 1643
the Bishop of Evreux, Monsignor Francois Pericard, determined to begin a throrough investigation. He was assisted
by several Capuchin fathers of great tact and aexperience.; The nuns soon made the most alarming confessions,
mortally implicating Madeleine Bavent, who they seem to have regarded as the chief instrument of their undoing,
the dead Picard, the living Boulle. The good Bishop did not delay to promulgate his sentence. Madeleine Bavent
was to be degraded from religion and imprisoned for life; the body of Picard was no longer to be suffered to
remain in consecrated earth, but to be disinterred and flung with contumely into a ditch, le Puits Cronier, which lay
outside the boundaries of the town; Boulle was pronounced worthy of death. This judgement was delivered on 12
March, 1643, and before a few months were out Monsignor Pericard, heart broken at the insults offered to the
Most Holy sacrament, had sunk into an untimely grave. Secular justice stepped in, and the accused were
transferred to Rouen. Delay followed delay and procrastination followed by procrastionation, until after 4 years a

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final condemnation was issued by the supreme courts. On 21 August, 1647, Thomas Boulle after having humbly
begged pardon of God and the King before the principal door of Rouen Cathedral, was degraded from all
ecclesiastical order, and burned alive in the marketsquare. The corpse of Picard was flung into the same fire
Madeleine Bavent remained in close confinement, and ended her days forgotten in a dungeon. At first she
revolted against her doom, and attempted suicide, wounding her throat with a knjife she had concealed and
thrusting it into her side. She also swallowed glass and would have starved herself to deah. In time a deep
resignation succeeded, but there is no further record of her fate.[85]

Father Paul and the blue eyed Nun of St Catherines. a monk seated before a Madonna in his cell embraces a nun
who faces him holding a crucifix; behind a statuette of St Anthony of Padua. 1 October 1776 Mezzotint. Note: It
looks like it says VIRGO DEATH underneath a white Madonna we will explore this later. (Bonus)

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 The Crusades
St. Louis & The Unhappy Crusade
1248 1250
For several months after the Council of Clermont, France and Germany presented a singular spectacle. The
pious, the fanatic, the needy, the dissolute, the young and the old, even women and children, and the halt and
lame, enrolled themselves by hundreds. In every village the clergy were busied in keeping up the excitement,
promising eternal rewards to those who assumed the red cross, and fulminating the most awful denunciations
against all the wordly minded who refused or even hesitated. Every debtor who joined the Crusade was freed by
the papal edict from the claims of his creditors; outlaws of every grade were made equal with the honest upon the
same conditions. The property of those who went was placed under the protection of the Church, and St. Paul and
St. Peter themselves were believed to descend from their high abode, to watch over the chattels of the absent
pilgrims. Signs and portents were seen in the air, to increase the fervor of the multitude. An aurora=borealis of
unusual brilliancy appeared, and thousands of the crusaders came out to gaze upon it, prostrating themselves
upon the earth in adoration. It was thought to be a sure prognostic of the interposition of the Most High, and a
representation of his armies fighting with and over throwing the infidels. Reports of wonders were every where
rife. A monk had seen two gigantic warriors on horseback, the one representing a Christian and the other a Turk,
fighting in the sky with iads of stars were said to have fallen from heaven, each representing the fall of a pagan foe.
It was believed at the same time that the Emperor Charlemagne would rise from the grave, and lead on to victory
the embattled armies of the Lord. A singular feature of the popular madness was the enthusiasm of the women.
Everywhere they encouraged their lovers and husbands to forsake all things for the holy war. Many of them
burned the sign of the cross upon their breasts and arms, and coloured the wound with a red dye, as a lasting
memorial of their zeal. Others, still more zealous, impressed the mark by the same means upon the tender limbs of
young children and infants at the breast.
During the spring and summer of this year (1096) the roads teamed with Crusaders, all hastening to the
towns and villages appointed as the rendezvous of the district. Some were on horseback, some in carts, and some
came down the rivers in boats and rafts, bringing their wives and children, all eager to go to Jerusalem. Very few
knew where Jerusalem was. Some thought it fifty thousand miles away, and others imagined that it was but a
month’s journey; while at sight of every town or castle the children exclaimed “Is that Jerusalem? Is that the city?”
Parties of knights and nobles might be seen travelling eastward, and amusing themselves as they went with the
knightly diversion of hawking, to lighten the fatigues of the way.[86]
It is now time to speak of the leaders of the expedition. Great multitudes ranged themselves under the
command of Peter the Hermit, whom, as the originator, they considered the most appropriate leader of the war.
Others joined the banner of a bold adventurer, whom history has dignified with no other name than that of
Gautier sans Avoir, or Walter the Pennyless, but who is represented as having been of noble family, and well
skilled in the art of war. A third multitude from Germany flocked around the standard of a monk named
Gottschalk, of whom nothing is known except that he was a fanatic of the deepest dye. All these bands, which
together are said to have amounted to 300,000 men, women, and children, were composed of the vilest rascality
of Europe. Without discipline, principle, or true courage, they rushed through the nations like a pestilence,
spreading terror and death wherever they went. The first multitude that set forth was led by Walter the Pennyless
early in the spring of 1096, within a very few months after the Council of Clermont. Each man of that irregular host
aspired to be his own master. Like their nominal leader, each was poor to penury, and trusted for subsistence on

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his journey to the chances of the road. Rolling through Germany like a tide, they entered Hungary, where, at first,
they were received with some degree of kindness by the people. The latter had not yet caught sufficient of the fire
of enthusiasm to join the Crusade themselves, but were willing enough to forward the cause by aiding those
embarked in it. Unfortunately this good understanding did not last long. The swarm were contented with food for
their necessities, but craved for luxuries also. They attacked and plundered the dwellings of the country people,
and thought nothing of murder where resistance was offered. On their arrival before Semlin, the outraged
Hungarians collected in large nmbers and, attacking the rear of the crusading host, slew a great many of the
stragglers, and, taking away their arms and crosses, affixed them as trophies to the walls of the city. Walter
appears to have been in no mood or condition to make reprisals; for his army, destructive as a plague of locusts
when plunder urged them on, were useless against any regular attack from a determined enemy. Their rear
continued to be thus harassed by the wrathful Hungarians until they were fairly out of their territory. On his
entrance into Bulgaria, Walter met with no better fate. The cities and towns refused to let him pass; the villages
denied him provisions: and the citizens and country people uniting, slaughtered his followers by hundreds. The
progress of the army was more like a retreat than an advance; but as it was impossible to stand still, Walter
continued his course till he arrived at Constantinople with a force which famine and the sword had diminished to
one third of its original number.
The greater multitude, led by the enthusiastic Hermit, followed close upon his heels, with a bulky train of
baggage, and women and children sufficient to form a host of themselves. If it were possible to find a rabble more
vile than the army of Walter the Pennyless, it was that led by Peter the Hermit. Being better provided with means,
they were not reduced to the necessity of pillage intheir progress through Hungary; and had they taken any other
route than that which led through Semlin, might perhaps have traversed they country without molestation. On
their arrival before that city, their fury was raised at seeing the arms and red crosses of their predecessors hanging
as trophies over the gates. Their pent up ferocity exploded at the sight. The city was tumultuously attacked, and
the besiegers entering, not by dint of bravery, but of superior numbers, it was given up to all the horrors which
follow when victory, brutality, and licentiousness are linked together. Every evil passion was allowed to revel with
impunity, and revenge, lust, and avarice, each had its hundred victims in unhappy Semlin. Any maniac can kindle a
conflagration, but it may require many wise men to put it out. Peter the Hermit had blown the popular fury into a
flame, but to cool it again was beyond his power. His followers rioted unrestrained, until the fear of retaliation
warned them to desist. When the king of Hungary was informed of the disasters of semlin, he marched with
sufficient force to chastise the Hermit, who, at the news, broke up his camp and retreated towards the Morava, a
broad and rapid stream that joins the Danube a few miles to the eastward of Belgrade. Here a party of indignant
Bulgarians awaited him, and so harassed him, as to make the passage of the river a task both of difficulty and
danger. Great numbers of his infatuated followers perished in the waters, and many fell under the swords of the
Bulgarians. The ancient chronicles do not mention the amount of the Hermits loss at this passage, but represent it
in general terms as very great.
At Nissa, the Duke of Bulgaria fortified himself, in fear of an assault; but Peter, having learned a little
wisdom from experience, thought it best to avoid hostilities. He passed 3 nights in quietness under the walls, and
the duke, not wishing to exasperate unnecessarily so fierce and rapacious a host, allowed the townspeople to
supply them with provisions. Peter took his departure peaceably on the following morning; but some German
vagabonds, falling behind the main body of the army, set fire to the mills and house of a Bulgarian, with whom, it
appears, they had had some dispute on the previous evening. The citizens of Nissa, who had throughout
mistrusted the Crusaders, and were prepared for the worst, sallied out immediately, and took signal vengeance.
The spoilers were cut to pieces, and and children who had lagged in the rear, and a great quantity of baggage.

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Peter hereupon turned round and marched back to Nissa, to demand explanation of the Duke of Bulgaria. The
latter fairly stated the provocation given, and the Hermit could urge nothing in palliation of so gross an outrage. A
negotiation was entered into, which promised to be successful, and the Bulgarians were about to deliver up the
women and children, when a party of undisciplined Crusaders, acting solely upon the town. Peter in vain exerted
his authority; the confusion became general, and after a short but desperate battle, the Crusaders threw down
their arms, and fled in all directions. Their vast host was completely routed, the slaughter being so great among
them, as to be counted , not by hundreds, but by thousands.
It is said that the Hermit fled from this fatal field to a forest a few miles from Nissa, abandoned by every
human creature. It would be curious to know whether, after so dire a reverse.
“His enpierced breast
Sharp sorrow did in thousand pieces rive,”
or whether his fiery zeal still rose superior to calamity, and pictured the eventual triumph of his cause. He, so
lately the leader of a 100,000 men, was now a solitary skulker in the forests, liable at ever instant to be discovered
by some pursuing Bulgarian, and cut off in mid career. Chance at last brought him within sight of an eminence,
where 2 or 3 of his bravest knights had collected 500 of the stragglers. These gladly received the Hermit, and a
consultation having taken place, it was revolved to gather together the scattered remnants of the army. Fires
were lighted on the hill, and scouts sent out in all directions for the fugitives. Horns were sound at intervals, to
make known that friends were near; and before nightfall the Hermit saw himself at the head of 7,000 men. Durign
the succeeding day, he was joined by 20,000 more, and with this miserable remnant of his force, he pursued his
route towards Constantinople. The bones of the rest mouldred in the forests of Bulgaria.
On his arrival at Constantinople, where he found Walter the Pennyless awaiting him, he was hospitably
received by the Emperor Alexius. It might have been expected that the sad reverses they had undergone would
have taught his followers common prudence; but, unhappily for them, their turbulence and love of plunder was
not to be restrained. Although thy were surrounded by friends, by whom all their wants were liberally supplied,
they could not refrain from rapine. In vain the Hermit exhorted them to tranquility; he possessed no more power
over them, in subduing their passions, than the obscurest soldier of the host. They set fire to several public
buildings in Constantinople out of pure mischief, and stripped the lead from the roofs of the churches, which they
afterwards sold for old metal in the purlieus of the city. From this time may be dated the aversion which the
Emperor Alexius entertained fro the Crusaders and which was afterwars manifested in all his actions, even when
he had to deal with the chivalrous and more honourable armies which arrived after the Hermit. He seems to have
imagined that the Turks themselves were enemies less formidable to his power than these outpourings of the
refuse of Europe: he soon found a pretext to hurry them into Asia Minor. Peter crossed the Bosphorus with
Walter; but the excesses of his followers were such, that, despairing of accomplishin any good end by remaining at
their head, he left them to themselves, and returned to Constantinople, on the pretext of making arrangements
with the government of Alexius for a proper supply of provisions. The Crusaders, forgetting that they were in the
enemys country; and that union, above all things, was desirable, gave themselves up to dissensions. Violent
disputes arose between the Lombards and Normans commanded by Walter the Pennyless, and the Franks and
Germans led out by Peter. The latter separated themselves from the former, and choosing for their leader one
Reinaldo, or selves from the former , and choosing for their leader one Reinaldo, or Reinhold, marched forward,
and took possession of the fortress of Exorogorgon. The Sultan Solimaun was on the alert, with a superior force. A
party of Crusaders, which had been detached from the fort, and stationed at a little distance as an ambuscade,
were surprised ad cut to pieces and Exorogorgon invested on all sides. The siege was protracted for 8 days during
which the Christians suffered the mot acute agony from the want of water. It is hard to say how long the hope of

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succour or the energy of despair would have enabled them to hold out: their treacherous leader cut the matter
short by renouncing the Christian faith, and deliviering up the fort into the hands of the sultan. He was followed
by 2 or 3 of his officers; all the rest, refusing to becom Mahometans, were ruthlessly put to the sword. Thus
perished the last wretched remnant of the vast multitude which had traversed Europe with Peter the Hermit.
Walter the Pennyless and his multitude met as miserable a fate. On the news of the disasters of
Exorogorgon, they demanded to be led instantly against the Turks. Walter, who only wanted good soldiers to have
made a good general, was cooler of head, and saw all the dangers of such a step. His force was wholly insufficient
to make any ecisive movement in a country where the enemy was so much superior, and where, in case of defeat,
he had no secure position to fall back upon; and he therefore expressed his opinion against advancing until the
arrival of reinforcements. This prudent counsel found no favour: the army loudly expressed their dissatisfaction at
their chief, and prepared to march forward without him. Upon this the brave Walter put himself at their head,
and rushed to destruction. Proceeding towards Nice, the modern Isnik, he was intercepted by the army of the
sultan: a fierce battle ensued, in which the Turks made fearful havoc; out of 25,000 Christians, 22,000 were slain,
and among them Gautier himself, who fell pierced by 7 mortal wounds. The remaining 3,000 retreated upon
Civitot, where they entrenched themselves.
Disgusted as was Peter the Hermit at the excesses of the multitude, who, at his call, had forsaken Europe,
his heart was moved with grief and pity at their misfortunes. All his former zeal revived; casting himself at the feet
of the Emperor Alexius, he implored him, with tears in his eyes, to send relief to the few surivivors at Civitot. The
emperor consented, and a force was sent, which arrived just in time to save them from destruction. The turks had
beleaguered the place, and the Crusaders were reduced to the last extremity. Negotiations were entered into, and
the last 3000 were conducted in safety to Constantinople. Alexius had suffered too much by their former excesses
to be very desirous of retaining them in his capital; he therefore caused them all to be disarmed, and , furnishing
each with a sum of money, he sent them back to their own country.
While these event were taking place, fresh hordes were issuing from the woods and wilds of Germany, all
bent for the Holy Land. They were commanded by a fanatical priest, anmed Gottschalk, who like Gautier and Peter
the Hermit, took his way through Hungary. History is extremely meagre in her details of the condct and fate of his
host, which amounted to at least 100,000 men. Robbery and murder seem to have journeyed with them, and the
poor Hungarians were rendered almost desperate by their numbers and rapacity. Karloman, the king of the
country, made a bold effort to get rid of them; for the resentment of his people had arrived at such a height, that
nothing short of the total extermination of the Crusaders would satisfy them. Gottschalk had to pay the penalty,
not only for the ravages of his own nbands, but for those of the swarms that had come before him. He and his
army were induced, by some means or other, to lay down their arms: the savage Hungarians, seeing them thus
defenceless, set upon them, and slaughtered them in great number. How many escaped their arrows we are not
informed; but not one of them reashed Palestine.
Other swarms, under nameless leaders, issued from Germany and France, more brutal and more frantic
than any that had preceded them. Their fanaticism surpassed by far the wildest freaks of the followers of the
Hermit. In bands, varying in numbers from one to five thousand, they traversed the country in all directions, bent
upon plunder and massacre. They wore the symbol of the Crusade upon their shoulders, but inveighed against the
folly of proceeding to the Holy Land to destroy the Turks, while they left behind them so many Jews, the still more
inveterate enemies of Christ. They swore fierce vengeance against this unhappy race, and murdered all the
Hebrews they could lay their hands on, first subjecting them to the most horrible mutilation. According to the
testimony of Albert Aquensis, they lived among each other in the most shameless profligacy, and their vice was
only exceeded by their superstition. When every they were in search of Jews, they were preceded by a goose and

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goat, which they believed to be holy, and animated with diving power to discover the retreats of the unbelievers.
In Germany alone they slaughtered more than a thousand Jews, notwithstanding all the efforts of the clergy to
save them. So dreadful was the cruelty of their tormentors, that great numbers of Jews committed self destruction
to avoid falling into their hands.
Again it fell to the lot of the Hungarians to deliver Europe from these pests. When there were no more
Jews to murder, the bands collected in one body, and took the old route to the Holy Land, a route stained with the
blood of 300,000 who had gone before, and destined also to receive theirs. The number of these swarms has
never been stated; but so many of them perished in Hungary , that contemporary writers, despairing of giving any
adequate idea of their multitudes , state that the fields were actually heaped with their corpses, and that for miles
in its course the waters of the Danube were dyed with their blood. It was at Mersburg, on the Danube that the
greatest slaughter took place, a slaughter so great as to amount almost to extermination. The Hungarians for a
while disputed the passage of the river, but the Crusaders forced their way across, and attacking the city with the
blind courage of madness, succeeded in making a breach in the walls. At this moment of victory an unaccountable
fear came over them. Throwing down their arms, they fled panic stricken, no one knew why, and no one knew
whither. The Hungarians followed, sword in and, and cut them down without remorse, and in sugh numbers, that
the stream of the Danube is said to have been choked up by their unburied bodies .[87]
It was early in the morning of the 1st of July 1097, when the Crusaders saw the first companies of the
Turkish horsemen pouring down upon them from the hills. Bohemund had hardly time to set himself in order, and
transport his sick and helpless to the rear, when the overwhelming force of the Orientals were upon him. The
Christian army, composed principally of men on foot, gave way on all sides, and the hoofs of the Turkish steeds,
and the poisoned arrows of their bowmen, mowed them down by hundreds. After having lost the flower of their
chivalry, the Christians retreated upon their baggage, when a dreadful slaughter took place. Neither women nor
children, nor the sick, were spared. Just as they were reduced to the last extremity, Godfrey of Bouillon and the
Count of Toulouse made their appearance on the field, and turned the tide of battle. After an obstinate
engagement the Turks fled, and their rich camp fell into the hands of the enemy. The loss of the Crusaders
amounted to about four thousand men, with several chiefs of renown, among whom were Count Robert of Paris
and William the brother of Tancred. The loss of the Turks, which did not exceed this number, taught them to
pursue a different mode of warfare. The sultan was far from being defeated. With his still gigantic army, he laid
waste all the country on either side of the Crusaders. The latter, who were unaware of the tactics of the enemy,
found plenty of provisions in the Turkish camp; but so far from economizing these resources, they gave themselves
up for several days to the most unbounded extravagance. They soon paid dearly for their heedlessness. In the
ravaged country of Phyrgia, through which they advanced towards Antiochetta, they suffered dreadfully for want
of food for themselves and pasture for their cattle. Above them was a scorching sun, almost sufficient of itself to
dry up the freshness of the land, a task which the firebrands of the sultan had but too surely effected, and water
was not to be had after the first day of their march. The pilgrims died at the rate of five hundred a day. The horses
of the knights perished on the road, and the baggage which they had aided to transport was either placed upon
dogs, sheep, and swine, or abandoned altogether. In some of the calamities that afterwards befell them, the
Christians gave themselves up to the most reckless profligacy; but upon this occasion, the dissensions which
prosperity had engendered were all forgotten. Religion, often disregarded, arose in the stern presence of
misfortune, and cheered them as they died by the promises of eternal felicity.[88]
Imagination cannot conceive a scene more dreadful than that presented by the devoted city of Antioch on
that night of horror. The Crusaders fought with a blind fury, which fanaticism and suffering alike incited. Men,
women, and children were indiscriminately slaughtered, till the streets ran with blood. Darkness increased the

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destruction, for when morning dawned the Crusaders found themselves with their swords at the breasts of their
fellow soldiers, whom they had mistaken for foes. The Turkish commander fled, first to the citadel, and that
becoming insecure, to the mountains, whither he was pursued and slain, and his grey head brought back to
Antioch as a trophy. At daylight the massacre ceased, and the Crusaders gave themselves up to plunder. They
found gold, and jewels, and silks, and velvets in abundance, but of provisions, which were of more importance to
them, they found but little of any kind. Corn was excessively scarce, and they discovered to their sorrow that in
this respect the besieged had been but little better off than the besiegers.[89]
Early in the spring of 1213, a more extraordinary body of Crusaders was raised in France and Germany. An
immense number of boys and girls, amounting, according to some accounts, to thirty thousand, were incited by
the persuasion of two monks to undertake the journey to Palestine. They were no doubt composed of the idle and
deserted children who generally swarm in great cities, nurtured in vice and daring, and ready for any thing. The
object of the monks seems to have been atrocious one of inveigling them into slave ships, on pretence of sending
them to Syria, and selling them for slaves on the coast of Africa (Jacob de Voragine and Albericus). Great numbers
of these poor victims were shipped at Marseilles; but the vessels, with the exception of two or three, were
wrecked on the shores of Italy, and every soul perished. The remainder arrived safely in Africa, and were bought
up as slaves, and sent off into the interior of the country. Another detachment arrived at Genoa; but the
accomplices in this horrid plot having taken no measures at that port, expecting them all at Marseilles, they were
induced to return to their homes by the Genoese.[90]
A traditional numbering scheme for the crusades gives us nine during the 11th to 13th centuries, as well as
other smaller crusades that are mostly contemporaneous and unnumbered. There were frequent "minor" crusades
throughout this period, not only in Palestine, but also in the Iberian Peninsula and central Europe, against not only
Muslims, but also Christian heretics and personal enemies of the Papacy or other powerful monarchs. Such
"crusades" continued into the 16th century, until the Renaissance and Reformation when the political and religious
climate of Europe was significantly different to that of the Middle Ages. The following is a list of crusades.
First Crusade 1095–1099
After Byzantine emperor Alexius I called for help with defending his empire against the Seljuk Turks, in 1095 at the
Council of Clermont, Pope Urban II called upon all Christians to join a war against the Turks, a war which would
count as full penance. Crusader armies managed to defeat two substantial Turkish forces at Dorylaeum and at
Antioch, finally marching to Jerusalem with only a fraction of their original forces. In 1099, they took Jerusalem by
assault and massacred the population. As a result of the First Crusade, several small Crusader states were created,
notably the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
Crusade of 1101
Following this crusade there was a second, less successful wave of crusaders. This is known as the Crusade of 1101
and may be considered an adjunct of the first crusade.
Second Crusade 1145–1149
After a period of relative peace, in which Christians and Muslims co existed in the Holy Land, Muslims conquered
the town of Edessa. A new crusade was called for by various preachers, most notably by Bernard of Clairvaux.
French and German armies, under the Kings Louis VII and Conrad III respectively, marched to Jerusalem in 1147,
but failed to accomplish any major successes, and indeed endangered the survival of the Crusader states with a
strategically foolish attack on Damascus. By 1150, both leaders had returned to their countries without any result.
Third Crusade 1189–1192
Also known as the Kings' Crusade. In 1187, Saladin, Sultan of Egypt, recaptured Jerusalem. Pope Gregory VIII called
for a crusade, which was led by several of Europe's most important leaders: Philip II of France, Richard I of England

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and Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor. Frederick drowned in Cilicia in 1190, leaving an unstable alliance between
the English and the French. Philip left, in 1191, after the Crusaders had recaptured Acre from the Muslims. The
Crusader army headed down the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. They defeated the Muslims near Arsuf and were
in sight of Jerusalem. However, the inability of the Crusaders to thrive in the locale due to inadequate food and
water resulted in an empty victory. Richard left the following year after establishing a truce with Saladin. On
Richard's way home, his ship was wrecked and he ended up in Austria, where his enemy, Duke Leopold, captured
him. The Duke delivered Richard to Emperor Henry VI, who held the King for ransom. By 1197, Henry felt himself
ready for a Crusade, but he died in the same year of malaria. Richard I died during fighting in Europe and never
returned to the Holy Land.
Fourth Crusade 1201–1204
The Fourth Crusade was initiated in 1202 by Pope Innocent III, with the intention of invading the Holy Land
through Egypt. The Venetians, under Doge Enrico Dandolo, gained control of this crusade and diverted it first to
the Christian city of Zara (Zadar), then to Constantinople, where they attempted to place a Byzantine exile on the
throne. After a series of misunderstandings and outbreaks of violence, the Crusaders sacked the city in 1204.
Albigensian Crusade
The Albigensian Crusade was launched in 1209 to eliminate the heretical Cathars of southern France. It was a
decades long struggle that had as much to do with the concerns of northern France to extend its control
southwards as it did with heresy. In the end, both the Cathars and the independence of southern France were
exterminated.
Children's Crusade
The Children's Crusade is a series of possibly fictitious or misinterpreted events of 1212. The story is that an
outburst of the old popular enthusiasm led a gathering of children in France and Germany, which Pope Innocent III
interpreted as a reproof from heaven to their unworthy elders. The leader of the French army, Stephen, led 30,000
children. The leader of the German army, Nicholas, led 7,000 children. None of the children actually reached the
Holy Land; they were either sold as slaves, settled along the route to Jerusalem, or died of hunger during the
journey.
Fifth Crusade 1217–1221
By processions, prayers, and preaching, the Church attempted to set another crusade on foot, and the Fourth
Council of the Lateran (1215) formulated a plan for the recovery of the Holy Land. In the first phase, a crusading
force from Hungary, Austria joined the forces of the king of Jerusalem and the prince of Antioch to take back
Jerusalem. In the second phase, crusader forces achieved a remarkable feat in the capture of Damietta in Egypt in
1219, but under the urgent insistence of the papal legate, Pelagius, they proceeded to a foolhardy attack on Cairo,
and an inundation of the Nile compelled them to choose between surrender and destruction.
Sixth Crusade 1228–1229
Emperor Frederick II had repeatedly vowed a crusade, but failed to live up to his words, for which he was
excommunicated by the Pope in 1228. He nonetheless set sail from Brindisi, landed in Palestine and through
diplomacy he achieved unexpected success, Jerusalem, Nazareth, and Bethlehem being delivered to the Crusaders
for a period of ten years. Louis IX attacks Damietta
Seventh Crusade 1248–1254
The papal interests represented by the Templars brought on a conflict with Egypt in 1243, and in the following year
a Khwarezmian force summoned by the latter stormed Jerusalem. The Crusaders were drawn into battle at La
Forbie in Gaza. The Crusader army and its Bedouin mercenaries were outnumbered by Baibars' force of
Khwarezmian tribesmen and were completely defeated within forty eight hours. This battle is considered by many

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historians to have been the death knell to the Kingdom of Outremer. Although this provoked no widespread
outrage in Europe as the fall of Jerusalem in 1187 had done, Louis IX of France organized a crusade against Egypt
from 1248 to 1254, leaving from the newly constructed port of Aigues Mortes in southern France. It was a failure
and Louis spent much of the crusade living at the court of the Crusader kingdom in Acre. In the midst of this
crusade was the first Shepherds' Crusade in 1251.
Eighth Crusade 1270
The eighth Crusade was organized by Louis IX in 1270, again sailing from Aigues Mortes, initially to come to the aid
of the remnants of the Crusader states in Syria. However, the crusade was diverted to Tunis, where Louis spent
only two months before dying. The Eighth Crusade is sometimes counted as the Seventh, if the Fifth and Sixth
Crusades are counted as a single crusade. The Ninth Crusade is sometimes also counted as part of the Eighth.
Ninth Crusade 1271–1272
The future Edward I of England undertook another expedition in 1271, after having accompanied Louis on the
Eighth Crusade. He accomplished very little in Syria and retired the following year after a truce. With the fall of
Antioch (1268), Tripoli (1289), and Acre (1291), the last traces of the Christian rule in Syria disappeared.[91]

Chapter 6
Whose World is This
The Law of the Land
The Church & The Plague
On the house doors red crosses were painted with the inscription: ‘Lord, have mercy upon us.’ Nothing
was to be heard save the wailing of the dying, the lamenting of the relations, and the tolling of the bell for those
about to be buried, and the mournful all: ‘Bring out your dead!’”[92]
To one chronicler the miraculous vision appears memorable “which in the year of Christ 1571 was seen at
Cremnitz in the mountain towns of Hungary on Ascension Day in the evening to the great perturbation of all, when
on the Schuelersberg there appeared so many black riders that the opinion was prevalent that the Turks were
making a secret raid, but who rapidly disappeared again, and thereupon a raging plague broke out in the
neighbourhood.”
In the year 1680 there is reported in the so called Journal: “That between Eisenberg and Dornberg 30
funeral biers all covered with black cloth were seen in broad daylight, among them on a bier a black man was
standing with a white cross. When these had disappeared a great heat set in so that the people in this place could
hardly stand it. But when the sun had set they perceived so sweet a perfume as if they were in a garden of roses.
By this time they were all plunged in perturbation. Whereupon the epidemic set in in Thuringia in many places.”
Not only before but during the plague signs and omens appeared in multitudes. Thus in the 14th and 15th
centuries it happened repeatedly that when bread was taken from the oven and cut some drops of blood fell out.
“In the year 1501 small crosses, white, red, and the colour of blood and matter, fell on the women’s veils and the
clothes of the people, even on those that were stowed away in chests and drawers. In the following year such

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crosses fell upon the people the people and drops of blood were observed on the walls. Thereupon there ensued
a great plague, and those on whom the crosses had fallen generally died.” All those who in the previous year had
seen the crosses and stains on their clothes were seized with despair, and having no hope, believing that they were
bound to die, they awaited daily with fear and trembling the end of their lives, letting things go as they liked and
taking no heed of anything. ‘
In Mark Brandenburg no one tilled the fields any more, the gardens were neglected, the cattle were not
tended, as everyone expected death the next moment. The bishops issued pastorals in which they announced the
anger of God and instituted great festivals. “In the year 1599, when the great plague predicted by him had broken
out, Johann Kepler wrote from Graz to his friend, Professor Mastlin, in Tuebingen that his little daughter,
Susannah, had succumbed to the plague.
“Should her father die very shortly it would not come unexpected to him. When a short time ago here and
there in Hungary blood red crosses appeared on the bodies of the people and other blood red signs on the house
doors, walls, and benches, I was, as far as I know, the first in the town to perceive a little cross on my left foot, the
colour of which merged from blood red to yellow. It appeared on that part of the foot where the back spreads out,
right in the middle between the root of the shin and the toes. I should think that this and no other was the place
where the nail of the cross was driven into Christ’s foot. In some people, as I am informed, there is a mark of a
drop of blood on the surface of the hand. Christ’s hands were also transfixed. But no one here has anything
familiar to that which I have.
As late as 1704, in various villages in the jurisdiction of Insterburg in east Prussia, markings of a similar
nature were observed and considered to be Hebrew letters.
Not until a few decades later did a courageous natural scientist prove that the blood stains were due to the
excrements of butterflies (leucoma dispar). When the storm blast and “it is not to be taken lightly and waved
away” prostrates the straightest and stoutest trees, but also rips off the freshest fruit, it then seems to the
Thuringian chronicler to be an omen that many young, strong and lusty people will be laid low and carried off by
the plague. During the plague of 1565 in Italy rumblings of thunder were heard day and night, as in a war,
together with the turmoil and noise as of a mighty army. In Germany in many places a noise was heard as if a
hearse were passing through the streets of its own accord, “and of other phantom gravediggers were meeting the
real gravediggers on their return from the cemetery, as is frequently said to have happened to the gravediggers,
the so called wicked men of Leipzig, inspiring them with the greatest horror.”
On the termination of the plague the spirits and apparitions generally developed particular activity “as the
wicked fiend then by the grace of god endeavoured to overthrow many more, and sought to attain one more and
yet another.” In the 17th century, particularly distinguished by its superstition, the newspapers already began
greedily to collect items of news of this sensational nature. An example of the horror column of journalism of that
period is a paper of September 1, 1682, entitled “Truthful and exact account of the native town of the late Dr.
Luther how Eisleben was particular interest, as it was evidently written by an opponent of the Reformation:
“Conditions in Eisleben are such as to break one’s heart and bring tears into one’s eyes, and would make one
believe that God has forgone all mercy. It would be vain to endeavor to describe the great quantities of corpses.
In Long Street all citizens with the exception of 4 are dead, the whole of Bell street is exterminated with
the exception of 3. All the carpenters, brewers, turners, as well as 15 bakers, together with their families, are
dead. Many are as full of plague as Lazarus was of boils. The new town of Eisleben has been exterminated with
the exception of 12 citizens. The cattle have died of starvation, decaying cattle fill the byres. The town of
merseburg dispatched 5 cattle men, but they were hardly able to endure it for 5 days on account of the fearful

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stench that has arisen; the surviving cattle have been driven into the rapuse meadows. The town of Naumburg
had sent 5 score of boards together with nails, victuals, and a hundred Rixdollars in cash.
Source: Johannes Nohl; The Black Death: A Chronicle of the Plague: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. 1926; pg. 63 66
Most curious is what is reported by some reliable men, according to whom a man in the hour of his death
assured, on the earnest inquiry of his confessor and wishing it to be taken as his last dying testimony, that he
together with another for certain business had proceeded to Hernals, that market borough nearest Vienna, and
had tarried there somewhat late against his will; so that, overtaken by night, he had to make his way home in the
dark, although the pale moon, at that time full, changed the night into bright day, and he could observe everything
so clearly that he would even have undertaken to read a letter; then he heard and he stood still a long time to
listen, at a well known spot in the fields a mournful tune, sung as if many sad voices were mournfully intoning and
repeating the following words “Placebo Domino in regione Vivorum.” Which words it is the custom of the Catholic
Church to sing at funerals; and, behold! Not long afterwards the plague broke out and, unconscious of the fact, on
the very place where this mournful music had been heard a huge burial trench was dug in which several thousands
lie buried. This music was heard by several others, but these were ignorant of the Latin language and, therefore,
could not understand the words. I do not entertain the least doubt about this story and believe firmly that more
signs of this nature were vouch safed, of which the people relate many which I did not insert here, as in such
matters untruths so easily slip in. It is true our most kind God very frequently announces great evils by certain
precursory signs. And yet it should be no little comfort that the above mentioned verse, “Placebo Domino,” was
heard sung by an invisible choir of the dead, indicating that God the All Merciful had saved the majority of the
dead and compensated the shortening of their days on earth by eternal life, as it was revealed in the year 1489 at
Brussels, when 35,000 people died of the plague, that all had obtained salvation with the exception of 2, 1 of
whom had doubted the boundless mercy of God, and the other had voluntarily neglected confession and the
sacrament of repentance.[93]
The circumstance that the universities were under the jurisdiction of the Church, in whose estimation it
was a secondary science, “as its aim was only care of the body and not the mind,” raised immense difficulties. In a
small allegorical poem of the 13th century, “The Marriage of the 7 Arts and the 7 Virtues,” Grammar, after having
married her daughters Dialectic, Geometry, Music, Rhetoric, and Theology, and after having united herself with the
priesthood, introduces Lady Physics (by which name medicine was then known, as we still speak of physicians and
begs that a husband be found for her too. But the new arrival has a very bad reception and is told: “You are not of
our blood, we give you no council.” In a little anonymous primer for doctors of the period we find that it was the
first duty of the physician on entering the house to ask the relations of the patient if he had confessed and
received the holy sacrament, as upon this in the first instance his salvation depended. For this he had to use the
following locution: “The soul is more worthy than the body, therefore its salvation goeth before all things.” The
patient must in the name of God be induced to seek the salvation of his soul, and if he has not yet done so, he
must do it at once or promise to do it, for most frequently sickness is the consequence of our sins. Thus the
enlightened physician was obliged to play a double role in accordance with the prevailing opinioins of the time
indeed in the 12th and 13th centuries he had to unite the ecclesiastic profession with medical science so as to
escape the envy and persecution of the clergy. It did not suit the Church that men enlightened by the knowledge
of natural science should enjoy the intimacy of princes and the great men of the country. “The priests pushed and
crowded round the sick beds and endeavoured to prove the efficiency of their appeals to the saints, their
intercessions and relics, their consecrated candles, masses, endowment vows, sacrifices and other pious means of
robbery. If a physician attained a good cure, it was attributed to the intercession of the saints, the vows of the
prayers of the priests. If the cure was a failure, the physiciains were rendered responsible for the death of the

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patient, and the lack of trust in God and the saints was stated to be the cause of death, which was regarded as a
punishment of God, for which the relations has to do penance by an excess of masses for the repose of the soul.”
Right into the 18th century the science of medicine had to hold her own against ecclesiastic encroachments, and
was to some extent still encumbered by theological prejudice. A witty doctor, Christian Diderich, was impelled to
make the following statement as late as 1710: “An honest medical man can as little be an atheist as an angel can
be a devil, as both in his studies as in his practice he has the great works of God before his eyes. But as a medical
man he leaves this side to those by whom the Holy Ghost pronounces a judgment against the mockers of
ecclesiastic teachers with the words: If any man rely on having Christ, let him think with himself that as he has
Christ we too have Christ. As, on the other hand, no sensible theologian converts his church into an apothecary
where may be obtained theriac, electuria, panacea, ointments, Balsam sulphuris, clyster and the like.”[94]
The plague priests were forbidden to enter the churches and to avoid unexpected encounters with them
they, as well as the surgeons, corpsebearers, and nurses, were instructed not to walk along the houses, but in the
middle of the street and to carry a bell.
Similar instructions are to be found in the 16th century in all countries. Thus in Vienna corpse bearers and
nurses were marked with a white cross and provided with a peculiar pipe, so that they might warn all advancing
towards them. White crosses were attached to plagues houses in Thorn in 1579, and all who came from a stricken
house were made to carry white wands. In London all infected houses were marked by a red cross, “which was
one foot in length and attached in the middle of the door, so that it could be distinctly seen’ right above the cross
the words “Lord be merciful to us” were to be inscribed. In Berlin in 1576, 1584 and 1589 whole streets were
closed by iron chains, and municipal servants kept guard at the exits to prevent those infected or suspicious from
coming out, but to provide them with necessities.[95]
An author gives a humorous turn to the punitive theory in 1640: “That we may know this and how it all
comes to pass I will relate you a parable. An innkeeper has in his house undesirable guests and would fain be rid of
them, but does not know how to set about it decently; he tries to drive them out by stench and foul odours –he
could find no other means; he takes, leather, horns, hoofs, claws, woolen cloth, feathers, asafetida, and evil
smelling things, and makes a heap of them and sets it alight. The smoke rises and smells horrible, the guests bid
him farewell, etc. Thus also God behaves in Nature when he wishes to punish sinful men; he makes a pungent
smell that is, the poisoned air. What ingredients does he take? These are first his poisonous stars, the baneful
aspects and planets, etc. God has quick postal messengers. He can transmit his messages with speed, for thus you
have deserved it. He is omnipotent; for a small draught proved so strong, as is reported by the historians, in
Seleucia when the men at arms of Emperor Antoniusa wished to break open a shrine in the church of Apolonis,
believing that they would find money in it, but they only found a whirlwind, a stench, which filled all Greece with
pestilence and subsequently passed to Rome and all Europe. How quickly God can prepare such a whirlwind and
make his angels blow it forth into all countries, can be read in the Apocalypse in all parts.”[96]
According to Martin Luther it is the devil whom God uses as executioner in such cases: “Thus he punishes
us by the Devil, who is always our enemy, and, if God did not prevent him, would destroy us all in a moment. Like
a dog he is fastened with a chain, so that he may do us no harm unless we wantonly go to him of our own accord,
till God on account of our sins releases him from his chain so that he may run up and down and bite whomsoever
he may encounter.’ The sin on account of which God is said to have inflicted the plague on man would appear to
us to day in some respects very trivial. Thus the Spanish clergy attribute the outbreak of the plague to the opera,
the English bishops in the year 1563 to the theatre. Particularly the long pointed shoes which had just come into
fashion at the time of the Black Death were supposed to have caused special annoyance to God. The heavily
visited inhabitants of Frammerbach in the Spessart in 1607 still believed that they could appease God by a vow

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that all women on Sundays and holidays should only wear black blouses and black skirts, and the men only grey
clothes. In France an epidemic of plague was explained by the 3 sons of King Philip “having married in prohibited
degrees of relationship, on which account they had no luck, for all their 3 wives proved faithless to them. Sins of
this kind are frequently the cause of why God punishes a whole country.”[97]
A witness of the Black Death at Siena, Donato Dineri, gives in a few lines a graphic description of the
corruption which prevailed among the clergy, particularly among the monks. “The friars of the Order of St.
Augustine at St. Antonio stabbed their provinicial head. A young lay brother from Camporeggi slew another
brother of the monastery, the son of Carlo Montamini; yea, at Assise the Minor Friars fought with knives so that 14
of them were killed, and the Friars della Rocca di Siena did away with six of their companions. In Certosa also
unrest broke out, so that the head of the Order was obliged to transfer many monks to other monasteries. Things
had come to such a pass that all monks lived in disunity and strife. In Siena there was no truth or honesty to be
found among men, even the honesty of the nobility was not to be relied on. Thus the whole world was shrouded
in darkness.
Concerning the behavior of the priests during the great plague of 1348 very various reports have been
preserved. In Italy the clergy were seized by the general terror of death, and everywhere thousands perished
without the comfort of the Holy Sacraments. Thus Pompejo Pellini relates in his history of Perugia that no friar or
priest was to be found to hear confession and to converse with the sick, and no one to accompany from to the
grave. In France, and particularly in Germany, the priest were much more devoted. In order to avoid infection,
however, the host was offered at the end of a pole or small staff with a ferule, or in a long handled spoon. It was
not permitted to offer it if the tongue of the dying man was dry or his throat was swollen, or in cases of constant
coughing, hiccoughing, and vomiting. The extreme unction was not to be given to the infected. If this was done,
however, cottonwool, was dipped into the consecrated oil, and this was fastened to a rod or staff and inserted
through a hole in the door (the plague hole), and the face of the patient touched with it if it could be reached.
An example of striking fearlessness and priestly devotion to duty is registered by St. Charles in his book
“Memoriale al suo Diletto Populo” (Recollections of His Beloved People): “One night a man infected by the plague
had been laid together with the corpses of others who had died of the disease and driven to the cemetery near the
plague hospital of St. George was passing with the Holy Sacrament of the altar on his way to some dying plague
patients, and the miserable man crawling about among the corpses caught sight of him, he raised himself as far as
he could upon his knees amongst the corpses in the ardent desire, if any way possible, to receive the celestial food.
He applied to the priest and addressed him in a most beseeching and touching voice, saying, ‘O father, for the sake
of God give me the Most Holy Sacrament.’ Beyond these words, which were sufficient to prove how ardently he
desired to comfort his soul with the angelic food, he was, on account of his weakness, incapable of saying
anything. The love and devotion of the priest was so great that without hesitation he approached him to comfort
him and grant him his request. And when he now with great devotion and respect had received the most holy and
consecrated bread he lay down in the same place among the dead and expired immediately.”
Of Tauler it is also related that he distinguished himself by great intrepidity. It is said that at Strasburg at
the time of a great plague epidemic in the years 1349 and 1350 he administered the Sacrament to all who desired
it. Extraordinarily good work was done by the curious pious fraternities which were founded for tending the sick
and burying the dead. In the year 1180 the fraternity of St. Eligius, one of the apostles of Flanders, was founded.
It flourished particularly in Normandy. It is related that the Brothers of the Order carried plague corpses in their
arms to burial. 400 of them remained free from infection. “When they had completed this task they returned
unharmed to their families.” Fearless and indefatigable were also the Poor Friars, whose Order was founded by a
certain Tobias on the middle course of the Rhine in the middle of the 14th century. In a bull of Eugnen IV (1431)

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they are described by the name of Cellites which has now become usual, Cella being equivalent for grace or as
Burying Friars. In the year 1348 Bernhard Tolomail, the founder of the congregation of the Most Holy Virgin of
Monte Olievto, met with death while nursing the sick of the plague. In the same manner Gerhard Groote, founder
of the community called Brethren of the Common Life or Friar Lords, died of the plague on August 20, 1384, a
victim of his active love of humanity. Groote was one of the favourite disciples of J. van Rueysbruek. On June 21,
1591, Aloysius of Gonzaga succumbed to the infection in Rome after having tended and comforted innumerable
sufferers. He was canonized by the Chruch. In Vienna the fraternity of St. Sebastian was founded to combat the
plague. They preserved in the Scottish Church among their relics one of the original arrows which were drawn
from the corpse of the martyr St. Sebastian. On the saint’s day silver arrows, after having been touched by the
original arrow, and a particle of the bone of the arm was offered to be kissed. All this as a preservative against
infection.
During the plague at Marseilles the Capucins and Jesuits distinguished themselves; they hastened from all
quarters of the world to place themselves at the service of those attacked by the plague. At that time members of
these Orders were to be seen in the streets of Marseilles who had hardly recovered from the disease, and still
covered with plague boils dragged themselves along on their sticks to hear the confessions of the dying.
Prayers and vows were the 2 main spiritual means by which the Church endeavoured to combat the
plague. As in ancient times, on the outbreak of epidemics statues and altars were raised to the gods, now
churches, and costly pillars were erected in the honour of the Holy Trinity, the Divine Virgin Mary, and various
saints; at Vienna to the Holy Trinity, at Venice to the Divine Virgin, the liberator, at Milan to St. Sebastian was
regarded as the patron saint of the plague, when during a great outbreak in Rome someone had revelation that
the plague would not yield till in the church of St. Peter an altar was erected in Honour of St. Sebastian. So soon as
this was done the plague ceased. That supplication to St. Sebastian was followed by a subsidence of the plague is
frequently confirmed in later times. [98]
Extraordinary comfort was provided for suffering humanity by the absolution granted by the various popes
during times of the plague. Clement VI (1291 1352) promised extensive indulgences, and in the 3rd year of his
reign had a bull issued in which he granted complete absolution from all sins to all who should die on a journey to
Rome, where in 1350 a Holy Year was being celebrated, and in addition ordered the angels of heaven to bear their
souls straight to Paradise as he had absolved them from purgatory. The concourse to the Holy Year was immense.
At Easter 1,200,000 people were counted, and again at Whitsuntide a million from all parts of Europe, who visited
the churches of Rome for prayer and penance, and, chanting psalms, filled the high roads of Italy. The offerings
made by the pilgrims amounted for the pope alone to 17 million fiorini for a single year. A wit of the times
remarked: “God does not desire the death of the sinner but that he should live and pay.” But death also had his
jubilee at Rome, and worked such havoc that of a thousand people hardly every tenth is said to have returned
home. Clement VI, who at that time was at Avignon, which he had just purchased for 80,000 gold guilders from
Joan of Naples, observed at the advice of his physician in ordinary, Guy de chauliac, who had immediately
recognized the plague as an infectious disease, the greatest caution. For the whole duration of the epidemic he
remained constantly in one particular apartment between 2 huge fires, isolated from everyone, admission to his
presence being strictly prohibited. On his finger he wore as a protection against the plague an emerald which was
said to have produced marvelous effects. Turned towards the south it minimized the virulence of the poison,
turned to the east it reduced the possibility of infection.[99]
It has already been mentioned that in times of plague great riches accrued to the Church. In the 14th
century so much was given in the fear of death for the erection of altars, for bells and mases, that the Senate of
Augsburg was obliged to take steps to secure some pittance for the rightful heirs. Koenigshoven, in his Strasbourg

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chronicle of 1381, remarks: “Though this epidemic all the churches of Strasbourg became so rich that the old
churches of St.Nicholas and St. Peter were pulled down and new roomy churches were erected.” When in 1347 the
plague was raging at Luebuck the confusion was so great that the citizens, as if deprived of their senses, took leave
of life and willingly renounced all earthly possession. They bore their treasures to the monasteries and churches to
lay them on the steps of the altars. But for the monks the money had no attraction, for it brought death. They
closed their gates, but the people threw their money over the walls of monasteries; they would brook no
impediment in their last pious work, to which they were urged by mute despair. [100]
Guy de Chauliac, considers the influence of the conjunction, which was held to be all potent, as the chief
general cause of the Black Plague; the diseased state of bodies, the corruption of the fluids, debility, obstruction,
and so forth, as the especial subordinate causes. By these, according to his opinion, the quality of the air, and of
the other elements, was so altered, that they set poisonous fluids in motion towards the inward parts of the body,
in the same manner as the magnet attracts iron; whence there arose in the commencement fever and the spitting
of blood; afterwards, however, a deposition in the form of glandular swellings and inflammatory boils. Herein the
notion of an epidemic constitution was set forth, clearly conformably, to the spirit of the age. Of contagion, Guy
de Chauliac was completely convinced. He sought to protect himself against it by the usual means; and it was
probably he who advised Pope Clement VI to shut himself up while the plague lasted. The preservation of this
popes life, however, was most beneficial to the city of Avignon, for he loaded the poor with judicious acts of
kindness, took care to have proper attendants provided, and paid physicians himself to afford assistance wherever
human aid could avail; an advantage which, perhaps, no other city enjoyed. Nor was the treatment of plague
patients in Avignon by any means objectionable; for, after the usual depletions by bleeding and aperients, where
circumstances required them, they endeavored to bring the buboes to suppuration; they made incisions into the
inflammatory boils, or burned them with a red hot iron, a practice which at all times proves salutary, and in the
Black Plague saved many lives. In this city the Jews, who lived in a state of the greatest filth, were most severely
visited, as also the Spaniards, whom Chalin accuses of great intemperance.[101]
Christianity was the matrix of medieval life: Even cooking instructions called for boiling an egg “during the
length of time wherein you can say a Miserere.” It governed birth, marriage, and death, sex, and eating, made the
rules for law and medicine, gave philosophy and scholarship their subject matter. Membership in the Church was
not a matter of choice; it was compulsory and without alternative, which gave it a hold not easy to dislodge.
In daily life the Church was comforter, protector, physician. The Virgin and patron saints gave succor in
trouble and protection against the evils and enemies that lurked along every mans path. Craft guilds, towns, and
functions had patron saints, as did individuals. Archers and crossbowmen had St. Sebastian, martyr of the arrows;
bakers had St. Honore, whose banner bore an oven shovel argent and three loaves gules; sailors had St. Nicholas
with the three children he saved from the sea; travelers had St. Christopher carrying the infant Jesus on his
shoulder; charitable brotherhoods usually chose St. Martin, who gave half his cloak to the poor man; unmarried
girls had St. Catherine, supposed to have been very beautiful. The patron saint was an extra companion through
life who healed hurts, soothed distress, and in extremity could make miracles. His image was carried on banners in
processions, sculpted over the entrance to town halls and chapels, and worn as a medallion on an individuals
hat.[102]
That conflict between the reach for the divine and the lure of earthly things was to be the central problem
of the Middle Ages. The Claim of the Church to Spiritual leadership could never be made wholly credible to all its
communicants when it was founded in material wealth. The more riches the Church amassed, the more visible
and disturbing became the flaw; nor could it ever be resolved, but continued to renew doubt and dissent in every
country. [103]

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 The Church, not the government, sponsored the care of society’s helpless the indigent and sick, orphan
and cripple, the leper, the blind, the idiot by indoctrinating the laity in the belief that alms bought them merit and
a foothold in Heaven.
A Christian duty of particular merit was the donation of dowries to enable poor girls to marry, as in the
case of a Gascon seigneur of the 14th century who left 100 livres to “those whom I deflowered, if they can be
found.”
The Garden of Eden too had an earthly existence which often appeared on maps, located far to the east,
where it was believed cut off from the rest of the world by a great mountain or ocean barrier or fiery wall. In the
earthly Paradise grow every kind of tree and flowers of surpassing colors and a thousand scents which never fade
and have healing qualities. Birds’ songs harmonize with the rustling of forest leaves and the rippling of streams
flowing over jeweled rocks or over sands brighter than silver. A palace with columns of crystal and jasper shed
marvelous light. No wind or rain, heat or cold mars Paradise; no sickness, decay, death, or sorrow enters there.
The mountain peak on which it is situated is so high it touches the sphere of the moon but here the scientific mind
intervened: that would be impossible, pronounced the 14th century author of Polychronicon, because it would
cause an eclipse.
For all the explanations, the earth and its phenomena were full of mysteries: What happens to fire when it
goes out? Why are there different colors of skin among men? Why do the sun’s rays darken a man’s skin but
bleach white linen? How can the earth, which is weighty, be suspended in the air? How do souls make their way
to the next world? Where lies the soul? What causes madness? Medieval people felt surrounded by puzzles, yet
because God was there they were willing to acknowledge that causes are hidden, that man cannot know why all
things are as they are; “they are as God pleases.”
That did not silence the one unending question: Why does God allow evil, illness, and poverty? Why did
He not make man incapable of sin? Why did He not assure him of paradise? The answer, never wholly satisfying,
was that God owes the Devil his scope. According to St. Augustine, the fount of authority, all men were under the
Devils power by virtue of original sin; hence the necessity of the Church and salvation.
Questions of human behavior found answers in the book of Sidrach, supposedly a descendant of Noah to
whom God gave the gift of universal knowledge, eventually compiled into a book by several masters of Toledo.
What language does a dear mute hear in his hear? Answer: that of Adam, namely Hebrew. Which is worst:
murder, robbery, or assault? None of these; sodomy is the worst. Will wars ever end? Never, until the earth
becomes Paradise. The origin of war according to its 14th century codifier Honore Bonet, lay in Lucifers war against
God, “hence it is no great marvel if in this world there arise wars and battle since these existed in the first in
heaven.”[104]
Christianity in its ideas was never the art of the possible. It embraced Augustin’s principle that God and
Nature had put delight in copulation “to impel man to act,” for preservation of the species and the greater worship
of God. Using copulation for the delight that is in it and not for the end intended by nature was, Augustine ruled, a
sin against nature and therefore against God, the ordainer of nature. Celibacy and virginity remained preferred
states because they allowed total love of God, “the spouse of the soul.”[105]
In church, nobles often left the moment mass was over, “scarcely saying a Paternoster within the Church
walls.” Others more devout carried portable altars when they traveled and contributed alms set by their
confessors for penance, although the alms amounted on the whole to far less than they spent on clothes of the
hunt. Devout or not, all owned and carried Books of Hours, the characteristic fashionable religious possession of
the 14th century noble. Made to order with personal prayers inserted among the days devotions and penitential
psalms, the books were marvelously illustrated, and not only with Bible stories and saints’ lives. In the margins

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brimming with burlesque, all the comic sense, fantasy, and satire of the Middle Ages let itself go. Buffoons and
devils curl and twist through flowering vines, rabbits fight with soldiers, trained dogs show their tricks, sacred texts
trail off into long tailed fantastical creatures, bare bottomed monks climb , tonsured heads appear on dragons’
bodies. Goat footed priests, monkeys, minstrels, flowers, birds, castles, lusting demons, and imaginary beasts
twine through the pages in bizarre companionship with the sanctity of prayer.
Even so, communion and confession, which were supposed to be observed every Sunday and holy day,
were on the average practiced hardly more than the obligatory once a year at Easter. A simple knight, on being
asked why he went not to mass, so important for the salvation of his soul, replied, “This I knew not; nay, I thought
that the priests performed their mass for the offerings’ sake.” For northern France it has been estimated that
about 10 percent of the population were devout observers, 10 percent negligent, and the rest wavered between
regular and irregular observance.
At the moment of death, however, people took no chances: they confessed, made restitutions, endowed
perpetual prayers for their souls, and often deprived their families by bequests to shrines chapels, convents,
hermits, and payments for pilgrimages by proxy. [106]
Pessimism was a normal tone of the Middle Ages, because man was understood to be born doomed and
requiring salvation,l but it became more pervasive, and speculation about the coming of Anti Christ more intense,
in the second half of the century. Speculatores or scouts existed, it was believed, who watched for signs that
would tell of the coming of “last things.” The end was awaited both in dread and in hope, for Anti Christ would
finally be defeated at Armageddon, ushering in the reign of Christ in the new age.[107]
While devotion to the Virgin could still arouse such feeling, disbelief and irreverence were common at the
end of the 14th century, if the complaints of clerics and preachers reflect the true case. Scolding the laity was the
clerics normal occupation, but now the volume was rising. Many folk “believe in naught higher than the roof of
their house,” lamented the future saint Bernadino of Siena. His fellow monk Walsingham reported that certain
barons of England believe “that there is no God, and deny the sacrament of the altar and resurrection after death,
and consider that as is the death of a beast of burden, so is the end of man himself.” Alongside evidence of failing
faith may be put the unfailing succession of wills and bequests to shrines, chapels, convents, hermits, and sums for
prayers and for pilgrimages by proxy. Few who professed disbelief during life took chances when they neared the
end.
The too frequent use of excommunication for failure to take communion or keep feast days, so deplored
by Gerson and other reformers, was measure of the falling off of religious observance. Churches were empty and
mass meagerly attended, wrote Nicolas de Clamanges in his great tract De Ruina et Reparatione Ecclesiae (The
Ruin and Reform of the Church). The young, according to him, rarely went to church except on feast days and then
only to see the painted faces, decollete gowns of the ladies and the spectacle of their headdresses, “immense
towers with horns hung with pearls.” People kept vigils in church not with prayer but with lascivious songs and
dances, while the priests shot dice as they watched. Gerson deplored the same laxity: men left church in the midst
of services to have a drink and “when they hear the bell announcing consecration, they rush back into the church
like bulls.” Card playing, swearing, and blasphemy, he wrote, occurred during the most sacred festivals, and
obscene pictures were hawked in church, corrupting the young. Pilgrimages were the occasion for debauchery,
adultery, and profane pleasures.[108]
The scene of the last judgement was expected to be at Jerusalem. In the year 999, the number of pilgrims
proceeding eastward, to await the coming of the Lord in that city, was so great that they were compared to a
desolating army. Most of them sold their goods and possessions before they quitted Europe, and lived upon the
proceeds in the Holy Land. Buildings of every sort were suffered to fall into ruins. It was thought useless to repair

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them, when the end of the world was so near. Many noble edifices were deliberately pulled down. Even churches,
usually so well maintained, shared the general neglect. Knights, citizens, and serfs, travelled eastwards in
company, taking with them their wives and children, singing psalms as they went, and looking with fearful eyes
upon the sky, which they expected each minute to open, to let the Son of God descend in his glory.[109]
720: One thing about the Church and the plague that is not mentioned in to many places is the financial gain.
From the deaths of many people they claimed the possessions that were left over. These possessions were divided
up amongst the church and the state, especially the case if they received the sacraments and confessions before
death. You have to understand that the Pope replaced the Emperors of Rome. There were many wars and
crusades that occurred that allowed, the church to get vastly rich. The church pretty much kept its nose out of the
plague literally. The distribution and sale of relics and other holy charms was large. With the church having the
understanding that they could not stop such pestilence, they kept a distance. The stories that are attributed to
saints curing the plague are stories for the imagination. We wont be able to prove them now. If a plague were to
happen today, the church would say go to the hospital and that would probably be the response in all religions.
No miracles would occur as most likely they didn’t occur then. But, to muster up the highest level of hope energy
that one will survive in essence will make you survive. These stories are just that an engine of hope, your belief in
them is the gasoline that makes the engine work.

The Church’s Views on Sex

St. Augustine, as early as the late 4th century, established the notion that during sexual intercourse “there
is an almost total extinction of mental alertness; the intellectual sentries…are overwhelmed.* If sexual intercourse
banished reason, and if reason were the defining quality of humans, sexual intercourse was bestial and threatened
one’s humanity. Even Clement, the apologist for moderate Christian sexuality, said that Adam and Eve had rushed
into intercourse “like irrational animals.” The irrational passion implicit in the act of intercourse led Thomas
Aquinas to say that “in sexual intercourse man becomes like a brute animal” and that insofar as people cannot
“moderate concupiscence” with reason, they are like beasts.
This idea, of course, derives from the belief that lust is the opposite of reason, so as animals lacked reason,
they expressed more lust. In general, they characterized lust as that which was uncontrolled (including other
manifestations of lack of control such as noise, lack of moderation, etc.). Augustine accepted animals as inherently
lustful, so much so that he believed lust was not evil in an animal because it was “natural.” His point was that
reason was “natural” for people, and thus lust was “unnatural”; in animals, the reverse was true. Augustines
association of lust with animal passion might be best seen in his discussions of human erections. He believed
human lust was expressed most readily and visibly in men’s erections, which he called “bestial movements,”
because erections were not controlled by the human mind and thus had more in common with animal
passions.[110]
Dorsal intercourse (facing towards the back) not only was seen as being too much like animal behavior to
be appropriate for Christian intercourse but was thought to generate increase lust, which was also bestial. Thus, it
was doubly dangerous. With few exceptions (to allow for obesity, for example), the only appropriate position for
human intercourse was reclining face to face (the “missionary position”).
The Midrash states that all animals “copulate face to back, save 3 who copulate face to face humans,
serpents, and fish, and they copulate face to face because at some point God spoke directly to them.*Humans may
seem to be in rather peculiar company in this analysis, but the significant element is that face to face intercourse
was seen to mirror a conversation with God. Serpents and fish, the, were engaging in human style, indeed almost

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sanctified, intercourse by face to face copulation. The rest of the animals in this tradition were left with purely
bestial positions.
Thus, hyenas were considered sexually strange because people believed with classical authors that hyenas
changed their gender, showing a disconcerting blurring of gender lines.** This gender confusion caused some
Christian thinkers to believe that hyenas had a special orifice for homosexual encounters.[111]
Physiologus explained that female weasels were impregnated through oral intercourse and gave birth
through their ears.* Hares were seen as exceedingly promiscuous, but were also associated with anal intercourse.
As early as circa 100, Barnabas wrote against eating hares because one might then become a “corrupter of young
boys”. Throughout the Middle Ages, people recounted the story that owing to their peculiar sexual inclinations,
hares grew a new anus each year, so that, according to Clement and others, “he has the same number of openings
as the number of years he has lived.
Goats, too, were considered particularly promiscuous and hermaphroditic. The sexual reputation of goats
extended well into the modern era when, in the 16th century, armies took thousands of goats to accompany the
army, to serve the men’s sexual needs.*** Even birds were not exempt from attribution of “bestial” sexuality.
Thomas Aquinas, argued that homosexual intercourse was unnatural because animals did not practice it. Gilles de
Corbeil, physician to the king of France in the late 12th century, wrote: “The most ferocious beasts are better than
man because they have intercourse and reproduce according to what is their natural function Aquinas continued
this argument, saying that humans who engaged in homosexual practices were “unnatural” because heterosexual
union was the “natural” practice among animals.[112]
In reflecting upon becoming what one eats, Aquinas and the 13th century scholastics wrestled with the
question of the degree to which one’s very flesh became the animal flesh that one ate. The preoccupation led
Aquinas to address a question that sounds most peculiar to modern eats; if semen were made from excess food,
that is, the “flesh of cows, pigs and such like, “ why was not the “man begotten of such semen…more akin to the
cow and the pig, than to his father or other relative?” His answer, that the human form imposes its likeness on the
animal matter,*is perhaps less interesting than the original question, which recognizes a disconcerting ambiguity in
the strict lines that were supposed to separate humans from the animals they ate.[113]
Theologians recognized only one “natural position for intercourse. The others were “unnatural” because
they modeled man on the animal , because they inverted the nature of male and female, or because they were
suspected of preventing conception and therefore contrary to the nature of marriage.[114]
One sin which most priests had to deal with regularly was seminal emission, which attracted only 7 days
fasting if it was involuntary; 20 days if manually assisted. Even a monk who masturbated in church was liable to no
more than a 30 day fast, and a bishop to 50. The fact that this was a solitary practice made all the difference. The
Church’s view of coitus interruptus, essentially a shared version was a great deal more stringent.
The major sex sin was contraception. A modern American scholar who has studied 20 surviving
penitentials dating from the 6th to 9th centuries found that all but one considered it very grave indeed, especially if
it involved “poisons creating sterility,’ anal intercourse, or oral intercourse (seminnem in ore, “semen in the
mouth’). These were almost culpable as homicide and attracted penances ranging from three to 15 years. It
appears that “a poor little woman” who “acted on account of the difficulty of feeding” extra mouths was likely to
receive lesser penances, whereas one who “acted to conceal a crime of fornication” would rate the greater A
similar distinction was presumably drawn in the case of coitus interruptus, which rated two to ten years. The long
term penances usually seem to have consisted of fasting in one form or another abstaining from food and drink
(with the exception of bread and water), or from sex, or from anything that could be interpreted as self
indulgence. An alternative that came in during the eleventh century was self flagellation (for monks) or, for the

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laity, whipping by the parish priest, while there was another category that entailed the singing of penitential
psalms. A man who, however involuntarily, experienced nocturnal emissions, was expected to rise at once and
intone 7 psalms, followed by another 30 in the morning.
Abortion within 40 days of conception (before the fetus had acquired its human soul) was fractionally less
sinful thn contraception, possible because abortion so often carried its own pains and penalties. As St. Jerome
pointed out with unsaintly venom, promiscuous women who took potions in order to bring about an abortion
sometimes died as a result and went to hell as ”threefold murderesses: as suicides, as adulteresses to their
heavenly bridegroom Christ, and as murderesses of their still unborn child.
“If a layman corrupts a virgin devoted to God and loses his reputation and if he has a child of her, let this
man do penance for three years….If however, there is no child, but nevertheless he corrupts the virgin, he shall do
penance for one year.’ In fact, a man who indulged in rape or seduction was virtually recommended to practice
some form of contraception (and to keep quiet about it in the confessional).[115]
Medieval texts frequently make reference to “the sin against nature,” which is sometimes used
interchangeably with “sodomy.” The personification of Nature in Alain of Lille’s Plaint of Nature objects to the
practice of this sin. “Many other youths, too, clothed by my favour in grace and beauty, intoxicated with thirst for
money, converted Venus’ hammers to the function of anvils.” But if we look more closely at what medieval writers
meant by nature of the natural, we find a good deal of conflict. Natural is what animals do for the purpose of
reproduction, according to medieval authors and yet for humans to have sex in a rear entry position, the way
animals do, was considered unnatural. William Peraldus (1190 1271), a moral writer much quoted and translated
throughout the Middle Ages, distinguished between two kings of sins against nature: that which is “against nature
in terms of the manner,” when the woman is on top or some other unusual position is used for heterosexual
vaginal intercourse, or “against nature in terms of the substance, when someone obtains or consents that semen
be spilled elsewhere that in the place deputed by nature.” In effect “natural” was being used as a stand in for
what a later age would call “normal”.
Thomas Aquinas thought everything has a purpose for which God created it, and its nature is to fulfill that
purpose. Human nature, divinely implanted, is to be rational, and any sexual act that defies rationality (which for
Aquinas tends to mean any act that is not procreative) is unnatural, For others, “doing what comes naturally”
means following the dictates of ones body, as opposed to the artificial conventions of society. Nothing could be
farther from a medieval view in which there existed a natural law, far stricter than social convention. “Nature,”
then, is also a socially constructed concept, and the nature that medieval people recognized is not the same as
what we recognize. We must keep this in mind in following their discussions of the natural and the
unnatural.[116]
The Roman tradition of forming a legal union with another male by declaring a "brother" persisted during
the early Medieval years. Also, though there was no official marriage within religious communities, long lasting
relationships or bonds were made. Also, there are many poems from that century that suggest the existence of
lesbian relationships. Even in areas where homosexual relationships were not recognized, through the end of the
twelfth century there was a strong tradition in Christian beliefs that viewed and judged homosexuality and
heterosexuality by the same standards.[117]
Throughout the 13th century, in fact, teachers gradually incorporated what they could of the innovators’
thought into the traditional teaching of the Church. In increasing measure, according to Goerges Duby, the new
school offered man happiness. Two major works crowned this long effort, Thomas Aquinas’ Summa theological
and the second part of the Roman de la Rose. Jean de Meun tendered a passionate invitation to his readers to
obey Nature unreservedly. As for St. Thomas, he denounced ‘all who fail to remember that they are men’ and all

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who , like the heretics, refused to believe in the natural union of body and soul. He also recalled that the inner life
does not develop in isolation from things, and that humanity inscribes its laws into the order of Nature.
The principal corollaries of this dual teaching were that henceforth:
1. Theologians and canonists drew a cleare distinction between spiritual sins and carnal sings. The
spiritual were judged more severly that then carnal, since they lodged in the mind, not in
concupiscence, and they were a graver offence to God;
2. The defenders of orthodoxy admitted that it is difficult indeed to resist powerful natural
impulses. The ‘naturalists’ forbade all resistance. Both groups agreed,, however, in condemning
unconditionally unnatural acts, which were denounced with increasing urgency in treatises and
sermons. This tendency resulted in a lessened emphasis on sins qualified as natural;
3. The re evaluation of nature, and hence of the flesh, led to a relative devaluation of chastity: the
‘naturalists’ considered chastity as hypocrisy; St Thomas judged it a shard responsibility, for ‘each
accomplishes his mission for the safeguard of all’, Hence, even though Thomas placed chaste on a
higher plane of virtue, he reduced the distance that had been established between the abstinent
and the rest of mankind.
This ‘readjustment’ was of course tied, in the theologians’ minds, to the triumph of sacramental marriage.
Where Jean de Meun states that man’s ‘natural labour’ and his appetite for pleasure were justified by the fruit of
the union, even outside all marriage bonds, St. Thomas and his disciples insisted that it was within the framework
of marriage, and hence within the limits of a sexuality under the control of the faithful, ritualized by the laws, and
sacralized by its intentions, that the act of the flesh was rehabilitated.[118]
That the Church was never blind to the sexual needs of husbands and wives is indicated by its first gingerly
pronouncements about the “marital debt” mutually owed by spouses. Sex as a subject for consideration was even
more important to the Church than to the laity, who regarded it more casually. From the Penitentials it is clear that
the Church held a narrow view of bedroom propriety, and was doubly opposed to practices that had a
contraceptive significance.”[119]
Already we can suggest, albeit abstractly, that the prostitute represeneted manhood because she
represented male sex rights in women, because with her all men could enact their masculinity. That this was a
manhood limited to Christians is clear, especially when Christian prostitutes were involved. But I would like to
claim that the prostitute embodied the Christian community of men in an even more powerful way: that the
overlap between her role as receptacle of communal Christian male lust, on the one hand, and medieval theories
about the physical and spiritual bonds created by intercourse, on the other, transformed the prostitute into a
concrete representation of a community of men united to each other by a common sexual bond. In the case of the
14th century Crown, this was a community delimited in terms of religious identity. All Christian males could, in the
words of St. Paul, “become one body” with a Chrisitan prostitute, but through her (and this St. Paul did not say)
they also became one with each other.
To see how this might be so we need only glance at the complex networks of affinity medieval people, or
at least medieval theologians, believed were created by sexual intercourse. When a man ejaculated inside a
woman’s vagina, there was established between the 2 a bond of consanguinity similar to that with a blood relation
of a godparent. The 2 were enmeshed not only with each other, but within each others kinship networks as well,
establishing incest taboos between themselves and their partners relations as powerful as those created by
biological affinity. Pope Celestine III could even rule that if a couple fornicated before marriage, the exchange
created an incest barrier between them, a canonical impediment to their subsequent marriage. The mechanisms
of this bonding were often expressed in terms of the exchange of blood. In the words of a canonist, “unity of

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flesh” was achieved whenever there was “mixing of blood.” The mechanism behind such mixing was clearly
spelled out in medieval medical theories of spermatogenesis. Sperm was “mans purest blood,” distilled
throughout the veins and arteries of the body, whipped up to a steaming white froth by male heat, then ejaculated
into the womb, where it mixed with the cooler blood of the female.
Within this system of sexual and blood relations, the prostitute, available to all and denying none, can be
thought of as the center of a circle, bount by radiating blood relations to all males with sexual rights in her.
Christian men, through their relation to the prostitute, and likewise related to each other, incorporated in her
person as a blood brotherhood of Christian males. In the synedochic language of the body so beloved of our
sources, the prostitutes skin bounded the Christian community, her orifices, when penetrated by Christians
reinforced it. Hence the danger of a miscegenation that could achieve, at least symbolically, the clandestine
admittance of the non Christian into the Christian community through the body of the prostitute. From this point
of view we can see how the prostitutes body might become the site of abjection, the place at which the “self” (i.e.,
the collective group, the Christian community) recognized and (ideally) rejected the “other,” as it did in the case of
Alicsend. [120]
The No Sex days: Restrictions that the church placed on the timing of intercourse may have contributed to a lower
birth rate in medieval Europe than in many other preindustrial populations. The liturgical calendar was full of feast
and fast days on which marital intercourse was forbidden; Sundays and sometimes other days of the week were
taboo as well. Couples were not supposed to have sex during the woman’s menstrual period, or in between the
time they made a confession and the time they received the sacrament of the Eucharist. The penitentials of the
early Middle Ages were particularly restrictive about the dates on which one could legitaimately have sexual
intercourse. Fewer than half the days in the year would have been permissible: Sundays, Wednesdays, Fridays,
many holidays, and all of Advent and Lent were days for abstention, as well as women’s periods of menstruation,
pregnancy, and lactation. It is difficult to know how seriously these strictures about the timing of marital
intercourse were taken. “Gratian’s” Decretum made observance of the holy days dependent upon the consent of
the parties, and later writers treated them as guidelines rather than absolute commands. (The Christian
prohibition of marital sexual relations on Sundays contrasts markedly with the Jewish mitzvah or commandment of
sexual relations on the Sabbath except if the wife is menstruating, stressing the contrast between these 2 religions
over the moral status of marital sex.)
Even when sex on particular days was prohibited, a violation of the prohibition might be a lesser sin than
the alternative refusal to render the marriage debt. In the Orthodox east, where the days before Easter were
considered the most holy, a Serbian story tells of the consequences of too zealous abstinence, even for a married
priest: “On Holy Saturday evening, a priest was tormented by a demon of lust. Remembering the requirement of
abstinence, his wife refused to satisfy his urges. As a result, the priest went out to a barn and sought release with
a cow. The next day, during the easter mass, flocks of birds attacked the church. The priest ordered that the doors
and windows be barred against the onslaught, and tearfully confessed his sin before the congregation. The priest
and the congregants then opened the door and were allowed to leave unharmed. When the priests wife went out,
however, the birds descended upon her and tore her to pieces. Clearly she was seen as responsible for her
husband’s sin, because she had driven him to it. This story illustrates not only the expectations about sexual
relations within a marriage but also the idea of masculine lust as a powerful force that could not be denied but
must be satisfied one way or another.
Sex in the Church: Warnings about the consequences of marital intercourse at the wrong time were not nearly as
pervasive as warning about the consequences of intercourse in the wrong place, notably in churches. The story of
a couple who had sex in a church and became stuck together “like dogs,” to the amazement and derision of the

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congregation who found them there the next day, was widely retold. It is hard to know to what extent this story
represents an actual concern, or whether it should be taken more metaphorically. Certainly it would have been
difficult, in a medieval village, for a couple to find a place for an illicit liaison. The church, safe, dry and deserted
for much of the day, might have been the medieval equivalent of the back seat of a car. But the story often
involves a married couple. Even a married couple might conceivably seek out the quiet and privacy of a church.
Medieval houses were small and married couples, except at the highest level of society, did not have small and
married couples, except at the highest level of society, did not have their own bedrooms. The story may be more
symbolic of the division between clergy and laity, between sacred and profane, than literal, but it may also reflect
a real issue for medieval people.
The idea that sexual intercourse somehow polluted a place was also a basis for the custom of churching of
women. Women who had given birth were not permitted to enter a church until 40 days had passed, and they had
to undergo a particular ritual. For a culture that made reproduction the basis of marriage it seems strange that it
would have been seen as at the same time polluting, but the very conflicted relation between the medieval church
and the flesh made this contradiction possible. The custom may have had its roots in the Jewish custom of ritual
purification after childbirth, which the Virgin Mary was thought to have undergone. In the Middle Ages its was
interpreted as a service of thanksgiving for a safe deliviery, and some scholars have argued that it honored women
and gave them a symbolically central place.[121]
Sex Crime: Like usury, sex defied doctrinal certitude, except for the agreed upon principle that any sexual
practices contrary to the arrangements and ends “ordained by nature” was sinful. The covering term was sodomy,
which meant not only homosexuality but any use, with the same or opposite sex, of the “unfit” orifice or the
“unfit” position, or spilling the seed according to the sin of Onan, or auto erotic emission, or intercourse with
beasts. All were sodomy, which, by perverting nature, was rebellion against God and therefore counted as the
“worst of sins” in the category of lechery.[122]
Whoever fornicates with an effeminate male or with another man or with an animal must fast for 10 years.
Elsewhere it says that whoever fornicates with an animal must fast 15 years and sodomites must fast for 7 years….
If he defiles himself (masturbates), he is to abstain from meat for four days. He who desires to fornicate
(with) himself (i.e., to masturbate) and is not able to do so, he must fast for 40 days or 20 days. If he is a boy and
does it often, either he is to fast 20 days or one is to whip him….
Whoever ejaculates seed into the mouth, that is the worst evil. From someone it was judged that they
repent this up to the end of their lives.
While it was permitted to have sex with your spouse, only one type of position – the Missionary – was
allowed, on the basis that this provided the least pleasure for the couple.
Penitentials gradually fell out of favour during the Middle Ages, and were rarely produced after the twelfth
century.[123]
Thomas Aquinas makes the memorable and terrible statement that ‘the victim of forcible seduction, if she
is not wed by the seducer, will find it more difficult to marry. She may be led to give herself to debauchery, from
which her modesty, intact up to then, had kept her.’ These women tricked into providing momentary pleasure and
mocked by all the males about provided pitiful figures for bawdy tales. In the 13th and 14th centuries, secular and
ecclesiastical morality seemed in total agreement on the need to punish female adultery severely, since it was held
to be a public crime. The most humiliating strictures remained on the books and were on occasion applied:
running the town and public flogging occurred in Ales, Villeneuve lez Avignon and Manosque. In salon de
Provence, those who had knowledge of a case of adultery and who failed to report it risked heavy fines.[124]

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 All the sex related crimes are enumerated here: Saignet denounces those who spill their seed on stone
and not in the earth (coitus interruptus? Masturbation?); those who make the woman used abortifacients
(submergunt); others who neither irrigate nor cultivate the seeded earth, but abandon the land to birds
(fornicators who make use of common prostitutes, the birds being the other lovers); others who neglect to harvest
or who harvest too soon (abortion) or who burn the grain (infanticide?); others who do not bother to take in the
harvest of ripe grain (who abandon the mother and child?); others who throw out the grain shaken from the stalk
(infanticide? Masturbation?); others who leave their grain in a putrid granary and thus spoil it (sodomites); others
who store their grain but fail to make flour of it, and even less, good bread (who fail to supervise the upbringing of
their offspring).[125]
Fornication: Nevertheless, the triumph of marriage as a sacrament had given the clergy an opportunity to refine
their reflections concerning fornication. This time, they distinguish categories and cases with precision. To
‘qualified fornication’ (which stood for the sin of lust consummated and included such public crimes as kidnapping
for sex, adultery, incest, and ‘crimes against nature’) canonists and theologians opposed ‘simple fornication’ – a
sin, to be sure, but severely disapproved only when unreasonably frequent. What is more, the most recent
theology regarding marriage arrived at the point where it contributed, paradoxically, to freeing ‘simple fornication’
from the maledictions that had so long beset it. It was, in fact, defined as copula soluti cum solute ex mutuo
consensus. This act, committed by 2 persons free of all ties and consenting to a transitory union, was not,
according to Thomas, of the odious nature of errors against the theological virtues. It threatened the rights of man
directly, but, since the fornicator was seeking pleasure, and not to do ill, it threatened the Supreme Legislator only
through its consequences. It is not considered criminal and it imperils only the regularity of the status of a
potential and unborn Christian. Furthermore (the good doctor had concubinage particularly in mind), its
consequences can be put right from both the moral and the material point of view.
It is in fact obvious for the theologians fornication covered a range of very different circumstances and
relationships. Until the conjugal model had been firmly established among the faithful of Christendom, moralists
could do little more than condemn fornication with great severity, since it included concubinage. Thomas says at
the outset of his argument (Ia IIae qest. 73 art. 7) that ‘fornication is the intercourse of a man with one who is not
his wife.’ With reform put into effect and concubinage curbed, ‘simple fornication’ seemed to the doctors of the
Church infinitely less dangerous, at least when it was committed by unmarried men with women who were truly
free of all ties, for otherwise the young man was exposing himself to grave sin. This is why brother Laurent,
reasoning somewhat theoretically in his Somme, teaches that carnal sin outside marriage is graver when it is
committed with ‘common women’ than with entirely free, ordinary women, ‘because such women [e.g.
prostitutes] are never married nor of the religious life and refuse neither he nor his brother, cousin, son, or father’.
This passage, which at first glance seems paradoxical, dates from a period in which the distinctive symbols
designating public prostitutes may not yet have been imposed everywhere or had been imposed without great
discernment, ‘dishonest’ women wore no coif, but such ‘debauched females’ may have included wives, itinerant
nuns, and others. What was needed was a way to recognize the real public prostitutes. One they had been set
apart, ‘simple fornication’ consisted, to repeat Thomas’s formula, in intercourse with a woman who was indeed
not ones own wife, but who was also known for certain to be common property. The theorists of organized
prostitution set up several criteria (more strictly defined by clergy than by laity) to define the woman reputed to be
‘public’. She must rent out her body for fain and not lend it for pleasure; she must be free of all bonds, hence, in
theory , must be a stranger in the city in which she plied her trade; and she must be either unmarried or widowed.
This is the reason for the high proportion of foreigners still among the ranks of public prostitutes in the 15th
century in Florence, Dijon, Avignon or Tarascon. This also explains why those who protested about the setting up

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of a house of toleration in Lyons in 1478 complain in particular that the proprietors carried out no preliminary
interview with the women. This inquiry – one of the most important tasks of the ‘abbess’ – guaranteed that the
girls admitted to the prostibulum were inded free of ties, which thus protected the clients from committing the sin
of consummated lust. It was to this same end that at the end of the 13th century the wearing of a red arm band
was imposed on public prostitutes, the only ones recognized by civic authorities. Rahab, ‘harlot of Jericho’, was
told to place a red cord at her window as a sign of allegiance (Joshua 2:18). The sign of Rahab was ambivalent: not
only did it separate the woman who wore it from the community of the pure; it also served as proof to fornicators
that the consequences of their visits to a companion of the moment would not be serious. The aiguillette thus
functioned somewhat like the prostitute’s identity card in a regulation prone France at the beginning of the
current century, but where the latter brought theoretical protection from venereal disease, the former promised
protection from ‘qualified fornication’.[126]
Durand de Saint Pourcain, doctor of theology and Master of the Sacred Palace under Clement V and John
XXII, wrote a ‘Commentary on Sentences’ that enjoyed considerable success. This doctor resolutissimus states in it
that ‘in natural law simple fornication constitutes only a venial sin; if [the sin] is considered mortal, it is a result of
the sanctions of positive law’. In those times of the intellectual exaltation of Nature, when natural law and positive
law were paired and contrasted, the latter came off second best. This judgement offers an excellent example of
the shifting borderline between mortal sin and venial sin.*
*fornication gives the following definitions: ‘Natural law governs the relations between all human beings. It is a
set of precepts dictated by reason to the human conscience….Positive Law….is the sex of laws or customs that
govern precisely the life of a people. Where as eternal laws (divine law) and natural law are immutable, positive
law, to the contrary, varies according to time and place. It is even perfectible: changes can be brought to it to
correct its defects and make it respond better to the demands of natural law’.[127]
Furthermore, professional prostitutes had to be beautiful, for if one wanted the common good of the ordo
conjugatorum, one had to work towards focusing the desires of unmarried men and widowers on ‘beautiful and
titillating’ prostitutes. Did it not lessen the fornicator’s sin when the woman’s body was seductive? Alain de Lille
had already said that one should ask whether the woman with whom the sin was committed was beautiful, adding
that is she were, the penance should be reduced. Thomas echoes this judgement; ‘Because the greater a sin’s
cause, the more forcibly it moves to sin, and so the more difficult it is to resist. But sin is lessened by the fact that
it is difficult to resist.’ The very sight of accessible feminine beauty stimulates nature, augments desire, weakens
judgement, and, by that very token, lessens the sin.
Thomas’s reflections on sin contain 2 propositions that caught the attention of those (clergy and laity alike)
charged with organizing or controlling prostitution:
1 ‘The greater or lesser gravity of a sin, in respect of the person sinned against’ depends to a
degree on ‘the condition of the person against whom it was committed’. Further, ‘a sin is the
more grievous according as it is committed against a person more closely united to God by reason
of personal sanctity, or official status.’ Thus the sin of the fornicating city dweller was, once again,
attenuated, since the prostitute was considered at the very bottom of society, and it was scarcely
appropriate, in her case, to speak of her virtue.
2 ‘On the part of his neighbor, a man sins the more grievously according as his sin affects more
persons, so that a sin committed against a public personage, for example a king or prince who
stands in the place of the whole people, is more grievous than a sin committed against a private
person. The prostitute was believed to have broken with her family by her fall from virtue. As a
public prostitute, she was necessarily and by definition free of all ties and accessible to all comers.

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 The public prostitute, then, was, to put it in Thomist terminology, a publicly available private
person.[128]
The longest lasting and most explicit condemnation of fornication, however (in St. Thomas, for example)
was related to the social turmoil to which it led when the resulting offspring were abandoned of their upbringing
was neglected. [129]
Fornication by a male, even by a married man, is conspicuously absent from the list of public crimes.
Although Michel Menot specifies that the man’s transgression is fully as serious as the woman’s when he breaks
his marriage vows (a proposition that he contradicts immediately), he sees only public adultery as deserving of
excommunication. This condemnation seems not to be aimed at the husband whose fornication remains discreet
– the client of the bordellos or the bathhouses; it is unequivocal only when a man keeps a concubine or abandons
his hearth.
Obviously, the denunciation of the concubinage was aimed at ecclesiastics as well. When they kept a
prostitute a pain et a pot they were guilty of sacrilege as well as public adultery. If they fornicated in the brothel,
however, it was up to God to judge them. Olivier Maillard limits himself to pointing out to priests that women
keeping their watch at the foot of the cross were not prostitutes, and that custom adopted by young priests of
dancing with ‘prostitutes’ following their first celebration of mass made little sense. Priestly concubinage, on the
other hand, was abominable. It led to the ciomfiture of the Church and the depletion of its wealth. It was
dangerous. Was not the antichrist to be born of such a sacrilegious and accursed union? Their counsel concerning
all these ‘ecclesiastical whores’ was clear: ‘You must not tolerate them, but expel them from your houses, and
today is even better than tomorrow.’ Was this a call to action to the crowd? At the very least it was an appeal to
the Lords of Justice of the city and the city fathers, whom the preachers upbraided for their laxity and on whom
the called to take rigorous action.
A few cities in fact did impose the wearing of the old distinctive signs (as in Amiens in 1485) as soon as the
first calamties struck. Others (Metz, for example) attempted to contain prostitutes within the red light district.
When a city had given up all control of prostitution and no longer kept a prostibulum publicum, the city fathers
took care to rent or buy appropriate space, this time in order to oblige the women to live there.[130]
Homosexuality: In 693, the Council of Toledo, describing sodomy as being “prevalent” in Spain, enacted that “if
any one of those males who commit this vile practice against nature with other males is a bishop, a priest, or a
deacon, he shall be degraded from the dignity of his order, and shall remain in perpetual exile, struck down by
damnation.” A hundred lashes, a shaven head, and banishment were the penalties for guilty by association. To
the Church punishment the king added the secular one of castration.
Punishment varied according to whether the offender was under or over the age of twenty, whether he
was single or married, and whether the offense was habitual.
The offenders age made a difference, and so did his occupation; a monk was more harshly treated than a
layman. Whether he had played the active or the passive role also had to be taken into account, as had the
frequency of the offense and its extent. Some variants were particularly heinous. Nuns who made use of a dildo
were treated with extreme severity and so were brothers who had incestuous homosexual intercourse.
In 6th century Wales, a practicing homosexual rated three years’ penance; in Burgundy in the early 8th
century, ten years. For oral intercourse, depending on where he resided, a homosexual might find himself liable
for anything from 7 years to life.
The 7th century Cummean Penitential, Frankish in origin, was reasonably representative of the manuals
used by priests in the confessional during the early medieval period. Homosexual sins were treated as follows:
KISSING: Offenders under 20 years of age:

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 “Simple kissing.” Six special fasts.
“Licentious kissing.” Without emission, eight special fasts.
Kissing “with emsion or embrace.” Ten special fasts.
Offenders over twenty years of age:
There was no distinction made here. The penance was to live in continence, eat separately (on bread and
water), and to be excluded from church; the length of it was presumably at the direction of the confessor.
MUTUAL MASTURBATION: By men over 20
Twenty or Forty days penance.
100 days for a second offense
If habitual, “the persons concerned are to be separated
And to do penance for a year.”
INTERFEMORAL CONNECTION ( insertion of the penis between the thighs of the passive partner):
A penance of 2 years.
Or 100 days for the first offense and one year for the second (The first penance may have been for over
twenties and the second for under twenties; or the first clergy and second for laymen.)
FELLATIO (oral INTERCOURSE):
A penance of four years.
For habitual offenders, seven years.
SODOMY (anal intercourse):
Seven years’ penance
From the 6th until the early 11th century, homosexuals were in fact treated no more harshly than couples
who practiced contraception. But then the climate began to change. The imporition of clerical celibacy my have
aroused fears that homosexsuality would increase among the clergy, who would contaminate the laity. Peter
Damiani in the 11th century raised an outcry against the practice of homosexual offenders making confession to
the very men with who their sins had been committed.
In France in 1300, all “sins against nature by a man over twenty years of age’ had to be referred to the
bishop; by “sins against nature” were meant interfemoral connection, fellatio, sodomy, and zoophilia. The
penitentiaries dealt with the same sins committed by boys under 14 and women under 25, and with solitary
masturbation.
If any one man responsible for the hardening of the Churchs attitude toward homosexuals it was the great
philosopher and theologian of the 13th century, St. Thomas Aquinas. Just as Augustine had given a rationale to the
Church Fathers’ distaste for the heterosexual act and rendered it acceptable only in terms of procreation, so
Thomas Aquinas consolidated tradioinal fearsof homosexuality as the crime that had brought down fire and
brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah, by “proving” what every heterosexual male had always believed that it was
unnatural in the sight of God as of man. It was not difficult to prove, especially as he started from Augustine’s
proposition that the sexual organs had been designed by the creator specifically for reproduction, and could only
be legitimately used in ways that did not exclude the possibility of it. Homosexuality was thus, by definition, a
deviation from the natural order laid down by God (as, of course, were heterosexual anal and oral intercourse,
and, obviously, zoophilia), and a deviation that was not only unnatural but, by the same Augustinian token, lustful
and heretical.
Aquinas, fascinated by the harmony of a single moral pattern, was enormously influential in his time and
for long after. But the disadvantage of a single moral pattern is that anything that does not find a place in it finds

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no place, either, in societies based upon it. From the 14th century on, homosexuals as a group were to find neither
refuge nor tolerance anywhere in the Western Church or state.[131]
Where men were deprived of women, and where many women were suspect, sexual sin was rife, and the
Puritan assessment of human weakness seemed to be justified. In the tradition of the time, punishment was
harsh. Fornicators were flogged, and then had to make public confession in church; adulterers were similarly
treated, and sometimes branded as well; the pillory or the stocks were the penalty for parents whose first child
was born too soon after the wedding day; an infant born on a Sunday was often refused baptism because it was
believed that it must have been conceived on a Sunday.[132]
There is, however, evidence of highly placed figures that were homosexuals. King Richard I (the Lionheart)
of England was thought to be homosexual; it is rumoured that he met his wife Berenegaria while in a sexual
relationship with her brother, the future King Sancho VII of Navarre. It is also reported that he and King Philip II of
France were sexually involved. An historian of the time said they “ate from the same dish and at night slept in one
bed” and had a “passionate love between them”.[133]
The dangers that threatened the species must be warded of as well. Three ‘crimes against nature’
sodomy, masturbation and chastity – were denounced more strongly than ever. Let us make them up in that
order.
(1) As early as the end of the 13th century, theologians had considered ‘the sin against nature’
(homosexuality, for the most part) the worst of the sexual sins. The Church never slackened its
severity, and it was encouraged to redouble its vigilance by municipal authorities, particularly
in Italy, where the peril was thought to have reached disturbing proportions. In the 1400s, city
fathers in the Italina peninsula renewd their efforts to curb this ‘enormous crime, offence to
god, peril to the city, contrary to the propagation of the human race’, to quote the terms of
the signori of Venice as they launched a systematic repression. In 1418 the search for
‘sodomites’ had become one of the stats chief tasks and was entrusted to a collegium
sodomitarum that set up surveillance in all the suspect places (schools of dance, music, or
fencing), rewarded informers, and increased the penalties, even for minors. In April 1403 in
Florence, abhorrence of ‘the filth of the evil, abominable and counter to nature, and the
enormous crime that is the vice of homosexuality’ led to an attempt to root it out by
instituting the office of the Onesta. In December 1415, when the Florentine clergy launched a
pamphlet and sermon campaign against homosexuality, the city government backed its efforts
in 1432, still in the interests of pursuing homosexuals, it created the Office of the Night.
Popular preachers throughout Italy joined in to denounce an evil that was thought to be
rampant throughout the land, to be enrolling more and more converts, and to be turning
young men away from marriage. The Venetian magistrates stated boldly that it contributed to
depopulation.*
*It was after 1400 1406 in particular – that homosexuality was regularly prosecuted, and in 1418 the collegium
sodomitarum was given pre eminence over all other city councils.
Elsewhere in Western Europe, particularly in France, men in positions of political responsibility were
usually more concerned about all the sodomitic acts thought to lead to homosexuality, masturbation among them.
(2) If we look at penitential literature, it is difficult to see that masturbation was considered a
grave sin; it appears, in any event, to be considered much less serious than fornication.*
Theologians of course modified their opinions during the 13th century, and they came to
consider masturbation a form of sin against nature, and hence a crime. None the less, this

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 new and theoretical severity was only slowly translated into punitive penitential measures.
This ‘pollution’ was long excused among young children in particular. As late as 1300 in the
diocese of Cambrai, sins against nature and the ‘sin of weakness’ in children up to the age of
14 (for boys) and 25 (for girls) still fell under the jurisdiction of the parish priest.
*Nicole Grevy Pons, speak of a ‘certain erotic candour’ in poems of the 12th century addressed to handsome
adolescents as well as to young women: ‘pederasty does not have the scandalous character that one might think,’
she concludes. It acquired this quality at the end of the 13th century. The famous trials of 1300s (that of the
Templars, for example) illustrate this. In Avignon in 1320 an old man was burned alive for having had relations
with a youth. The incubus of the spread of homosexuality is perceptible at the very end of the 14th century, though
it is not as clear as in Italy. In the treatise of Burchard of Worms, male masturbation practiced alone is very lightly
punished with 10 days of mild penance, to be tripled if practiced between 2 people. [134]
Sodomy: Orderic Vitalis (1075 1142), writing before 1140, criticized sodomy at the court of the English King
William Rufus: “At that time effeminates set the fashion in many parts of the world: foul catamites, doomed to
eternal fire, unrestrainedly pursued their levels and shamelessly gave themselves up to the filth of sodomy.”
Effeminacy did not necessarily mean that the men did not have sex with women: ‘Our wanton youth is sunk in
effeminacy, and courtiers, fawning, seek the favours of women with every kind of lewdness.” William Rufus,
however, never married, and this refusal to associate women threatened the succession to the throne.
The Criticism of men taking “Ganymedes” and thus rejecting women, however, did not prevent the ideal of
male love and friendship from continuing throughout the Middle Ages. This was because, as much as churchmen
might criticize sodomitical behavior, medieval people did not understand it as exclusive. If the main problem with
male freindships and loves was that they led men to ignore their marital duties, then as long as men carried out
those marital duties properly there was nothing with their relations with men. And even though criticism of
sodomy continued, so did male love, and the two were not always juxtaposed. They tended to be treated as 2
different categories of activity.[135]
Sodomy was reviled precisely because it was non reproductive, sterile, an argument not much used today
in a world in which most heterosexual acts are also non reproductive because of contraception. It was also
blasphemy; it went against the creation of God, an argument that appears today in a slightly different form: “God
created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” It could subvert the gender order by making men into women.
What was not a major part of the medieval polemic against sodomy was the defense of marriage, the idea that
same sex relations would undercut the social order because it undermined male dominance via the household.
Indeed, in the Middle Ages a man’s interest in sex with other men was not thought to be exclusive or to prevent
him from marrying and having children. A wife was not considered to be the focus of a husband’s emotional life or
even his sexual life. Marriage was a sacrament, but because it was so often arranged, and even if arranged by the
parties themselves was often undertaken for economic reasons, the conjugal unit did not have the same emotional
importance it has for many people today, and thus was not so threatened by sodomy.[136]
There were a variety of anti sodomy penitentials and laws in the early Middle ages, but these did not go
into detail about the sin itself; rather, they gave specific penances for anal and interfemoral intercourse and
various ages of partner. The penalties were comparable to penalties for other sexual activities like adultery. The
medieval critique of sodomy really began, however, with Peter Damian in the 11th century. Damian’s vehement
polemic was especially critical of the clergy who engaged in this vice. Indeed, sodomy in the sense of sex between
men was associated with the clergy throughout the Middle Ages, possibly because their unmarried status made
them suspect, possibly because the monastery encouraged and provided an opportunity for particularly close

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relationships between men. Priests and monks throughout the Middle Ages were satirized for their heterosexual
adventures, but also for their love of boys.[137]
Richard Trexler found only one instance before the early 16th century (in 1474) or a man accused of acts
‘against nature’ with a prostitute, although in the later period the women did not hesitate to complain of their
customers demands. The situation was basically the same in Venice, where until 1470, according to Elisabeth
Pavan, prostitutes, both public and private, were almost never – once again, there is no exception – involved in
trials for sodomy.[138]
Bestiality: As the Council of Ancyra (314 A.D.) stipulated a longer penance for anyone older than 25 and married,
so did the penitentials believe the sin was greater if an individual violated the marital bond by having intercourse
with an animal. For example, even the mild Penitential of Columbanus required 6 months’ penance for bestiality
for a single man and double that for a married man.*Churchmen might have shown some understanding for the
sexual sins of a youth (whether they be homosexual or bestial play) but, once a man had taken up the
responsibilities of age and marriage, his sexual energies were to be channeled only through the marital bond. [139]
The 9th century Carolingian capitularies directly quoted the Council of Ancrya, linking bestiality with
homosexuality, and the English Bigotian Penitential, compiled no earlier than the late 8th century and heavily
influenced by the Continental material, completed the shift from treating bestiality like masturbation to treating it
like homosexuality. It says, “One who often has intercourse with a male or with beasts, shall do penance for 10
years.
Equating homosexuality with beastiality not only escalated the penalty but expressed a change in the way
people looked at animals. Instead of being an inanimate, irrelevant object, the animal partner became just that, a
partner in an “unnatural” act, just as homosexuality was an act between 2 partners. The notion of animals as
essentially willing partners in the act points again to the profound differences between our view of the world and
the medieval one. We require a willing partner to have enough intellect, or reason, to consent. In the medieval
world, sex was ruled by lust, not will, and as lust was a “bestial” quality, animals certainly shared in that, so they
could be partners in sexual activity.[140]
The Canons of Theodore of Cantebury (circa 741) elaborated on the biblical requirement: “Animals
polluted by coitus with men are to be killed the flesh thrown to dogs. But what they give birth to may be used and
the hides taken.”[141]
Thomas of Chobham (circa 1158 1233) identified bestiality as a grave sin calling for extreme penalties. The
human offender was required to do penance for 15 years (20 if married) and, in addition, to go barefoot
throughout his or her life, never enter church , and permanently abstain from meat, fish, and intoxicants. The
animal participant was to be killed, burned, and buried to prevent any memory of the crime being renewed.
Alexander of Hales (d. 1245) continued Thomas’s abhorrence, although in less detail. Alexander identified
bestiality as the greatest sin against nature, for to sin with “another species” and with “things irrational”
represents the furthest departure from human nature and, thus, the most unnatural sin. The penalty for
Alexander was simple and extreme: kill the human and the animal, and thus erase the memory of the act with the
participants.
The greatest of schoolmen, Thomas Aquinas (1224 1274) continued this view of bestiality but elaborated it
into a more complete system. He said that “unnatural vice” was ”contrary to the natural order of the venereal act
as becoming to the human race.” The 4 kinds of unnatural vice were masturbation, homosexuality, “unnatural
manner of copulation,” and bestiality. Within these unnatural vices, Aquinas ranked bestiality as the worst: “the
most grievous is the sin of bestiality, because use of the due species is not observed.’ In Thomas’s ranking, one can
see that the guiding principle was to observe and preserve the differences between humans and animals. The

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most grievous sin was to forget ones humanity while engaging in the act that along with consent defined
marriage.[142]
Unnatural acts were not unknown in Dijon, but they seem to have been infrequent and disapproved or
even refused by the public prostitutes. Practice within the world of prostitution most probably reflects practice in
other spheres as well. Heterosexual sodomy seems even more infrequent than bestiality, at least in lower and
middle strata of Dijon society. There are 2 cases of bestiality: a vintner with a cow and a foreign journeyman who
committed the crime several times with a she ass, a horse, a mare, and so forth. [143]
720: As we can see, sex was a major interest of the church, not necessarily teachings focused on maintaining a
marriage. There were fines that could be imposed and of course a penance as has been stated. I know many
people are wondering why so much sex in the 3 volume series. Well, overall the Medieval times was extremely
saturated with sexual imagery whether that be sexualized gargoyles, faiblauxs, bathhouses, brothels or the widely
spread daily prostitution. This is also found to be in alignment with the “pleasure seeker” mentality. It is obvious
that the “pains” will be eleveated at all costs whether that be man or animal. If the wife at home doesn’t want to
be pleasant other means will suffice. In essence no woman including the prostitute wants to have to submit to a
mans sexual demands. But as was stated this why the prostitute has her own setting/stereotype and once that
line is crossed by a woman it cant be crossed back in the sol world. In the literal modern world as long as others
aren’t able to identify her as a whore then she isn’t one, all she has to do is skip town, which most likely is a
custom which comes from these times.
It is obvious that todays church must be very weak to allow such activity as the LGBT to reign especially
worldwide and there not be anybody burning at the stake. For us to impose so called humane consequence by not
setting extreme examples for unspeakable acts committed then we are allowing the devils to run rampant and
free. America was not setup to allow such acts and this is proven by the state laws and federal until recently. As
we can see from dates such as 741 when bestiality was being spoken of and outlawed, the tribal peoples of the
earth in other locations were not partaking in bestiality. It is obvious to that the western sexual psyche is definetly
designed as individualistic not necessarily caring if the penetrated is receiving pleasure or not, hence the favoritism
of anal.
Women are just as sexual as men if not more. If we were to rely on the medieval mentality, all women are
wanton whores. I don’t necessarily think this is true. Women have the biological design of passivity. Women can
cut off all sexual desire and not be ridiculed as much today as they would have been during the Dark Ages. If a
man were to cut off his sexual desire he also understands that he is not aggressive, not dominant, not a pleasure
seeker and will be shunned amongst other men and society. He is not a protector, he does not conquer. All of
these elements are involved in a mans sexual prowess, not a womans. So to have available prostitutes, states that
all men have free capability to ensure their masculinity. If you do not, you have done it by option,therefore you
seek other means for your enjoyment which makes you a sinner. Which also indirectly states that you are avoiding
responsibility of a family. As it also mentioned, if a woman does not take her mans sexuality as a responsibility,
then she will be considered a cuckoldress, a hag and possibly a witch. There will be a consequence that follows her
neglect of pleasure and maintainance of love. At the end of the day, sex is natural, it is how we reprocduce. A
persons rules upon it will be based upon their cultural understanding. The Catholic church does have enough
grounding to be called a culture. The sols that they have claimed over 1000’s of years and the innocent martyrs
that have been sacrificed for their name, gives right for understanding at the highest levels of existence. This may
be part of the reason why the church looks at America as tainted. In America there is “freedom” so the demons
run free without being recognized. The theological influence to Americas law system is desentegrating. American
culture isn’t based off of a solid theological understanding of any religion.

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 The Church against Magic
In the 7 century was composed the Liber Paenitentialis of S. Theodore, 7th Archbishop of Canterbury, the
th

earliest collection of ecclesiastical disciplinary laws for England. No less than the whole of one section is
concerned with magic practices and ceremonies, a penance being duly assigned for each offence. The 37th Book
has as its rubric, “Of idolatry and Sacrilege, and of those who vow their vows otherwise than to Holy Church, and
the man who on the Kalends of January goeth about in the masque of a stag or a bull calf, as also of astrologers,
and those who by their craft raise storms.” These are 6 and 20 heads, and of these many are so important that the
more significantly provisions, of the principal enactments must at least be given. “if anyone sacrifices to demons,
one year of penance if he be a clown of low estate, if he be of higher degree, 10 years. If anyone sacrifice a second
or a third time to demons he shall do penance for 3 years. If anyone commits sacrilege, that is if he consulteth
soothsayers who divine by birds or in any other forbidden way he shall do penance 3 years, and of these one’s he
shall fast on bread and water. It is unlawful for any, cleric or layman, to exercise the craft of a seer or a charmer,
or to make philtres, and all such as practise such arts or use them we order them to be expelled from the church.
If anyone by evil spells hath slain another…. If anyone hath poisoned another from jealousy and yet hath not slain
him. … If anyone hath procured abortion…. If anyone frequents seers, whom men call diviners, or hath practised
any charms, for this is devilish…If anyone hath made a trial of those lots, which are wrongly called the Holy Lots, or
hath cast any lots at all, or hath with evil intent cast lots, or hath divined…..If any woman hath placed her son or
daughter upon the house top or in the oven in order to ensure them health….if anyone hath burned wheat upon
the spot where a man hath died in order to ensure the health and prosperity to his householde… If anyone in order
to ensure health to his young son hath passed the baby upwards through some cavity in the earth, and then hath
closed fast the hole behind him with thorns and brambles … anyone who hath had resource to diviners and
cleaveth to the traditions of the heathen, or hath brought men of this craft into his house in order to find out some
secret by their evil science, or in order to expiate some wrong…. If anyone hath vowed a vow and hath fulfilled the
same at a clump of trees, or a spring of water, or at certain rocks, or at a spot where boundaries meet, or at any
other place whatsoever, save in God’s house, the church, he shall do penance fasting on bread and water for 3
years, since this is sacrilege, and verily devilish. Who hath eaten or drunk in honour of idols one year shall he do
penance fasting on bread and water. If anyone at the Kalends of January goeth about as stag or a bull calf, that is,
making himself into a wild animal, and dressing in the skins of a herd animal, and putting on the heads of beasts;
those who in such wise transform themselves into the appearance of a wild animal, let them do penance for 3
years, because this is devilish. If anyone be a wizard, that is, if by the invocation of demons he hath wrought upon
any man’s mind… If anyone hath raised storms by this evil craft…. If anyone hath tied the knot (ligaturas fecerit)
because this is devilish.” S. Augustine (In Ioannem, VII) uses the word ligature for an amulet bound about one, and
by “ligaturas facere” we are here to understand sexual magic, nouer l’aiguillette. The ligature was both used for
casting a spell upon a man, or freeing him from the effects of a charm. So in Petronius, Satyricon, 131, the old
witch in order to restore Encolpius “took out of her bosom a hankerchief of various colours and bound it round my
neck.’ Upon which passage Turnebus (1512 65) glosses: “In spells and charms hanks or threads of various colours
are employed, not only to bind and make fast a spell as in the pharmaceutria but also to loose and undo as here,
whence these threads are called ligatures (ligatura).” George Erhard notes: “This little old woman was skilled in
magic spells, and so she undertook to cure the sexual frigidity of Polyaenus {Encolpius}, whose virility was, as he
himself acknowledged, cold and dead. Witches can heal diseases by ligatures…especially veneral
complaints….Theses hanks (Licia) the writers of the Middle Ages call ligatures (ligaturas).

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 The clause in S. Theodore’s Penitential which forbids anyone at the kalends of January to go about as a
stag or a bull, that is, making himself into a wild animal and dressing in the skins of herd animals and putting on the
heads of beasts, and assigns 3 years of penance to those who in such wise transform themselves in to the
appearance of a wild animal, since the practice is devilish, is of especial importance and interest, since here we
probably have the explanation of the greater part of these accounts which record that the Demon appeared as a
goat, a rampant bull, a huge black ram, whilst his satellites particularly favoured the shape of monstrous cats. The
individual clad in a beast skin or mask is the worshipper putting himself by personal contact under the influence
and protection of his deity.[144]
The Laws of Withraed, King of Kent, in 690, ordain: “If a theow make an offering to devils let him make a
bot of vi shillings, or his hide.”
In the Confessional of Ecgberhy, Archbishop of York (734 66) the following significant clauses appear: “27.
If any woman practice any magic arts, or spells, and work evil charms, let her fast for a 12month, or for 3 canonical
fasts, or for xl days: let the heinousness of her offence be computed. If she has slain any one by her evil charms,
let her fast for vii years. And 32. If anyone be found who hath offered sacrifice to devils, no matter on howsoever
trifling an occasion let him fast x years.” And in the law of the Northumbrian priests it is ordered: “If anyone be
found that shall henceforth practice any heathenship, either by sacrifice or by fyrt, or in any way love witchcraft, or
worship idols, if he be a king’s thane let him pay x half marks; half to Christ, half to the king.”
In the 9th century the Penitential of Pseudo Theodore renews these prohibitions. This Paenitentiale has
been quoted by Tille and other authors as being English, although it is really Frankish, and to some extent,
although not in these sections, based upon the genuine Penitential of S. Theodore. It may be remarked that very
many Penitentials particularly denounce and forbid the masquerade of the Ceruulus and Uetula. Their ultimate
authority may be the Council of Auxerre, held under S. Annacharius in 578 (or 585), a canon of which directs: “It is
forbidden to masquerade as a bullcalf or a stag on the first of January or to distribute devilish charms, but if gifts
are to be given on that day let them be bestowed as on other days.
The Venerable Bede, Doctor of the Church (died 735), in his great Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum
mentions devil worship, and says that Redwald, King of the East Saxons and his court “In the same temple had an
altar to sacrifice to Christ, and another small one to offer victims to devils.”
The ecclesiastical statutes of King Edgar, 959, direct “that every priest zealously promot Christianity, and
totally extinguish every heatheneism; and forbid well worshippings, and necromancies, and divinations, and
enchantments, and man worshippings and the vain practices which are carried on with various spells, and with
frith splots, and with elders and also with various other trees, and with stozes, and with many various delusions,
with which men do much of what they should not…. And we enjoin, that on feast days there be complete
abstinence from heathen songs and devils games.”
This enactment is repeated in the Laws of King Ethelred and in those of Cnut. The latter adds, “ and we
earnestly forbid every heathenism. Heathenism is, that men worship idols; that is, that they worship heathen gods,
and the sun or moon, fire or rivers, water wells or stones, or forest trees of any kind; or love witch craft, or
promote morth work in anywise; or by blot or fyrht, or perform anything pertaining to such illusions.”
The fearful prevalence of Witchcraft in England, and the survival of heathen superstitions which it so
readily adopted and moulded to its own evil, could not more plainly be demonstrated than in this catena of
ordinances, both ecclesiastical and civil, extending from the 7th to the 11th centuries. There is no doubt that from
the time that S. Augustine landed on the Isle of Thanet in the spring of 597 the Christian monks and missionaries
had continually to battle with the dark opposing powers, who were not easily to be driven from the fair land of
Britain, whose inhabitants already knew and dreaded their influences, as is shown by the fact that King Ethelberht

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immediately suspected the Roman stranger himself to be some mighty magician and insisted that their first
meeting should take place under a spreading oak tree where no incdantations could prevail.[145]
Public Penance:

Fig. 68.). Illustration from the Nuremberg Chronicle, by Hartmann Schedel (1440 1514), depicting flagellants
whipping themselves in penance.
Fig. 69.). Wood cut of Bonner punishing a heretic from John Foxe’s book (1563)
In the year 1534 the vicar of a church in Hull, England, preached a sermon in Holy Trinity church advocating
the teaching of the Reformers in Antwerp. He was promptly tried for heresy and convicted. He recanted; and in
penance walked around the church on Sunday clad only in his shirt, barefooted and carrying a large faggot in his
hand. On the market day he walked around the market place clad in a similar manner. This really solemn act is
robbed of its dignity because of the apparel of the penitent. A man’s shirt is an absurd garment; had the offender
been wrapped in a sheet, or robed in sackcloth and ashes, he would’ve been a noble figure, but you cannot grace
or dignify a shirt.[146]
All ceremonies of public penance were aimed at remedying public sins; it was seen as the only way to save
innocent people from punishment. It is clear that apocalyptic preaching revived the idea of collective
responsibility, and evn the more moderate preachers, joining St. Thomas on this point, concluded that although
each sinner is punished for his or her own transgressions, there is nothing to prevent sinners from being struck
down by a salutary punishment for someones elses sin and chastised with him if they had tolerated or given
consent to the sin. Thus God might punish family, the neighbourhood, or the vast of the city, and he might loose
the male mort (foul and violent death) for the crimes of the backsliding of a few. This severly limited the
consequences that were beginning to be drawn from the theology purgatory. Of course, the mendicant orders had
long taught the means to a ‘good death’, and the ‘Arts of dying’ unveiled the way to salvation through confidence
in Christ’s mercy, but a ‘good death’ – a natural death within the faith – demanded preparation. In death against
Nature the sinner risked eternal damnation.

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 This is why even those whose social status enabled them to pay scant attention to the clergy, who were
able to comprehend all the implications of the new devotion, and who had the means to make offerings or
bequests were not exempt from anxiety when they obeyed Natures call.*
*Gaston Phoebus confided to God in his book of hours: ‘I have an evil, Lord, even worse than all the other evils in
me; in childhood, in adolescence, and in youth it always multiplied in me and still refuses to let me go. This evil,
Lord, is delectation of the flesh, a tempest of lustfulness that in too many ways has wounded me and taken me
from your grace. Most sweet and most benign God, I show myself before Your omnipotence still enflamed by
filthy thoughts’. It remains to be seen just to how great an extent he was indeed governed by immondes
cogitations and tempetes de luxure![147]
A similar stone couple in a dark corner of the cathedral at Erfurt, probably from the hand of another
facetious craftsman, escaped ecclesiastical censure for an even longer period. Images of this and related types
may still of could once be found in churches at Wetzlar, Nordlingen, Worms, Bremen, Magdeburg, Doberan,
Zerbst, Basele and elsewhere. Such productions were of course more than a mere jest. Quite deliberate, they are
not illustrations of rumour but attempts to give secular expression to the profound discord of which the
Christianized peoples of Europe were conscious. Their religion had excommunicated the lusts of the flesh. But not
even the anointed servants of the Lord could ever really conquer them. [148]

Fig. 70.). Curious Punishments of Bygone Days, By Alice Morse Earle.

Fig. 71.). End Times Church Countdown: the busy busy church hits back
Rosary Beads: This was for ecclestical punishments. On Sunday, during church, the sinner was put inside the
church or at the church door, wearing the rosary around his neck. These punishments were for sleeping in church
and offending God, etc. Here in Rothenburg, the congregation came together once a year and were examined on
the Bible and Catechism. It was also punishable if one did not attend church on Sunday. This was easily found out,
since everyone had his own specific place in church. Each citizen had to live his life in a God fearing manner and
abide by the commandments.

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 Anathemas: Bartholomew Chassenee (1480–1541) mentions
several instances of the effectiveness of anathemas, accepting
as convincing testimony the ecstacies of saints and the
extravagant statements of hagiologists without the slightest
expression of doubt as to the truth of these legends. Thus he
relates how a priest anathematized an orchard, because its
fruits tempted the children of his parish and kept them away
from mass. The orchard remained barren until, at the
solicitation of the Duchess of Burgundy, the ban was removed.
In like manner the Bishop of Lausanne freed Lake Leman from
eels, which has become so numerous as seriously to interfere
with boating and bathing; on another occasion in the year
1451 the same ecclesiastic explelled from the waters of this
lake an immense number of enormous blood suckers, which
threatened to destroy all the large fish and were especially
fatal to salmon, the favourite article of food on fast days. This
method of procedure was both cheap and effective and, as
Felix Malleolus (1389) informs us in his Tractatus de Exorcismis
Fig. 72.). The Original Rosary Beads (Torture Device)
(I), received the approbation of all the learned doctors of the University of Heidelberg: omnes studii
Heydelbergensis Doctores hujusmodi ritus videntes et legentes consenserunt. By the same agency an abbot
changed the sweet white bread of a Count of Toulouse who abetted and protected heresy, into black, mouldy
bread, so that he, who would fain feed souls with corrupt spiritual food, was forced to satisfy his bodily hunger
with coarse and unsavoury provender. No sooner was the excommunication removed than the bread resumed its
original purity and colour. Egbert, Bishop of Trier, anathematized the swallows, which disturbed the devotions of
the faithful by their chirping and chattering, and sacrilegiously defiled his head and vestments with their droppings,
when he was officiating at the altar. He forbade them to enter the sacred edifice on pain of death; and it is still a
popular superstition at Trier, that if a swallow flies into the cathedral it will immediately fall to the ground and give
up the ghost. Another holy man, known as John the Lamb, cursed the fishes, which had incurred his anger, with
results equally fatal to the finny tribe. It Is also related of the honey tongued St. Bernard, that he
excommunicated a countless swarm of flies, which annoyed the worshippers and officiating priests in the abbey
church of Foigny, and lo, on the morrow they were, like Sennacherib’s host, “all dead corpses.” William, Abbot of
St. Theodore in Rheims, who records this miraculous event, states that as soon as the execration was uttered, the
flies fell to the floor in such quantities that they had to be thrown out with shovels (palis ejicientes). This incident,
he adds, was so well known that the cursing of flies of Foigny became proverbial and formed the subject of a
parable.[149]
The island Reichenau in Lake Constance, which derives its name from its fertility and is especially famous
for the products of its vineyards and its orchards, was once so infested by venomous reptiles as to be
uninhabitable by human biengs. Early in the 8th century, as the legend goes, it was visited by St. Pirminius, and no
sooner had he set foot upon it than these creatures all crawled and wriggled into the water. So that the surface of
the lake was covered for 3 days and 3 nights with serpents, scorpions and hideous worms. Peculiar vermifugal
efficacy was ascribed to the crosier of St. Magnus, the apostle of Algaue, which was preserved in the cloister of St.
Mang at Fussen in Bavaria, and from 1685 to 1770 was repeatedly borne in solemn procession to Lucerne, Zug,

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Schwyz and other portions of Switzerland for the expulsion and extermination of rats, mice, cockchafers and
others insects. Sometimes formulas of malediction were procured directly from the pope, which, like saints’
curses, could be applied without legal formalities. Thus in 1660 the inhabitants of Lucerne paid 4 pistoles and 1
Roman thaler for a document of this king; on Nov. 15, 1731, the municipal council of Thonou in savoy resolved to
join with other parishes of that province to obtain from Rome an excommunication against insects, the expenses
for which are to be assessed pro rata; in 1740 the commune of Piuro purchased from His Holiness a similar
anathema; in the same year the common council of Chiavenna discussed the propriety of applying to Rome for an
execratory against beetles and bears; and in December 1752 it was proposed by the same body to take like
summary measures in order to get rid of a pest of rodents. In 1729, 1730, and 1749 the municipal council of
Lucerne ordered processions to be made on St. Magnus Day from the church of St. Francis to Peters Chapel for the
purpose of expelling weevils. This custom was observed annually from 1749 to 1798. The pompous ceremony had
been superseded in Protestant countries by an officially appointed day of fasting and prayer. [150]
Towards the end of the 9th century the region about Rome was visited by a dire plague of locusts. A
reward was offered for their extermination and the peasants gathered and destroyed them by millions; but all
efforts were in vain, since they propagated faster than it was possible to kill them. Finally Pope Stephen VI (897)
prepared great quantities of holy water and had the whole country sprinkled with it, whereupon the locusts
immediately disappeared.[ 151]
Wakes & Funerals: Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky. The combination would sometimes knock the
imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them
for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat
and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence, the custom of holding a wake. England is old and small
and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the
bones to a bone house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have
scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive... So they would tie a string on
the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would
have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift.) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, saved
by the bell or was considered a dead ringer.[152]
The “wakes,’ or evening parties, which are still the custom in most of the French provinces, and which are
of very ancient origin, formed important events in the private lives of the peasants. It was at these that the
ignorant classes, were mostly created and propagated. It was there that those extraordinary and terrible fairy
tales were related, as well as those of magicians, witches, spirits, etc. It was there that the matrons, whose great
age justified their, experience, insisted on proving, by absurd tales, that they know all the marvellous secrets for
causing happiness or for curing sickness. Consequently, in those days the most enlightened rustic never for a
moment doubted the truth of witchcraft.[153]
An Irishwoman, living in London, had a daughter who died of smallpox, a fairly common event at the time.
The parish prepared with all speed to bury the girl in a pauper’s grave, but the mother begged to be allowed to
follow then traditional Irish custom of holding a wake and raising enough money from the mourners for a decent
burial. She was allowed to keep the body at home. The wake was held, the mourners arrived, and the money was
collected, but soon it began to slip away to provide more gin to keep the wake going, to stave off the awful
morning after. After a time they realized, blearily, that there was no money left for the funeral. So friends rallied
round, and a second wake was held with the same result.
Eventually the parish officers had to intervene to break up a scene that only Edgar Allen Poe could have
described adequately: a drunked orgy that had lasted for 12 days, a tiny filthy room packed with drunken, vomiting

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people around a decomposing corpse, a forthnight dead. Smallpox was spreading from one mourner to another,
and in the flicking light of the tallow dips it was impossible to tell whether the white faced bodies lying on the floor
were drunk, or diseased or dead.[154]
The witch of Berkeley, who inspired Southey’s ballad, is traditionally said to have lived about the middle of
th
the 9 century. She is a shadowy figure enough, although she is still well remembered in the West country, and it
is just possible there may have been some such person about whom the legend encrusted. She had been wealthy,
but on her death bed she confessed that her riches were derived from a compact with the Devil. Accordingly she
bids them sew her body in the hide of a stag and place her in a stone coffin, binding it with heavy chains of iron.
50 psalms are to be sung each night, and 50 masses to be said each morning, and if her body can be thus kept safe
for 3 nights, upon the 4th day they may bury it deep in the churchyard, the Devil will have sought and not have
found.
The bier is laid before the high altar, and on the first night monks and nuns chant their nocturns, whilst the
demons wail and howl outside the church. On the second night the fiends grow more powerful and burst open the
doors and invade the cloister, but prayer prevails. On the 3rd night the monastery is shaken to its foundations by a
hideous tempest, the religious white to the lips and trembling with fear can scarce intone the dirge, the yells of the
demons sound fiercer and nearer, until at length with an awful crash the gates fly open and a devil, more terrible
than any who had yet been seen, stalks up the aisles to where the wretched woman lay. In a voice of thunder he
bids her rise and follow him. Piteously she please she cannot, she is held by the iron bands. In a moment he snaps
them as if they were burned thread, and wrenches open the coffin. Livid and stark, in sore affright, the stiffening
corpse uprose, and the devil taking her by the hand led her to the door, where stood a gigantic black horse,
impatiently pawing the ground and breathing flame. Like a flash he vaults into the saddle and throws her across
before him; away they speed swifter than then wind, whilst earth and heaven ring with the hopeless shrieks of the
tortured soul. An idle story, and grossly immoral, since evil triumphs over repentance and prayer.[155]
“In truth this story which is told cannot be accounted other than true, for blessed Gregory has written in
one of his dialogues that a man, who was buried in a church, was cast out of the holy place by a horde of devils.
Charles Martel, too, King of the Franks, a hero of no mean prowess, who drove back into Spain the Saracens when
they invaded France, is said to have been buried, when he had finished his course, in the cathedral of S. Denis. But
since he had grievously sinned in that he robbed nearly all the churches of France of their revenues and tithes to
pay his soldiers, his body was torn from its resting place by devils in most horrid wise, and it hath not been found
even unto this day.’[156]
The shape of the grave and of the mound, barrow, or tomd above it varied. Ig might be shallow or deep,
fenced against wild animals or leveled to hide it from canibals, ghouls, and marauders. In the grave the body might
be left sitting, squatting, or prone on side or back. The direction in which it was faced or headed was important
and varied greatly Moslems toward Mecca, Christian Europeans toward the West, migrant tribes toward the
homeland of their ancestors. Solomon Islanders were always buried with their feet turned inland. [157]
720: The devils will come to the grave and get your ass. This is what is stated, they will collect the debt at all costs
and give you an exclusive entrance into hell. This is just a very short section on wakes & funerals, in which there
are for more rituals that can be researched pertaining to the subject and the time period. When it comes to the
penance and being whipped public. There are homoerotic and other occult reasons on why the spanking takes
place. These reasons will be explained in the holiday section.

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 Chapter 7
The State of Ecstasy
Saint Miracles & Other Oddities
Thomas Merton tells us in his biography of St. Lutgarde of Aywieres (d. 1246) that the Saint became so
fervent in choir that a flame was seen to shoot out of her mouth and rise into the air. “A young nun, who
happened to look up just in time to catch sight of this strange phenomenon, was so panic stricken that she fell over
in a dead faint.”
The Dominican nun, Ven. Maria Villani of Naples (d. 1670), is believed to have had a similar experience.
Ven. Maria died at the age of 86 havbing within her body, according to her own declaration, a furnace of love. Her
life, written 4 years after her dead by Fr. Francis Marchesse, O.P., reveals that Ven. Maria believed she was
wounded in the side and heart by a fiery spear of love. The wound was definitely apparent and was carefully
examined by 3 of her confessors, who signed affadavbits to what they had seen and touched. One of these
confessors, the Dominican Leonardo di Lettere, was a man of great reputation and sanctity whose cause for
beatification was introduced soon after his death. The fire of love sparked by the flaming arrow produced such
heat that Ven. Maria was forced to drink an excessive amount of water each day. Witnesses claimed that the
drinking of the water was accompanied by a hissing sound like that of water falling on a sheet of hot iron.
In her ltters and other writings it was often expressed by the Venerable that she was continuously
consumed by an almost insupportable flame of love. The hear from this flame was quicfkly brought to the
attention of a surgeon after her death when he conducted an autopsy. When an incision was made in the area of
the heart, the witnesses, were amazed to see “smoke and heat which exhaled from the heart, that veritable
furnace of divine love.” The what was so intense the surgeons found it necessary to stop and wait until the body
cooled somewhat. After a time the surgeon returned. “He put in his hand to extract the heart, but he found it so
hot that, burning himself, he was compelled to take his hand out again several times before he succeeded in
effecting his purpose.”
The biographer declares that a formal affidavit regarding these facts was made by the surgeons Domenico
Trifone and Francesco Pinto, who also described the open wound found in the heart. It corresponded exactly to
the wound on the outside of the body. Her biographer, writing just 4 years after the autopsy, writes:
This wound (in the heart) I have seen and touched and examined. The lips of he wound ware hard and
seared, just as happens when thecautery is used, to remind us, no doubt, that it was made with a spear of fire.
Like Ven. Maria Villani, Ven. Francesca Dal Serrone (d. 1601) also had a wound in the side placed there
during a transport of love. We read in the life of this Franciscan nun of San Severino that the wound occasionally
bled, while at other times blood was vomited from the mouth. The unusual aspect of this bleeding is that the
liquid was so hot that it cracked an earthenware vessel used to receive it. In consequence, the blood had to be
collected in a metal bowl.
St. Ignatius Loyola (d. 1556) , the founder of the Jesuit Order, had the gift of tears and experienced many
ecstasies during his Holy Masses. An unusual manifestation was noted during one of his Masses which was
attended by Fr. Nicholas Lannoy. During the Memento of the Mass, a flame of fire hovered above St. Ignatius’
head, much to the horror of Fr. Lannoy. Rushing forward to extinguish it before the Saint was harmed, the priest

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suddenly stopped when he realized that the Saints face clearly indicated he was lost in contemplation. The flame,
moreover, was causing no harm. This amazed the priest, and he stared at the spectacle for some time incomplete
amazement.
It is recorded of the Ven. Serafina Di Dio (d. 1699) that while she was rapt in prayer following Holy
Communion, the community saw her face glowing like a red flame as her eyes sparkled fire. “It burned them if they
but touched her,” and she herself declared that she was consumed and shrivelled with heat, that her blood was as
molten lead in her veins.[158]
In the Bull of Canonization for St. Catherine Dei Ricci (d. 1589), mention is made that her sufferings began
when she was 20 and that for 12 years they recurred regularly. Her biographers report that her ecstasies lasted
exactyly 28 hours, from Thursday noon until Friday afternoon at 4 o’ clock.
The Saint conversed aloud while witnessing the drama of Our Lord’s Passion in 17 scenes while moving in
conformity with the movements of Our Lord. Afterward, at the end of the ecstasy, in addition to her bleeding
wounds, she was covered with the injuries produced by the whips and cords of the scourging. In addition, she
suffered from the wound on her shoulder which was that of the carrying of the Cross.
The wounds of her stigmata, located in her hands, feet and side, and those wounds inflicted by the Crown
of Thorns, were variuously described by people who saw them. Many declared that the hands were bleeding and
pierced through. Others saw a brilliant light that dazzled their eyes, while others saw the wounds as being healed,
but red and swollen.
Bl. Lucy of Narni (d. 1544) received her stigmata during a meditation on the Passion while she was in the
choir with the rest of her community. Suddenly she became pale and gave all appearances of suffering acute pain.
The nuns rushed to help her, but in a few moments the agony was such that Lucy Swooned. On recovering in her
cell, where her companions had taken her, she could not hide her hands; they were livid, and the skin was raised
and inflamed. By the end of the week the wounds became large and shed an abundance of blood. The religious
authorities were notified, resulting in a minute investigation by the bishop of Viterbo. Afterward 3 successive
commissions of inquiry were appointed by the Pope. After these inquiries, declarations were issued which
maintained that the stigmata were beyond all dispute.
The Saint participated in all the sufferings of the Passion, which were accompanied by a great loss of blood
every Wednesday and Friday for the 3 years she remained at Viterbo. [159]
St. Heribert (d. 1021) is regarded as one of the most distinguished of the prelates who have ruled over the
diocese of Cologne. His generosity to the poor and his service to the sick, as well as reports of his ardent prayer
life, have enhanced his biographies. It is in these books that we learn of a miracle involving rain.
During the time of a great drought, the archbishopinstituted a penitential procession from the achuch of
St. Severin to that of St. Pantaleon. Butler’s biography of the Saint relates the following:
In fervent words he exhorted the multitude to do penance and to trust in God. Some of those present
declared that they saw a white dove flying close to the Saints head as he walked with the procession. Entering the
church of St. Severin, Heribert went up to the high altar and, bowing his head in his hands, gave himself to earnest
prayer for his people. Scarcely had he risen from his knees when a torrential rain poured down upon the city and
the countryside, and the countryside, and the harvestwas saved.
Heriberts biographer continues, “From that time onward the Saint was invoked for rain.”
A miraculous rainfall is also noted in the life of St. Dominic (d. 1221), the founder of the Order of
Preachers. This tok place while the Saint was preaching in Segovia. The area was afflicted by a severe drought;
even so one day while the Saint was preaching out of doors, he felt inspired to announce that a plentiful rain
would fall that very day. The sky was clear when he began preaching, but as soon as his words were uttered, dark

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clouds quickly gathered and rain fell in such torrents that the crowd made their way home with some difficulty.
Inhonor of the Saint, and in commemoration of this miracle, a little chapel was built at the site where the Saint
made the prophecy.[160]
The great miracle worked by Moses when the Red Sea parted was worked in a much smaller fashion in
favor of one of God’s chosen souls, the humble shepherdess, St. Germaine Cousin (d. 1601). Rejected by her father
and stepmother because of her withered right hand and scrofulous neck, she was treated shamefully by her family.
But she was also the object of many miracles witnessed by the villagers of Pibrac, France.
We are told that in order for her to reach the village church for Holy Mass, it was necessary for her to cross
a stream which was often swollen by rain. On one occasion when the stream was overflowing and the current was
particularly strong, the villagers watched in amazement as the rushing water separated to provide a dry
passageway for her.
Not rain, but destructive hail was averted by St. Francis of Assisi (d. 1226) while he was visiting the
monastery at Greccio. The people had complained to him about the frequent hail storms that were destroying
their fields and vineyards. The Saint advised that they should all confess their sins and “bring forth fruits befitting
repentance.” The Saint also promised that if they did as he recommended, the Lord would look kindly upon them
and increase their temporal goods. He also warned that if they returned aside to some other region.
Unfortunately, the people eventually reverted to their former ways, which brought about a severe
punishment from God in that a pestilence brought many to the grave and a fire destroyed the whole town.[161]
Flies are also mentioned in the life of St. Bernard of Clairvaux (d. 1153), since they visited the Saint while
he was in Foigny for the dedication of a monastery church. During the service the church was filled with a
multitude of flies that disturbed the devoition of the faithful with their buzzing. Since no one knew how to
disperse them, St. Bernard cried aloud, “Excommunicabo eas!” (I shall excommunicate them!) The next day the
flies were all found dead. Their number was so great that they blackened the pavement and were removed from
the church with shovels. A chronicler of the time adds: “This miracle was so well known, and so celebrated, that
the curse of the flies of Foigny passed into a proverb among the people around, who had come from all parts to
assist at the dedication of the church.”
Not flies, but insects described as lice are mentioned in the biographies of St. Teresa of Avila (d. 1582). The
infestation took place when her community of nuns from the monastery of San Jose decided to wear, as a means
of penance, certain tunics made of a very rough sackcloth known as horsecloth. All went well until the weather
grew warm. It was then that a great difficulty was experienced. It seems that horsecloth was a favorite habitat of
lice. William Thomas Walsh writes: “And a lice infected household devoted to mental prayer and contemplation is
a cnontradiction in terms. “Finally, the situation could be tolerated no longer. While the Saint was at prayer one
night between 10 and 11 o’ clock, the nuns carrying lighted candles formed a procession with the first nun in line
carrying a crucifix. They went from room to room singing hymns and psalms in petition for the extermination of
the bugs. Fimally St. Teresa joined the procession. The community then began a chant in this fashion:
Nuns: Since You give us new array, O hevenly King, Free this serge from denizens so threatening.
St. Teresa: Daughters, since you take the cross, be stout of heart, And ask of Jesus, Light of yours, to take your part.
He will defend you surely in such a thing.
Nuns: Free this serge from denizens so threatening.
St. Teresa: Ill boots it to be not at ease in mental prayer; Devotion when the spirit flees is very rare. But let your
unaffrighted hearts to God fast cling.
Nuns: Free this serge from denizens so threatening.

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St. Teresa: Since you have come that you may die, be not dismayed. And do not let such scurvy knaves make you
afraid. In all this trouble God will air your suffering.
Nuns: Since You have given us new array, O heavenly King, Free this serge from denizens so threatening.
Waalsh continues: “Not only did the lice disappear from the tunics, but from that time to this the Discalced
Carmelite convents have been free from all manner of predicular intrustion.”
A contemporary biographer, Fr. Ribera, S.J., is said to have gone to great pains to verify this. The present
author does not know of any surveys that have been made since that time.[162]

Fig. 73.). Saint Francis and the Wolf Gubbio, Italy

The little book known as The Little Flowers of St. Francis tells that: “At a time when St. Francis of Assisi (d.
1226) was staying in the town of Gubbio , something wonderful and worthy of lasting fame took place.” This
wonderful event involved the Saint and an unusually large and fierce wolf that was attacking and eating not only
animals, but human beings as well. The situation became so dangerous that people took to carrying weapons
when they were forced to go outside the city gate. But “God wished to bring the holiness of St. Francis to the
attention of the people.”
Despite warnings, St. Francis decided to go and meet the wolf. Together with some of his companions and
many of the bravest citizens, St. Francis went out to see what could be done. To the horror of his followers, the
wolf charged toward the Saint with fierce teeth showing in its open mouth. Without the slightest trace of fear, St.
Francis made the Sign of the Cross toward the animal, which produced an immediate effect. The wolf closed its
mouth and slowed its pace so that it eventually crept to the Saint in humble submission. But that was not all. St.
Francis gently rebuked the wolf, ordering it never again to hurt anyone. The Saint also made a pact with the
animal, that if it did no more harm, the townsfolk would give it food every day and the dogs would no longer bark
at it. The wolf agreed by twists of the body and the wagging of its tail. The Saint then ordered the wolf to walk

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beside him to the town. “When the people saw this they were greatly amazed and the news spread quickly, so
that all of them assembled in the marketplace because St. Francis was there with the wolf.”
The Saint then addressed the people: “Brother Wolf, who is standing here before you, has promised and
has given me a pledge that he will make peace with you and will never hurt you if you promise also to feed him
everyday.” The people promised to do as the Saint recommended, and the wolf, to show his cooperation and
readiness to keep the pact, raised his right paw and placed it in the hand of the Saint. From that day on the wolf
and the people kept the peace which St. Francis had made.
The wolf lived 2 years more, and it went from door to door for food. It hurt no one, and no one hurt it.
The people fed it courteously and it is a striking fact that not a single dog ever barked at it.
Then the wolf grew old and died. And the people were sorry, because whenever it went through the town,
its peaceful kindness and patience reminded them of the virtues and the holiness of St. Francis.
This was not the only wolf St. Francis tamed. He once journeyed to Greccio and the little monastery of his
order there which he liked to visit. As soon as he arrived, the people told him about a pack of ravening wolves
attacking both men and animals. In addition, hailstorms were destroying their fields and vineyards. The Saints
answer to their problems came in the form of a sermon in which he advised that all should confess their sins and
bring forth “fruits befitting repentance.” He further promised, “I give you my word that every pestilence will depart
and the Lord, looking kindly upon you, will grant you an increase of temporal goods.” He also warned that if they
returned to their former ways, the troubles would return and be doubled in intensity. Needless to report, the
people did as he recommended and were not only delivered from the wolves and the hail, but they also prospered
and ere “filled beyond measure with temporal goods.” But in time they relapsed to the anger of God, who added
to their troubles a heaven sent sickness and a fire that destroyed the whole town.
Another incident in the life of St. Francis of Assisi involved a little rabbit that had been caught in a trap and
was brought to him by one of the brothers. When the Saint saw the rabbit he said to it: “Brother rabbit, come to
me. Why did you allow yourself to be caught like this?” As soon as the brother placed the rabbit on the ground,
thinking that it would hop towards the woods, but it jumped again onto his lap an action that was repeated a
number of times, until the Saaint directed the brother to carry the rabbit into the woods.[163]
St. Pharaildis (d. 740), a belgian laywoman, is said to have used her distaff to strike the side of a hill near
Bruay, near Valenciennes, causing a fountain of fresh water to spring out of the ground to relieve the thirst of the
harvesters who were reaping for her. The fountain is believed to have contained healing virtues, especially for
children’s complaints, and so the Saint is invoked by mothers who are anxious about the health of their little
ones.[164]
An unusual appearance of water is reported in the biography of BL. EUSTOCHIA OF PADUA (d.1469).
Almost immediately after her incorrupt body was moved from its grave, although the grave had been perfectly dry
during the Saint’s 3 year interment, a fresh spring of water appeared.
“Many afflictions were cured or relieved for those who drank of it and great numbers of people journeyed
there on pilgrimages.” The water possessed the strange property of never overflowing the tub which had been
built around it. Dr. Padre Giamamatteo Giberti kept a record of the miracles which occurred at the spring. His
writing was later published as a book in Venice in 1672.[165]
In the 13th century we learn that St. Dominic (d. 1221) often used holy water for a number of reasons. We
read that he was once in the company of cardinals and nuns, who were conducting business about the acquisition
of a new convent, when they were suddenly interrupted by a man who excitedly announced that “The nephew of
my lord Stephen has just fallen from his horse, and is killed!” The young man’s uncle,

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 hearing him named sank, fainting on the breast of the blessed Dominic. They supported him; the blessed
Dominic rose, and threw holy water on him; then, leaving him in the arms of the others, he ran to the spot where
the body of the young man was lying, bruised and horribly mangled…
After celebrating Holy Mass, the Saint prayed by the body and then commanded the young man to return
to life, which he did.[166]
720: The stage of ecstasy should stay apart of your information processer throughout the rest of this book. You
must understand that regardless of this being the church they were about as intoxicated as the others. Maybe not
on wine or shrooms. But definetly the lead poisoning and smell of the air. Inclusive with the repetitive sight of
human slaughter the mind has got to be altered to a different form of thinking. The word Ecstasy today is known
as a street drug which supposedly enhances sex. Sex provides the original ecstasy status that humans are to
naturally receive. So indirectly this ecstasy scenario maybe stating that you can still enjoy the hi received from sex,
while being abstinent and focusing all your energy on God. This status of ecstasy supposedly makes them float
infront of the cross, commit miracles and many other things. If this is the case then what would stop priests,
bishops and popes from going into a status of ecstasy today? How come the world hasn’t heard of these men
whove raised people from the dead, excommunicated animals and have stopped wars all in the name of Lord. Are
they being greedy with their God?

Saint Levitation
When we turn to the lives of the Saints we find that these manifestations have been frequently observed,
and it will suffice to mention but a few from innumerable examples.
S. Francis of Assisiwas often “suspended above the earth, sometimes to a height of 3, sometimes to a
height of 4 cubits”; the same phenomenon has been recorded by eye witnesses in many instances throughout the
centuries. Among the large number of those who are known to have been raised from the ground whilst wrapt in
prayer are the stigmatized S. Catherine of Siena; S. Colette; Rainiero de Borgo San Sepolcro; S. Catherine de Ricci;
S. Alphonsus Rodriguez, S.J.; S. Mary Magdalen de Pazzi; Raimond Rocco; Bl. Charles de Sezze; S. Veronica Giuliani
the Capuchiness; S. Gerard Majella, the Redemptorist thaumaturge; that wondrous mystic Anne Catherine
Emmerich; Dominica Barbagli (died in 1858), the ecstatica of Montesanto Savino (Florence), whose levitations
were of daily occurrence. S. Ignatius Loyola whilst deeply contemplative was seen by John Pascal to be raised
more than a foot from the pavement; S. Teresa and S. John of the Cross were levitated in concurrent ecstasies in
the shady locutorio of the Encarnacion, as was witnessed by Beatriz of Jesus and the whole convent of nuns; S.
Alphonsus Liguori whilst preaching in the church of S. John the Baptist at Foggia was lifted before the eyes of the
whole congregation several feet from the ground; Gemma Galgani of Lucca, who died 11 April, 1903, was
observed whilst praying one evening in September, 1901, before a venerated Crucifix, to rise in the air in a celestial
trance and to remain several minutes at some distance from the floor. Above all, S. Joseph of Cupertino (1603 63),
one of the most extraordinary mystics of the 17th century, whose whole life seemed one long series of unbroken
raptures and ecstasies, was frequently lifted on high to remain suspended in mid air. Such notice was attracted by
this marvel that his superiors sent him from one lonely house of Capuchins or Conventuals to another, and he died
at the little hill town of Osimo, where his remains are yet venerated. For many years he was obliged to say Mass at
a private altar so inevitable were the ecstasies that fell upon him during the Sacrifice. There are, I think, few
sanctuaries more sweet and more fragrant with holiness than this convent at Osimo. During a most happy visit to
the shrine S. Jospeh I was deeply touched by the many memorials of the Saints, and by the kindness of the Fathers,
his brethren to day. S. Philip Neri and S. Francis Xavier were frequently raised from the ground at the elevation,

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and of ascetic S. Paul of the Cross the Blessed Strambi writes: The servant of God during Holy Mass was twice
elevated in the air to a height of 2 hand breadths from the ground both before and after the Consecration. It is
well known that in a certain London church a holy religious when he said mass was not unseldom levitated from
the predella, which manifestation I have myself witnessed, although the father was himself unconscious thereof
until the day of his death.[167]
Before, St. Drogo (d. 1186) was born, his father died and at his birth his mother also died, leaving him an
orphan. When he was old enough to understand, he learned that his mother’s life had been sacrificed for his own,
a revelation that distressed him greatly.
Around the age of 18 he decided to follow Our Lord in strict poverty and embarked on a penitential life as
a pilgrim, visiting churches and shrines in several lands. After a time he settled at Sebourg, near Valeniennes,
where he was hired as a shepherd by Elizabeth de la Haire. In this humble position he grew even deeper in prayer
and virtue and was regarded as a Saint by the people of the district. It is known that he tended the sheep every
day, yet he was often seen assisting at the offering of the Holy Sacrifice in distant churches. So many of these
bilocations were noted that a local saying became widely known: “Not being St. Drogo, I cannot be in 2 places at
the same time.”
After 6 years the holy man resumed his pilgrimages. St. Drogo died at the age of 84 after suffering for
many years from a repulsive and painful hernia, which could not be hidden. He is the patron of Shepherds.[168]
720: So now the saints are so powerful, in their obedience to the Lord and service to man they can show up
miraculously at 2 places at once.
Another Saint who experienced this phenomenon and wrote about it was VEN. MARIA Villani, a Dominican
nun (d. 1670). In documenting the experience for her confessor she wrote:
On one occasion I was conscious of a new experience. I felt myself seized and ravished out of my senses,
and that so powerfully that I found myself lifted up completely by the very soles of my feet, just as the magnet
draws up a fragment of iron, but with a gentleness that was marvelous and most delightful. At first I felt much
fear, but afterwards I remained in the greatest possible contentment and joy of spirit. Though I was quite beside
myself, still, in spite of that, I knew that I was raised some distance above the earth, my whole body being
suspended for a considerable space of time. Down to last Christmas Eve (1618) this happened to me on 5 different
occasions.[169]
Margaret of Castello (also called Margaret of Metola, after her birthplace) was born in 1287, in the castle
of the nobleman Parisio and his wife Emilia at Metola. But her father was not really “noble.” When his wife was
with child, Parisio simply assumed that he would have a healthy son and heir. But the festivities planned to
celebrate this joyful event were suddenly called off when the child born was a dreadfully deformed girl.
She was unusually small, hunchbacked, facially deformed, her right leg was shorter than the left, and she
was blind. Margaret’s parents treated her very badly. They kept the child hidden from relatives and friends, and
worse, from themselves. When she was 6 years old her father walled her up in a cell next to a chapel hidden in a
forest. 14 years later, her parents took her to a shrine at Citta di Castello to pray for a cure. When she was not
cured, Margarets’ parents returned home without a word to their blind, crippled daughter, cruelly abandoning her.
Left to roam the streets, Margaret became a beggar among beggars. She had always been a bright, good
child, and had profited from lessons of the castle’s chaplain. Left on her own at age 20, she became a holy young
woman blind, but limping around to help others.
On the day she became a Mantellata, a member of the Third Order of Penance of St. Dominic, the blind
Margaret knew about a dozen Psalms by heart. The next morning, she knew all 150 Psalms by heart. She said the
knowledge simply came to her.

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 Despite her deformities, Margaret had always been kind and cheerful. She once made a profund
impression on a group of prisoners when she was elevated some 20 inches off the ground in ecstatic prayer and
her poor face was transformed in beauty. She made true predictions about what would happen to various
individuals. She cured a little girl who was dying, and ended a roaring fire in the home where she lived by throwing
her cloak down the stairs upon the flames.
Margaret is also credited with having restored to life a man and 2 children. A little boy fell into a river and
was drowned. When his body was recovered, the heart broken mother prayed to Margaret, and the child came
back to life.
A woodsman was killed by bears. Hours later, his friends found his body, horribly mangled. They carried it
to his home. His wife and children gathered around the corpse and implored Margaret to plead with God for the
Restoration of their husband and father. The man returned to life.
A child fell from a high balcony to the street below and was killed. Through Margarets intercession he was
brought back to life uninjured.
And these are only a few among the astoundingly long list of miracles attributed to Margaret: the dead
brought back to life, healing of the blind, mute, deaf, lame, paralyzed, cancerous, and of people with every kind of
sickness and infirmity.
When Margaret died at age 33, on April 13, 1320, the people at her funeral cried out that she was a saint
and should have the privilege of being buried inside the church. The local prior saw this devotion as premature
and unauthorized as yet. But the crowde was insistent.
A girl, crippled, mute, and with a curvature of the spine, who had never been able to walk, was brought by
her parents to the church, Chiesa della Carita. The parents with their helpless child pushed through the disputing
crowd to Margarets bier. There, they pleaded with the cripple who was a friend of God to have pity on a fellow
cripple.
Suddenly there was an awed silence as the crowd stared at the left arm of Margaret; it was rising from her
side! The arm reached over and touched the young crippled girl beside the bier.
A moment later the girl who had never walked rose to her feet unaided. The girl who had been mute
looked around as if in a dread, and then screamed: “I have been cured! I have been cured through Margaret!” The
one time mute cripple threw herself into the arms of her father and mother, laughing and crying. Pandemonium
broke out in the church. The prior needed nothing further; Margarets body was buried in a vault in the
church.[170]
Margaret of Metola and Castello (d. 1320) was dwarfed, blind, hunchbacked and lame. Unfortunately, she
was deserted by her parents when a cure at a miraculous shrine was not received. Cared for by various families of
the city, she devoted her life to prayer and endeared herself to everyone. She became a Dominican tertiary and
cared for the sick and dying, but she showed special solicitude toward prisoners and frequently visited them. One
special prisoner, Alonzo, came to her attention.
Alonzo, it is reported, was imprisoned on a false charge, leaving his wife and young son destitute. Tortured
by guards who were attempting to learn of the crime he did not commit, Alonzo was permanently crippled. Later,
his despair was uncontrollable when he learned that his little son had died of starvation. In his despair, he became
known for his blasphemous language and uncontrollable rages.
One day when Margaret was visiting Alonzo with 2 of her companions, she detected the man’s distress and
stood beside him in prayer. In a moment there were loud grasps and cries of astonishment. Margaret had
levitated 20 inches from the ground. With her hands joined in prayer and her head thrown back as though she
were looking toward the heavens, her typically unattractive face was transformed by a glorious radiance.

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 When Margaret finally descended she spoke of God’s mercy and encouraged Alonzo to repent. The
desperate man tried to blaspheme, as was his custom, but he could not. Instead he pleaded. “Little Margaret,
please pray for me.”[171]

Fig. 74.). Blessed Margaret of Metola (Castello) Died in 1320 and was found incorrupt in 1558. Her body is on
display under the high altar of the Church of St. Domenico at Citta di Castello , Italy
Another early miracle was effected through the prayers of St. Dominic (d. 1221). It seems that one day at
the friary of St. Sixtus, St. Dominic sent Br. John of Calabria and Br. Albert to the city to beg alms. They were
unsuccessful until they met a woman on the return journey who gave them a loaf of bread. But before they
reached the friary, they gave the loaf of bread to a poor man who was in great need.
On meeting St. Dominic they explained all that happened to the satisfaction of the Saint, who explained
that it must have been an angel who was testing their generosity. As there was no food in the friary, St. Dominic
trusted in Divine Providence and summoned all the brethren to the refectory. The table was prepared, dishes and
cups were placed and, as the friars sat down, Br. Henry the Roman began to read, as was the custom during meals.
St. Dominic, with his hands on the table, bowed his head and began to pray. As the Saint’s biographer writes:
Suddenly 2 beautiful young men appeared in the midst of the refectory, carrying loaves in 2 white cloths
which hung from their shoulders before and behind. They began to distribute the bread, beginning the lower
rows, one at the right hand and the other at the left, placing before each brother one whole loaf of admirable
beauty. Then, when they were come to the blessed Dominic, and had in like manner placed an entire loaf before
him, they bowed their heads and disappeared, without any one knowing, even to this day, whence they came or
whither they went.
Another miracle at this time took place when there was only a little wine in the cellar. The Saint, by his
prayers, increased the amount so that the friars ate and drank all they wanted, both for that day, the next and the
day after that. After the third day, St. Dominic would not allow any of the multiplied bread to remain in the house
and gave a beautiful discourse warning the brethren never to distrust the Divine goodness, even in time of greatest
need.
Br. Tancred, the priuor of the convent, Br. Odo of Rome and Br. Henry, Br. Lawrence of England, Br.
Gandion and Br. John of Rome and many others were present at the miracle, which they related to St. Cecilia and
the other sisters who were still living at the monastery of Santa Maria. It is also related that some of the bread and
wine were preserved for a long time as relics.
More is told to us by Fr. Ludovico Prelormitano of other miracles of St. Dominic. According to his account,
after St. Dominic had finished some business with the Holy Pontiff at Rome, he went to Bologna and lodged there

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with the friars of his order at Santa Maria Mascharella. While there the miracle mentioned above was renewed,
with enough bread remaining for 3 days. The miracle is said to have taken place twice at Bologna and twice at
Rome. After one of the miraculous distributions of bread, the 2 beautiful young men gave each friar a handful of
dried figs, of which one brother testified to Pope Gregory IX under oath: “Never had I eaten better figs.”
Three centuries later, in 1528, the rector of Santa Maria Mascharella reported that every year, on the
same day when the holy Angels brought the heavenly bread, a most delightful perfume was perceived in the place
where the refectory had been located a scent that lasted 40 hours. Additionally, the table on which the
miraculous loaves had been placed was still to be seen (in 1528), protected behind iron bars in the wall.[172]
St. Gertrude The Great (d. 1302) was a mystic who experienced mystical favors and numerous visions,
which are recounted for us in her Life and Revelations. Our Lord once gave her extraordinary graces which are
given in Chapter XXI of her book. Soon after, she was so full of joy that she rather boldly, but lovingly, mentioned
to Our Lord that He ‘had not assured me of these favours by solemn contract.” To this Our Lord replied, “Do not
complain of this; approach and receive the confirmation of my promises.” Our Lord then opened both His hands to
reveal His Heart and commanded Gertrude to extend her hands. Our Lord then promised to preserve the gifts he
had given her St. Gertrude continues:
After these most sweet words, as I withdrew my hand, I perceived thereon seven golden circlets, in the
form of rings, one on each finger, and 3 on the signet finger; which indicated that the 7 privileges were confirmed
to me, as I had asked.
This mystical favor in commemorated by the Church in St. Gertrude’s Office. This appears during the third
antiphon at Lauds which: “My Lord Jesus has espoused me to Him with 7 rings, and crowned me as a bride.” St.
Gertrude’s feast is observed worldwide on November 16.
We have in the case of St. Catherine of Siena (d. 1380) an example of a ceremony witnessed by the Blessed
Virgin and 4 Saints. We are fortunate in having Bl. Raymond of Capua, the Saint’s confessor, relate for us what took
place.
It was almost the time of Lent, Bl. Raymond writes, “when men celebrate the vain feast of the stomach,”
before the time “when the faithful must abstain from meat and fats.” While others in the household feasted, St.
Catherine was alone in her room “seeking through prayer and fasting the face of her eternal Bridgegroom.”
Suddenly Our Lord said to her:
“Since for love of Me, you have forsaked vanities and despised the pleasure of the flesh and fastened all
the delights of your heart on Me now, when the rest of the household are feasting and enjoying themselves, I have
determined to celebrate the wedding feast of your soul and to respouse you to Me in faith as I promised.”
Before he had finished speaking, His most glorious Virgin Mother appeared with the most blessed St. John
the Evangelist, the glorious Apostle Paul, St. Dominic, the founder of the order, and the prophet David with his
harp. While David played sweet strains on the harp, the Mother of God took Catherines hand in her own most
holy hand and, presenting her to her Son, courteously asked Him to marry her to Himself in faith. The Son of God,
graciously agreeing, held out a gold ring with 4 pearls set in a circle and a wonderful diamond in the middle, and
with His most holy right hand He slipped it onto the virgin’s second finger saying, “There! I marry you to Me in
faith, to Me, your Creator and Saviour. Keep this faith unspotted until you come to Me in heaven and celebrate
the marriage that has no end.
After the vision disappeared Cathering saw the ring on her finger, although no one else could see it. Bl.
Raymond tells that “she frequently confessed to me in all humility that she could always see it on her finger and
that there was never a moment when it was out of her sight.”[173]

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 An unusual case is that of St. Catherine of Siena (d. 1380), whose reception of the stigmata is told us by her
convesor, Bl. Raymond of Capua. The event took place a Pisa after the reception of Holy Communion. Entering
into an ecstasy, as was her custom, St. Cathering lay prone for a time. Then to the surprise of everyone present,
“We saw her little body, which had been lying prostrate, gradually rise up until it was upright on its knees, her
arms and hands stretched themselves out, and light beamed from her face. She remained in his position for a long
time, perfectly stiff, with her eyes closed, and then we saw her suddenly fall, as thought mortally wounded.”
After the ecstasy, Catherine called for Bl. Raymond, who suspected that she had received a remarkable
grace. The Saint quietly began to relate what had taken place.
You must know, Father, that by the mercy of the Lord Jesus I now bear in my body His stigmata. I saw the
Lord fixed to the Cross coming towards me in a great light, and such was the impulse of my soul to go and meet its
creator that it forced the body to rise up. Then from the scars of His most sacred Wounds, I saw 5 rays of blood
coming down towards me, to my hands, my feet and my heart. Realizing wthat was to happen, I exclaimed, “O
Lord God, I beg You do not let these scars show on the outside of my body! As I said this before the rays reached
me their colour changed from blood red to the colour of light, and in the form of pure light they arrived at the 5
points of my body: hands, feet and heart.
Bl. Raymond then asked if a shaft of light had reached the right side. She replied, “No, it came straight to
my left side, over my heart; because that line of light from Jesus’ right side struck me directly, not aslant.”
When Bl. Raymond asked if she felt any pain, St. Catherine replied, “I feel such pain at those 5 points ,
especially in my heart, that if the Lord does not perform another miracle I do not see how I can possibly go on, and
within a few days I shall be dead.” Strange to relate, Bl. Raymond, together with her companion, prayed that the
good God would relieve her of the pain, a prayer that was promptly answered. On being asked by Bl. Raymond if
she still suffered, the Saint answered, “The Lord, to my great displeasure, has granted your prayers, and those
wounds no longer give my body any pain, instead they have made it stronger and healthier and I can feel quite
clearly that the strength comes from the places where the agonies came from before.” This is one of the few cases
in which the stigmata did not cause considerable discomfort. [174]
The question arises: how many stigmatists have there been? Dr. Imbert Gourbeyre, a French physician
numbered 321 genuine stigmatis in his 2 volume work, La Stigmatization, which was written in 1894. A few more
stigmatists have been added since then. One source reports that all of these were Roman Catholic, the majority
being female and Italian. Of the several hundred stigmatists whose lives have been studied since the 13th century,
only 62 have been either canonized or beatified.
Dr. Imbert Gourbeyre gives other statistics. Of those stigmatists he regarded as being genuine, he
calculated that 229 were from Italy; Siciliy claimed 10; France, 70; Spain, 47; Germany, 33; Belgium, 15; Portugal,
13; 5 each from Switzerland and Holland;’ 3 from Hungary and 1 from Peru.
With regard to religious affiliations, Dr. Imbert Gourbeyre tells us there were 109 stigmatists from the
Dominican Order, the Franciscans numbered 102, of which a quarter were Poor Clares; Camelites, 14; Ursulines,
14; Visitation nuns, 12; Augustinians, 8; Jesuits, 3; and the others were laymen or members of smaller religious
orders. Because the doctor’s book was published in 1894, there are, of course, no 20th century cases
mentioned.[175]
Many of the visitors to the sickroom of St. Lydwine of Schiedam (d. 1433) were skeptical of the reports
they had heard regarding her mystical gifts and decided to test her. Many of her gifts are recounted in this book,
but the one that caused the most consternation among her visitors was that of reading their souls and disclosing to
them transgressions known only to God and themselves.

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 One such visitor was a woman who actually “had relations with a demon” but who pretended virtue and
claimed to be a virgin. St. Lydwine scoffed at the claim and exposed the hypocrite, who did not contradict the
Saint, but left, furious at having been exposed.
A young girl who was a witness to this event questioned the Saint about her severity with the woman and
was told by the Saint to make this experiment to prove the woman’s worth. The young girl was to go to the
womans house and speak with her. If the woman listened patiently, it would prove that St. Lydwine was wrong. If
the woman responded with rage, it would prove that the Saint was correct in her appraisal of the woman’s sinful
condition. The young girl did as the Saint suggested and was met with furious insults. The woman died soon
afterward. When the Saint began praying for the woman, Lydwin’s Guardian Angel revealed that “she is in the
abyss from which there is no escape.”
One visitor to St. Lydwines sickroom was overwhelmed with her holiness and his own wretched sinfulness
and felt compelled to mention his sins to her, perhaps in the hope that she would pray for him to overcome his
failings. The visitor, Dom Angeli, recounted his sins through his tears, but out of shame withheld the sin of
adultery. The Saint mentioned the sin to him, but he denied ever having committed it. During another visit the
Saint confronted him with the sin, telling him the day, hour and place where it had been committed since their last
conversation. To this Dom Angeli exclaimed, “Who has been able to reveal to you?” After crying for a time for
having offended God, he promised to amend his ways, and did so.[176]
St. Joseph of Cupertine (d. 1663) needed only one command to stop a storm that threatened the area.
Going out of doors, he dismissed the storm with the command, “Go away in God’s name.” And it left the area
immediately.
On another occasion a storm, described as something of a hurricane with a heavy downpour of rain,
threatened the area around the convent at Grottella, which badly frightened the towfnfolk. It, too, ceased at his
command. It is reported that the clouds fled before him and the sky cleared, to the wonderment of all.
Although many of the preceding miracles were about the quieting of storms, one storm arose as a result of
the prayers of the Polish people and of BL. LADISLAUS of GIELNIOV (d. 1505). His native Poland was in danger of
being overrun in 1498 by the Tartars, who were in league with the Turks. The combined enemy numbered some
70,000 men. Who encamped between the Pruth and the Dniester Rivers prior to their planned attack.
Bl. Ladislaus appealed to the frightened population to pray and put their trust in God. Before the enemy
could begin their assault, the waters of both rivers rose to flood stage, thoroughly inundating the area. The flood
was followed by an intense frost and then a severe snowstorm. Thousands of the enemy either drowned of
perished in the cold. The rest were easily defeated by the Polish Prince Stephen.
Bl. Ladislaus’ biographer writes: “The victory was generally ascribed to the prayers of Bl. Ladislaus, whose
prestige was enormously enhanced.”[177]
720: Now is this where the bullshit begins or what? Saints flying and reviving dogs from the dead. I could care
less about your so called divine seals of approval and witness signatures. Reproduce the activity infront of my eyes
or its malarchy! Were not gonna sit here with the back and forth of what is and what isn’t. This my friend is
imaginary land Disney talk. If one was even to believe said stories would make one obviously an idiot relative to
the understandings of existence that science provides. This may be why the church is spat upon and also not
spoken about publicly in the modern world. For number 1 the hypocritical status of imposing divinity when theyre
raping little boys all across the world. As a matter of fact just recently a homosexual drug filled orgy was
discovered by police in the Vatican in 2017. When we see white people angry at Catholicism we are definetly
looking at a mental condition of exposure to extravagant lies that are presented to be real and also supported with
facsimilie archaeology to further enforce the lie.

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 In essence this is why occultism wins. You see Catholicism is tryin to cloak or mask ancient practices for
the masses to practice symbolically without them knowing. In order to do that they must also prove themselves
capable of certain preset psychological schemas that are implanted in the human mind to be of a superior God
status. Such as flight, other supernatural capabilities like walking on water, not corroding after death and raising
the dead. Once the masses have adjusted their thinking to accept your supposed superior position from proof of
actions. You will be considred the omnipotent. Which reinforces the Christian theology that humans aren’t
supposed to have knowledge. It is not a natural yearn for them, for they are like their infants always dependent.
Therefore they need to be controlled either directly or indirectly. The sheep will need a shepherd to protect them
from the wolves.

Raising The Dead

It is a long way from a convent in Scandinavia to a Poor Clare abbey in Corbie, France. St. Colette of Corbie
was born Nicolette Boylet at Calcye near Corbie on January 13, 1381. As a practical person for the saints are the
most practical persons in the world, despite some notions to the contrary Colette refomed many Poor Clare
monasteries and established 20 new ones (Colettine Poor Clares). Besides these accomplishments, Colette also
performed many miracles.
St. Colette was a friend of St. Juan Capistrano and St. Vincent Ferrer. From her convent as Besancon, she
once appeared to Vincent, while he was at prayer in Saragossa, pressing him to end the schism then dividing the
Church. She had many friends among the nobility, such as the Duchess of Burgundy; many daughters of princes
were sent to her Poor Clare convents of strict reform. She made many prophecies and had many visions.
Once when iding on a mule not far from Besancon, St. Colette fell into an ecstasy and her face became so
radiant that a stream of light flowed upon the 2 friars walking by her side. Along the road people left the fields,
coming to touch her mantle, and then her hands and feet as she went on. They were too much in awe to stop her,
and Colette was oblivious to their reverent attentions.
As an abbess, Colette once went to Verey to make her 8th monastery foundation. She was welcomed
warmly by the Dominican nuns (the spiritual sons and daughters of Dominic, Francis and Clare have always
maintained a special friendship). St. Colette embraced and kissed each Dominican nun as they all came forward.
But at the end of the greetings Colette noticed a young nun who stood at a distance and made no move to
approach. St. Colette said to the Dominican chaplain standing nearby, “Shall I not also kiss her?”
“She is a leper, Reverend Mother,“ the priest replied in embarrassment. “She cannot live in the
community; over there is her house”; he pointed to a small building neaby. “We are sorry to distress you. It would
have been better for her to stay way, but she wanted so much to come.“
Without a word, Colette quickly walked straight over to the young nun. She put both arms around the
pathetic figure and gave her the warmest embrace of all. The other nuns fell back in alarm, and the young nun,
not having been embraced for years, also recoiled in horror as she realized she had contaminated” the famed and
holy abbess. The priest moved forward to draw the abbess back.
But Colette quietly announced that everything was all right. And indeed it was the young nun had been
cured of leprosy!
Colette is also credited with raising many to life again, including a nun of Poligny already in her coffin, who
had died without absolution, a child who had been buried, 4 grandees who lived for years afterward, and a goodly
number of still born children.

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 One stillborn tbaby was born to the wide of a man named Prucet, at Besancon. The husband did not want
to believe the baby was dead. He seized the lifeless body and ran with it to the church, where he insisted that it be
baptized. But the priest had to tell him that it was undoubtedly dead. The father returned home sadly with his
tiny, silent burden.
Perhaps to distract his mind or to give him some hope in his grief, friends and neighbors encouraged him
to take the dead infant to the Poor Clare Monastery and ask for the prayers of the Abbess Colette. The father
grasped at this hope and went to the monastery, where Colette, when informed of the story, came to the
enclosure grate by the parlor.
Prucet fell on his knees and held out the dead infant in mute appeal. The abbess also fell on her knees
and began to pray. The friends who had followed Prucet also crowded into the parlot. At the sight of both the
father and the abbess on their knees, and of the dead infant, they all fell silent. Then they too sank to their knees
and the men doffed their caps in reverence. After a while Colette arose, stepped back from the grate, took off her
veil and had it passed out to the father. She said to him, “Wrap the child up in it, and take it back to the church to
be baptized.”
Prucet obeyed with the simplicity of a child. When he and his friends arrived at the church, Prucet again
asked the priest to baptize the baby. The poor priest thought Prucet had lost his senses in his grief. But he was
shaken when the familiar cry of an infant came out from under the black veil of the abbess. Prucet told the priest
what had happened. The priest, fearing that life might be only temporary, decided not to delay the child’s Baptism
for even a moment. “What name?” he asked.
“Colette!”
Colette Prucet grew into sturdy girlhood, entered the convent at Besancon, and late made her solemn
vows. She became abbess of a Poor Clare monastery at Pont a Mousson in Lorraine. Sister Perrine, the faithful
biographer of St. Colette, wrote that “Colette Prucet herself told me all this.”
St. Colette is credeited with many such miracles of raising the dead, 4 of which were involved in her
beatification. Great devotion grew up about St. Colette because of her intercessory powers for childless couples,
expectant mothers, and mortally ill infants. After the miracle of baby Colette, many came to her to be cured of
sicknesses and other troubles. When Colette herself died in 1447, the marks of her own sickness and suffering
disappeared. Her body became incomparably and marvelously beautiful, with skin white as snow, supple limbs,
and giving off a lovely fragrance.[178]
St. Catherine of Bologna (1413 1463) was a woman of the nobility, author of The Seven Spiritual Weapons,
a painter (also of miniatures) and a patroness of artists; she became abbess of a Franciscan convent in her native
Bologna. About 19 days after her death, miracles began to occur at her grave, so her body was exhumed and
found undecayed, white and fragant. Her face appeared joyful.
A special sort of chest chair was set up in the choir of the convent on which the dead abbess was seated in
her nuns robes. This “throne” could be rolled to a window for the public to see her. Once, after her death,
Catherine opened her eyes and made a sign for the young Leonora Poggi, then about 11 years old, to approach
her: “Leonora, come here! You will be a sister in this convent, where all will love you. And you shall be the
guardian of my body.”
8 Years later Leonora refused a wealthy suitor and entered the Bologna convent. At the end of the Year
1500 the saint appeared to Sister Leonora and requested a special chapel where her body would be kept in a
sitting position. Leonora fulfilled this commission, and the faithful then had easy access to the saint’s relics. In
1688 an even larger chapel was made for St. Catherine; one can see her incorrupt body enthroned there even

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today. The body has become darkened, but this is probably due to the flames and fumes of the innumerable
candles and votive lights that have been burned there for over 500 years.
One of the most unique saints of all time was Joan of Arc (1421 1431), la Pucelle, the Maid of Orleans.
While still in her teens she courageously and successfully led French troops against the occupying English armies;
she had been so directed by “voices” of St. Michael, St. Margaret, St. Catherine, and others. Like all great saints,
St. Joan was a very balanced personality; allied to her fortitude and fearlessness were gentleness and pity for the
suffering.
In early March, 1430, St. Joan arrived at the village of Lagny sur Marn, in the direction of Paris. Here she
learned of a woman who was greatly distressed because she had given birth to a stillborn son. Some villagers
approached Joan and asked hfor her intercession. The mother prayed only that the child might be brought to life
long enough to be baptized and so gain Heaven.
Joan went to the church where the dead child had been laid at the feet of the statue of the Blessed
Mother. Young girls of the village were praying by the small corpse.
St. Joan then added her own prayers. The baby came to life and yawned 3 times. Baptism was hurriedly
administered. Then the baby body died again, and his beautiful spotless baptized soul went straight to
Heaven.[179]
St. Martin de Porres (1579 1639)(Fig. 488), a mulatto who lived nearly twice as long as his friend Rose,
brought black and white together then and has done so ever since. When he died, as when Rose passed away, the
whole city of Lima and the “most important” people turned out. There were many wonders in Martin’s life of
charity: the multiplication of food, cures, ecstasies, bilocations, etc. Though he was a Dominican he had a
Franciscan love for animals, and was so kind to them as even to warn rodents to leave the monastery when their
destrcuction was being planned.
Martin brought back to life a dead dog, a long time pet of the Dominican monastery in Lima. The dog had
grown quite old, 18 years old, and had become mangy and smelly to boot. The animal was a pet on an older monk
of the community, Brother John, who felt it his duty to destroy the dog. He ordered a Negro to do so. The negro
killed it with a blow from a stone that fractured its skull.
The man was dragging off the dead dog to dispose of it when he ran into Brother Martin. Martin reproved
him severely, then carried the dog in his arms to his cell and laid it on the floor. As soon as the dog touched the
floor it began to move and pulled itself to a sitting position. Then Martin washed the blood and dirt out of the
wound and stitiched the head together. The dog was cured of both the head wound and the mange. The oldmonk
was very pleased to have his pet back; Martin humbly reproved him stating that “ he had not done well in ordering
a companion of so many years to be killed.” This story was attested by 3 witnesses and presented during St.
Martins canonization process.[180]
In the 14th century there was a miracle involving Bl. Peter Armengol (c. 1238 1304), a converted robber
captain. In his new life of charitable zeal, at one time he was attempting to arrange a ransom deal for 18 Christians
held hostage while waiting for the ransom money to arrive, Preter, in the new found enthusiasm of his conversion,
preached Christ to the Moors.
The Moors did not respond favorably to Peter’s efforts. They hanged him. He had been hanging there for
6 days when his friend Florentin arrived with the ransom money. Florentin, in great shock and grief, was amazed
to hear the body speak to him, saying that he, Peter, was alive through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
In the presence of many witnesses Florentin cut Peter down, alive and well. [181]
St. Margaret of Cortona (1247 1297) left home at age 18 because of harsh treatment by her stepmother.
She led a scandalous life for 9 years as the mistress of a young nobleman and she bore him a son. One day the

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nobleman did not come home; his dog returned and led Margaret to the blood stained corpse of her paramour in
the forest. She subsequently made a public confession of her sins in the church at Cortona, changed her life, and
became a great penitent. She secured the release of many souls from Purgatory, confronted demons, cured the
sick, and restored a dead boy to life. At Cortona, Italy, her body is incorrupt to this day, and at times it emits a
fragant odor.

Fig. 75.). St. Margaret of Cortona, laywoman, Franciscan penitent

Fig. 76.). Incorrupt Body of St. Rose of Viterbo
St. Rose of Viterbo, a city in Romagna, Italy, lived from 1235 1252. As soon as she could walk she wanted
to go to church, and loved to pray in quiet places. When an aunt died, the weeping of relatives stirred the small
child’s heart to deep sympathy. Rose was then only 3, but she prayed in silence with her eyes raised heavenward.
She touched the body of her dead aunt with her small hand and called the corpse by name. The eyes of the dead
woman opened; she was alive again! She happily embraced her little niece. Christ once appeared to Rose on the
cross, crowned with thorns and bleeding from all His wounds. Rose’s body remains incorrupt to our day. [182]
In the country of Neyll, a King Echu allowed St. Patrick to receive his beloved daughter Cynnia as a nun,
though he bewailed the fact that his royal line would thereby end without issue. The king exacted a promise from
Patrick not to insist that he be baptized, yet to promise him the heavenly kingdom. Patrickagreed, and left the
matter in the hands of God.
Sometime later King Echu lay dying. He sent a messenger to St. Patrick to tell him he desired Baptism and the
heavenly kingdom. To those around him the King gave an order that he not be buried until Patrick came. Patrick,
thin in the monastery of Saballum, 2 days journey away, knew of the situation through the Holy Spirit before the
messenger even arrived. He left to go to the King, bu arrived to find Echu dead.
St. Patrick revived the King, instructed him, and baptized him. He asked Echu to relte what he had seen of
the joys of the just and the pains of the wicked, so that his account could be used for the proving of Patrick’s
preaching. Echu told many other world wonders and of how, in the heavenly country, he had seen the place
Patrick had promised him. But the King could not enter in because he was unbaptized.
Then st. Patrick asked Echu if he would rather live longer in this world, or go to the palce prepared for him
in the heavenly kingdom. The King answered that all the world had was emptiest smoke compared to the celestial
joys. Then have received the Eucharist, he fell asleep in the Lord.

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 There was a Prince in Humestia who was baptized. Later he expressed unbelief about the doctrine of the
Resurrection. After St. Patrick quoted various texts from the Scriptures, the prince said that if Patrick would raise
his grandfather, by then buried many days, he would believe in that Resurection which Patrick preached.
Patrick signed the tomb of the grandfather with his staff, had it opened, and prayed. A man of very great
height, but not as big as a “giant” who had recently been raised from a huge tomb by Patrick, came forth from the
tomb. He described the torments that went on in Hell, and was baptized. He received the Eucharist, and retired
again to his former sepulcher and “slept in the Lord.” After witnessing this miracle none doubted the truth of the
Resurrection.
On another occasion a band of men who hated St. Patrick falsely accused him and his companions of
stealing, and sentenced them to death. Patrick raised a man from a nearby tomb and commanded him to witness
to the truth of the case, which the resurrected man did. He protested the innocence of Patrick and his companions
and the deceit of the evil ones. In the presence of all, the resurrected man also showed where the alleged stolen
goods–some flax–were hidden. Many of those who had conspired for the death of St. Patrick now became his
converts.
It is interesting to note that each of the miracles related here was aimed at establishing truth, besides
doing good to various individuals. Here is a final example.
An evil man named Machaldus, and his companions, who placed on their heads certain diabolical signs
called “deberth,” signifying their devotion to Satan, plotted to mock St. Patrick. They covered one of their group,
Garbanus, with a cloak as if he were dead. Garbanus, though in perfect health, was placed on a couch as if laid out
in preparation for burial. The men then sent for Patrick, asking him to raise the covered Garbanus from the dead.
This was a fatal mistake.
St. Patrick told them it was with deceit, but not with falsehood, that they had declared their companion
dead. Disregarding their entreaties, Patrick went on his way praying for the soul of the derider.
Then, uncovering their friend, the plotters found garbanus not feigning death, but actually dead! Conrite of
heart, they pursued St. Patrich; they obtained pardon and were baptized. At their entreaty, St. Patrick also revived
the dead Garbanus.
The same once evil Machaldus became a great penitent, a bishop eminent in holiness and miracles, and
became known at St. Machaldus.
Patrick also once raised to life a dead horse belonging to the charioteer of Darius. He also restored to the
charioteer the health he had lost after accusing Patrick of killing the horse. [183]
In 1643 two miners, Jan Wieliczko and his son Wawrzyn, carrying their tools, began to descen together on
a single rope down the 60 foot shaft of a small mine they operated. The rope broke and they fell to the rocky
bottom far below. The mountaineers of the area assembled and, after much difficulty, brought the 2 bodies,
crushed and mangled, to the surface.
Though all seemed beyond any human aid, the people did not despair. With the simple faith of the Polish,
they fell on their knees and implored Our Lady of Czestochowa for mercy. Suddenly the 2 men stood up, healthy
and well. All raised their voices to sing the praises of the Blessed Mother. (“If you have faith as a grain of mustard
seed…”)[184]
In 1540 a really gruesome event left a lasting memory among the inhabitants of Lublin, a few miles from
jasna Gora. Marcin Lanio, operator of large slaughterhouse, went to town on a shopping tour. His wife,
Malgorzata, left her kitchen momentarily to borrow some yeast from a neighbor. She needed it for the batter she
was about to bake in her large oven.

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 Malgorzata left her 2 youngsters at home; Poitrus, only 4, who had often watched the butcher’s slaughter
the livestock in the yard, decided to imitate them. In his childish mind the nearest and most convenient victim
would be his little brother Kazio, age 2, sleeping peacefully in a nearby crib.
Without realizing the consequences of such an action, Poitrus took a sharp knife and slashed the throat of
his oblivious innocent brother. Seeing the blood gush out, Poitrus realized that something bad had happened, and
overcome with fear and dread of punishment, he hid inside the large bakers oven left open by his mother.
Within a few moments the unsuspecting mother returned, and not hearing the children, assumed they
were both asleep. She finished preparing the batter and started the log fire in the oven in which Poitrus lay
hidden. Poitrus, poor child suddenly realizing his terrible predicament, began to scream in agony.
The poor mother’s blood froze: Realizing where the boy was, she finally managed to pull him out, but the
boy had already suffocated in the smoke filled oven; he lay lifeless in her arms. As the mother looked about,
paralyzed at this sudden tragedy, her eyes fell upon her other son, lying slain and blood soaked in his crib.
The double shock was too much for the poor woman. She became demented, struck her head against the
wall, pulled at her hair, tore her clothes to shreds, and became like a mad woman.
Her unsuspecting husband, Marcin, walked in on this dreadful sight. When he saw his wife in that
condition between the 2 corpses of his sons, he did not pause to think, but in great emotion, and apparently
thinking she had killed them both, he grabbed a nearby axe and crushed her skull with one blow.
After a little while Marcins mind cleared. He realized what he had done, and dreadful fear and remorse
seized him. In the meantime neighbors and friends were gathering with mixed emotions, and some with pious
advice. Marcin seemed to have a heavenly inspiration, and he turned from despair to hope in Our Lady of
Czestochowa, to whom he had always been devoted.
By now all the neighbors had arrived, standing in shock and amazement at the tripe tragedy. Their
astonishment grew as Marcdin silently and determinedly loaded the 3 corpses onto a wagon, made the Sign of the
Cross, and turned the horses toward Jasna Gora. Some watched in fear, others in tears.
Marcin journeyed on silently toward Jasna Gora, with people assembling along the roadside as they saw or
heard of the strange sight of a man with 3 dead persons, apparently his own wife and sons, in an open wagon. As
Marcin came to the shrine, several kind persons improvised 3 caskets and carried them into the chapel. Marcin
remained at the door, prostrate, pleading with the entering faithful to pray to the Madonna for his family. Perhaps
he felt too guilty to go inside.
Inside the shrine, Blessed Stainislaw Oporowski, a devout priest, was conducting Benedicition of the Most
Blessed Sacrament. The portrait of the Black Madonna, high above the main altar, seemed to glow with heavenly
splendor. Blessed Stanislaw and all the congregation joined in supplications for the poor husband and his family.
The 3 dead persons laid out before all the mother and 2 little boys were a piteous sight.
All the congregation sang the Blessed Mothers hymn, the Magnificat. A supernatural feeling penetrated
the chapel. At the words, “Because He that is might hath done great things to me, and holy is His Name,” a shock
came over the congregation.
The 3 lifeless corpses came to life and slowly rose from their places. For a moment there was a seemingly
age long silence. Then came a spontaneous outburst, and all joined in a thanksgiving hymn to the Madonna.
Husband, wife, and children had a marvelous reunion.
Soon the fame of this tremendous miracle spread worldwide. The Emperor ordered a true copy of the
miraculous portrait of Our Lady of Czestochowa to be made and placed in the Cathedral of Vienna. Copies of this
portrait should also be placed in many home shrines and in public plces. Just as the Poles (many in America) love
Our Lady of Jasna Gora, so should everyone love her.

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 If the faith of the Poles were imitated by others, there might well be many more miracles like those which
gave splendor to Jasna Gora, the Bright Hill sanctuary of Our Ladyof Czestochowa. [185]
Some saints, tortured and martyred, disfigured and beheaded, cut to pieces by swords or mangled by wild
beasts, seemed to have ended their lives in humiliation, disgrace, and utter destruction before their merciless
tormentors. In some cases, martyrs were temporarily healed by God to testify to the truth of their faith and to
glorify God. Usually this has not happened; but on Judgment Day the roles shall be reversed: the persecuted shall
judge their persecutors. Then shall the saints appear totally different from the way they looked in those last
bloody scenes on Earth. Then will they shine in glory, and their enemies will shudder with shame. The risen bodies
of the saints will then be comely and beautiful, strong and supple, perfect, radiant, and glorious.
No person ever dies. Once a soul has been created, it can never die, but will live forever, in either great joy
or in terrible misery. Only the body dies, because the soul must leave a physical instrument in which it can no
longer operate. At “death” the indestructible soul goes right on living either in heaven, Hell, Purgatory, or possibly
in Limbo, and it is the saved soul that shall reclaim a resurrected and glorious body on the day of Christs Second
Coming. [186]

Chapter 8
Wanted Dead or Alive
The Incorruptible Saints
St. Catherine of Genoa (d. 1510) was entombed in the hospital chapel where she had labored for many
years in the service of the poor. 18 months later it was discovered that a conduit of water ran behind the wall near
the tomb. To determine if the casket of the Saint had been affected by the moisture, an exhumation was
conducted. These fears were realized when the casket was found in deplorable condition due to the moisture, but
to the surprise of all present, the body of the Saint was found perfectly incorrupt, even though the shroud was
thoroughly moist. Following examination and re clothing of the body, it was left exposed for 8 days in the chapel
to satisfy the devoition and curiousity of the faithful.
The body is now enshrined in a glass sided reliquary high atop the main altar of the church built in her
honor in Genoa, Italy. The shrine of the Saint recorded for the author: “The conservation is truly exceptional and
surprising and deserves an analysis of the cause. The surprise of the faithful is justified when they attribute this to
a supernatural cause.[187]
One year following the death of St. Mary Magdalen De Pazzi (d. 1607) the sweet odors that emanated
from her tomb beneath the high altar of the church of the monastery prompted the community to exhume the
body. A biographer reports:
When the casket was opened, the corpse was to be still entire, fresh looking and fleshlike in its softness.
Blond hairs still adhered to the head; the whole body was flexible. The Saint appeared as one recently deceased.
Yet the clothing was wet, for the place of burial was a damp one with running water nearby.
The body of the Saint remains incorrupt, surrounded by crystal in her artistically crafted shrine which is
located in the Carmelie Church of Florence, Italy. [188]

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Fig. 77.). Closeup view of the incorrupt body of Saint Catherine of Genoa
St. Rita of Cascia died in the year 1457 at the age of 76, 41 years of which were spent in the cloister in
Cascia. In his biography of the Saint, Rev. M. J. Corcoran reports that the bells of the convent and of the castle of
Cascia, as well as other church bells throughout the city, rang out in jubilee although untouched by mortal hands.
Her poor cell was cloaked with vivid splendor, and an odor, sweet with the sweetness of Paradise, spread
through all the convent. The wound which was produced by the thorn and which at other times inspired disgust,
all at once was changed into a sign of election; and her body, worn and poor through fast and penance, took on a
beauty that was not of this earth.
Another author tells us that “Her body had not the sign of a corpse… she did not appear to be a prey of
death, but only sleeping peacefully. She appeared years younger than she was, and her face was more beautiful in
death than in life.”[189]
152 years after the death of St. Rita of Cascia (d. 1457), her body was found incorrupt. 22 years after the
beautifully preserved body was found, the eyes of the Saint opened and remained so for many years, as paintings
executed during the time indicate. Not only was this prodigy noted, but also observed by many were the
movements of the body. From time to time the body would turn and remain for some years on one side and then
turn to the other side. The nuns of the convent gave testimony under oath of the fact that these movements of
the body did indeed take place. Another phenomenon, the elevation of the body, was such that the Saints face
touched the screen of wire that formerly enclosed the top of the old coffin. This is said to have happened each
year on St. Rita’s feastday, the 22 of May. Details regarding the elevation of the body to the top of the
sarcophagus were carefully recdorded by eyewitnesses whose testimonies are still reserved in the archives of the
Archdiocese of Spolet. One of the longest elevations of the body took place on January 14, 1730. At that time the
city of Cascia was in great anxiety because of an earthquake that destroyed many houses in outlying towns and
villages. As the people fled the area, they sought refuge in the church of St. Rita and saw the elevation of the
Saint’s body. They interpreted it as an indication of the Saints concern and protection. Cascia also experienced the
earthquake with some damage, but St. Rita’s convent and church remained unharmed.

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 The movements of the body are described by the official witness for the canonization of St. Rita. Rev.
Corcoran gives this account from the official document:
Many persons who have been questioned from the time of the first Process in 1626 and again successively
in 1739, 1751 and 1893, gave testimony to have seen the body of Saint Rita move. Other persons tell the same
story on the testimony of trustworthy witnesses.
Amongst the first class, some there are who say that they saw with their own eyes her head turned toward
the people: according to some, the body raised itself to the top of the urn; and some moreover note the fact that
her habit was moved and disordered; and some add to the facts of sight the facts of hearing.[190]
Catherine came from an aristocratic Bolognese family, the daughter of Benvenuta Mammolini of Bologna
and Giovanni Vigri, an ambassador to Niccolò III d'Este, Marquis of Ferrara. From the age of nine, she was raised at
the court of the Duke of Ferrara as a lady in waiting of his daughter Margherita d’Este. During this time, she
received an excellent training in reading, writing, music, singing, drawing and illuminating.
In 1426, however, after twelve years at court, she left and entered the convent of Corpus Domini at
Ferrara. The convent, which had been established in 1406 as a lay community living a semi religious life and
following the Augustinian rule, was experiencing much tension at the time about whether instead to adhere to the
Franciscan rule (something which eventually happened in stages in the early 1430s). This fluid situation,
experienced by Catherine in her early years at Corpus Domini, is reflected in her writings. In 1432 together with
other young women of Ferrara, she founded a monastery of the Order of Poor Clares.
She returned to Bologna in 1456 when her superiors and the governors of Bologna requested that she
should be the founder and Abbess of a monastery of the same Order, which was to be established in association
with the Church of Corpus Domini in Bologna. Catherine is the author, among other things, of Treatise on the 7
Spiritual Weapons Necessary for Spiritual Warfare.
When, on 9 March 1463, she died at the age of 49, Catherine was buried. After eighteen days of alleged
graveside miracles, her incorrupt body was exhumed and relocated to the chapel of the Poor Clares in Bologna
(Cappella della Santa), next to the church of Corpus Domini where it remains on display, dressed in her religious
habit, seated upright behind glass.
Some of her art and manuscripts survive, including a depiction of St. Ursula from 1456, now in the Galleria
Academmia in Venice. Some historians have called her style naive. That these works of Catherine de' Vigri remain
existent might be due to their status as relics of a saint.[191]

Fig. 78.). The incorrupt body of St. Rita at Basilica of St Rita in Cascia, Italy
Fig. 79.). Saint Catherine of Bologna

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 Saint Zita

Fig. 80.). St Zita Virgin and Miracle Worker 1212 1272 Patron of servants, homemakers, lost keys, people ridiculed
for their piety, rape victims, single laywomen, waiters, waitresses. Canonized in 1696, her body is incorrupt.San
Frediano is the resting place of the remains of St. Zita, one of Italy's "incorruptible" bodies.
Zita was born in the beginning of the thirteenth century at Montsegradi, a village near Lucca, Italy. Her
mother raised her with the fear and love of the Lord, and at an early age she was very devoted to prayers and self
mortifications. She did all with the intention of honoring the good God that created her.
When Zita was still young, she went to Lucca to work as a maid for a rich family. She would awaken early in
the morning and give herself to prayer; and before it was time for work, she would hurry to attend daily Mass. For
her, God always came first. During her day of work, amidst trials and tribulations, there was never heard any
complaint from her lips.
Her fellow servants became very jealous of her and were mean to her at every opportunity. Because she
would not complain to her master, the other servants tormented her even more cruelly. But God greatly rewarded
Zita’s daily offerings of humility.
Zita died on the 27th of April in the year 1272, being sixty years old. One hundred and fifty miracles that
were wrought in behalf of those who had recourse to her intercession have been juridically proved.
Her body was found, whole and entire, in 1580; and it is kept with great respect and is richly enshrined in
St. Frediano’s Church in Lucca, Italy, next to the Fatinelli house where she worked for forty eight years. Her face
and hands, uncovered, can be viewed through the crystal glass. Pope Leo X granted an office in her honour, and
the city of Lucca pays a singular veneration to her memory.[192]

Blessed Imelda Lambertini

Lambertini was born in 1322 in Bologna, the only child of Count Egano Lambertini and Castora Galuzzi. Her
parents were devout Catholics and were known for their charity and generosity to the underprivileged of Bologna.
On her fifth birthday, she requested to receive Holy Eucharist; however the custom at the time was that children
did not receive their First Holy Communion until age 14. Lambertini would sometimes exclaim: "Tell me, can
anyone receive Jesus into his heart and not die?" She joined a cloistered Dominican community at age nine in
Valdipietra, near Bologna, which was unusual to do for a girl at her age.
On May 12, 1333, the day of the vigil of the Ascension, she knelt in prayer and the "Light of the Host" was
witnessed above her head by the Sacristan, who then fetched the Priest so he could see. After seeing this miracle,

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the priest felt compelled admit her to receiving the Eucharist. Immediately after receiving it, Lambertini went back
to her seat, and decided to stay after mass and pray. Later, when her holy sister came to get Lambertini for supper
and found Lambertini still kneeling with a smile on her face. When her sister called her name she did not stir, she
lightly tapped Imelda on the shoulder, Imelda collapsed to the floor dead. Her remains are kept in Bologna at the
Church of San Sigismondo, beneath the wax effigy of her likeness. There still remains some controversy as to
whether Blessed Imelda can be classified as incorrupt. Many [who?] argue that contrary to popular belief, she is
not truly incorrupt. Many other sources, including the Church of San Sigismondo, claim that she is incorrupt.[193]

Fig. 81.). Blessed Imelda Lambertini (1322 – May 12, 1333) is the patroness of First Holy Communicants.
Imelda, daughter of Count Egano Lambertini and Castora Galuzzi, was born in the year 1322 at Bologna,
Italy. At an early age Imelda’s heart was turned toward God. Even though she lived in the days when it was not
permitted to receive the Holy Eucharist until the age of fourteen, young Imelda’s greatest desire was to receive
Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Oh how she longed and longed to receive Our Lord! When Imelda was under
ten years old, she begged her father to allow her to enter the Dominican convent; and after much pleading, he
finally consented to her desire.
Once in the convent, she again began to plead to receive Communion. Time and time again she received
the same disappointment. “No, Sister Imelda, you are too young…” At the convent she took on many odd jobs. She
attended the gate for the poor, she scrubbed the floors, and she did all that was asked of her—all for the honor
and glory of almighty God.
On the 12th of May in the year 1333, when attending Mass with all of her Sisters, Imelda had the strongest
desire to receive Our Lord. At the end of Mass, when all of the Sisters were leaving, they noticed Sister Imelda
lovingly gazing toward the locked tabernacle. Some of the nuns looked at Imelda and noticed something white
hovering above her. It was a Host. The nuns immediately notified the priest, who hurriedly came and carefully took
the Host out of the air and placed It on a paten. Then he had no choice but to give the Host to Imelda. It was
obviously God’s Will that she receive her first holy Communion. This first reception also proved to be her last; the
rapture with which she received Our Lord was so great that it burst her heart. Imelda sank to the ground,
unconscious. And when loving hands upraised her, it was found that she was dead. Blessed Imelda is the
Patroness of First Communicants; and her beautifully incorrupt body can be seen in the Church of St. Sigismund at
Bologna, Italy.[194]

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 Saint Vincent De Paul

Fig. 82.). Saint Vincent de Paul (incorruptible) is venerated as a saint in the Catholic Church and the Anglican
Communion. He was canonized in 1737. De Paul was renowned for his compassion, humility, and generosity and is
known as the "Great Apostle of Charity". Founder of the "Ladies of Charity", wealthy women of Paris to collect
funds for missionary projects, found hospitals, and gather relief funds for the victims of war and to ransom 1,200
galley slaves from North Africa
St. Vincent de Paul was born of a peasant family at Pouy, Gascony, France, in 1580, and worked as a
shepherd boy on his father’s farm. At a young age Vincent had a great desire to become a priest; and after
completing his studies for the priesthood, he was ordained in 1600 and remained in the vicinity of Toulouse, acting
as a tutor while continuing his own studies.
Having traveled to Marseilles for an inheritance and sailing home to Toulouse, Vincent was captured by
Turkish pirates in the year 1605 and was taken to Tunis. He was maltreated and eventually sold as a slave; but he
escaped two years later with his master, a renegade whom he eventually converted to Catholicism. Upon his
escape from the Turkish pirates, Vincent immediately dedicated his life to the practice of spiritual and corporal
works of charity. He set up many poor houses for the crippled and sick and personally cared for the patients who
had the most contagious diseases. He would dress their wounds and nurse them back to health; indeed there
wasn’t a poor man that didn’t know of Vincent’s kindness.
On the 27th of September in the year 1660, Vincent died at the age of eighty, having faithfully served God
throughout his whole life. On August 13, 1729, Vincent was declared a Blessed by Benedict XIII; and on June 16,
1737, he was canonized by Clement XII. St. Vincent’s bones and heart are perfectly incorrupt and have been placed
inside a wax figure of his body. His relics can be seen in the Church of St. Vincent de Paul in Paris.[195]
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 Saint Theresa Margaret

Fig. 83.). The incorrupt body of St. Teresa Margaret

Teresa Margaret, born of the noble Redi family in Arezzo in Tuscany, Italy, in 1747, entered the Discalced
Carmelites at Florence while she was yet quite young. She was given a special contemplative experience
concerning the words of St John, “God is love”; and thus she deeply felt that her vocation was to live a hidden life
of love and self sacrifice. This vocation, confirmed by her heroic exercise of fraternal charity, was soon completed
when she died in 1770 at the young age of twenty three.
Immediately after her death, her body began to decompose. In a very short time her whole complexion
had turned to a dreadful green color. The nuns in the convent hurriedly prepared Teresa Margaret’s body for
burial; but as they were preparing to put her body into the ground, the green color miraculously was changed to
her original skin coloring. She looked as though she had died only seconds before! Her body is still incorrupt and
can be seen in the nuns’ choir in the Convent of Carmel in Florence, Italy.[196]

Saint Virginia Centurione

Virginia Centurione was born on 2 April 1587 in Genoa and was of noble origins. She was the daughter of
Giorgio Centurione (who was the Doge of Genoa from 1621 to 1623) and Lelia Spinola.
Despite her desire to live a cloistered life, she was forced into marriage to Gaspare Grimaldi Bracelli, who
was a rich noble, on 10 December 1602. She had two daughters: Lelia and Isabella. The marriage did not last long,
for she became a widow on 13 June 1607 at the age of 20. She refused another arranged marriage brought on due
to her father's influence and took up a vow to live a chaste life.
After her husband's death she began charitable works and assisted the poor and the sick. To help alleviate
the poorness in her town she founded the "Cento Signore della Misericordia Protettrici dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo".
The center was soon overrun with people suffering from the famine and plague of 1629–30 and soon she had to
rent the Monte Calvario convent to accommodate all the people that came in. Around 1635 the center was caring
for over 300 patients and received recognition as a hospital from the government. Due to declining funds given
from the middle and upper classes the institute lost its government recognition in 1647. Bracelli spent the
remainder of her life acting as a peacemaker between noble houses and continuing her work for the poor. Bracelli
died on 15 December 1651 at the age of 64.[197]

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Fig. 84.). Saint Virginia Centurione: died on December 15, 1651, at the age of 64.
720: So it looks as if the saints were so divine that their bodies didn’t corrode for hundreds of years. I believe this
to all be extreme nonsense. If that was the case then how come they aren’t shipped around the world for all
people to praise sorta like the museums do with Tutankhamun from Egypt. We must understand that on both
sides of the scale whether that be the occultism or the church of Europe there are alchemists at work. The
alchemist conquers the elements of life and the basis of that is the understanding of all histories and all sciences.
Egypt had much influence on the Medieval times and Old Europe. A prime example would be the origins of
Scotland which go back to Scota a daughter of an Egyptian Pharoah. While speaking about Egypt we should not
forget that these incorruptible saints may be the transformation of Egyptian Gods into the Catholic Saints by the
similarity of mummifying and worship of the holy dead. I state all this to state that during the times different forms
of burials were taking place all around. Other situations can occur were nature can preserve a body. For instance
the Bog bodies of Scotland which didn’t make the cut for the series. Not to forget that moss and ivory which was
highly transported and traded at that time preserves skin as well. Im not a dermatologist or a coroner, so in
actuality Icant present details based off of experience in this area. To go this far to secure a lie is phenomenal. Are
humans this immature and gullible that they believe in such questionable information or is there a preset thinking
in all humans that enforce them to search for some external supreme pure entity, while at the same time
committing the most heinous acts amongst eachother.
Ive studied many religions and cultures during my short time here and Ive never encountered
incorruptibles. Whats even more interesting is I have come into contact with many catholics here in America and
they know nothing about incorruptible saints. Every system in America is designed on earning and your interest.
People aren’t truly interested in their religions, they just wear outfits and do what everybody else is doing similar
to Halloween. The information is here for your discovery never expect anybody to give you anything, they will give
you shit and obviously that’s what weve all been getting for years. To follow the animal impulses of seeking
enjoyment consistently is exactly that an animal impulse. Humans on the otherhand can conqure time, air &
space. For those who have the mental capacity to move within the invisible elements, reinforce their position as a
human. While those looking for fun and other forms of feel good reinforce their position as an animal, with human
training.

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 St. Mary, Jesus & The Bible
The Three Magi
In connection with the birth of the Saviour, and as a pendant to the notice under Twelfth Day, or the
Epiphany, of the observances commemorative of the visit of the Wise Men of the East to Bethlehem, we shall here
introduce some further particulrs of the ideas current in medieval times on the subject of these celebrated
personages.
The legend of the Wise Men of the East, or, as they are styled in the original Greek of St. Matthews gospel,
the Magi, who visited the infant Saviour with precious offerings, became, under monkish influence, one of the
most popular during the middle ages, and was told with increased and elaborated perspicuity as time advanced.
The Scripture nowhere informs us that these individuals were kings, or their number restricted to three. The
legend converts the Magi into kings, gives their names, and a minute accountof their stature and the nature of
their gifts. Melchior (we are thus told) was king of Nubia, the smallest man of the triad, and he gave the Saviour a
gift of gold. Balthazar was king of Chaldea, and he offered incense; he was a man of ordinary stature. But the
third, Jasper, king of Tarshish, was of high stature, ‘a black Ethiope,’ and he gave myrrh. All came with ‘many rich
ornaments belonging to king’s array, and also with mules, camels, and horses loaded with great treasure, and with
multitude of people,’ to do homage to the Saviour, ‘then a little childe of xiii dayes olde.’
The barbaric pomp involved in this legend made it a favourite with artists during the middle ages. Our
engraving is a copy from a circular plate of silver, chased in high relief, and partly gilt, which is supposed to have
formed the centre of a morse, or large brooch, used to fasten the decorated cope of an ecclesiastic in the latter
part of the 14th century. The subject has been frequently depicted by the artist subsequent to this period. Van
Eyck, Durer, and the German schools were particularly fond of the theme the latest and most striking work being
that by Rubens, who reveled in such pompous displays. The artists of the Low CCountries were, probably, also
biased by the fact, that the cathedral of Cologne held the shrine in which the bodies of the Magi were said to be
deposited, and to which the faithful made many pilgrimages, greatly to the emolument of the city, a result which
induced the worthy burghers to distinguish their shield of arms by three crowns only, and to designate the Magi as
‘the three kings of Cologne.’
It was to the Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, that the religious world was indebted for
the discovery of the place of burial of these kings in the far east. She removed their bodies to Constantinople,
where they remained in the church of St. Sophia, untilthe reign of the Emperor Emanuel, who allowed Eustorgius,
bishop of Milan, to transfer them to his cathedral. In 1164, when the Emperor Frederick conquered Milan, he gave
these treasured relics to Raynuldus, archbishop of Cologne, who removed them to the latter city. His successor,
Phlip von Heinsberg, placed them in a magnificent reliquary, enriched with gems and enamels, still remaining in its
marble shrine in the cathedral, one of the chief wonders of the noble pile, and the principal ‘sight’ in Cologne. A
heavy fee is exacted for opening the doors of the chapel, which is the lighted with lamps, producing a dazzling
effect on the mass of gilded and jeweled sculpture, in the centre of which may be seen the three skulls, reputed to
be those of the Magi. These relics are enveloped in velvet, and decorated with embroidery and jewels, so that the
upper part of each skull only is seen, and the hollow eyes which, as the faithful believe, once rested on the Saviour.
The popular belief in the great power of intercession and protection possessed by the Magi, as departed
saints, was widely spread in the middle ages. Any article that had touched these skulls was believed to have the
power of preventing accidents to the bearer while travelling, as well as to counteract sorcery, and guard against
sudden death. Their names were also used as a charm, and were inscribed upon girdles, garters, and fingerrings.

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We engrave two specimens of such rings, both works of he 14th century. The upper one is of silver, with the names
of the Magi engraved upon it; the lower one is of lead simply cast in a mould, and sold cheap for the use of the
commonalty. They were regarded as particularly efficacious in the case of cramp. Traces of this superstition still
linger in the curative properties popularly ascribed to certain rings.
Bishop Patrick, in his Reflections on the Devotions of the Roman Church, 1674, asks with assumed naivete
how these names of the thre Wise Men Melchior, Blathazar, and Jasper are to be of service, ‘when another
tradition says they were Apellius, Amerus, and Damascus; a third, that they were Megalath, Galgalath, and Sarasin;
and a fourth calls them Ator, Sator, and Peratoras; which last I should choose (in this uncertainty) as having the
more kingly sound.’[198]

Fig. 85.). The most celebrated work of art in the Cologne Cathedral is the Sacrophagus of the Magi
Fig. 86.). Gold, frankincense, and myrrh, of course. It is kept at St. Paul’s Monastery on Mount Athos in Greece.

Fig. 87.). Reliquary of the Holy Crib Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore
Fig. 88.). Reliquaire du chef de Sainte Marie Magdeleine dans la crypte de la basilique de Saint Maximin.

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Fig. 89.). Incorrupt Left Hand of St. Mary Magdalene Reliquary
Fig. 90.). Reliquary Pendant for the Holy Thorn Treasures of Heaven Culture French (Paris)Date ca. 1340

Fig. 91.). This is where Jesus was tied while he was flogged during his passion. It is kept at the Basilica of Saint
Praxedes in Rome, Italy.
Fig. 92.). This is claimed to be the sign that hung above Jesus on the cross saying that he was “king of the Jews.” It
is kept at the Basilica of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem in Rome, Italy.

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Fig. 93.). This claims to be one of the nails used in the crucifixion of Jesus (look near the top), kept at the Bamberg
Cathedral in Bamberg, Germany.
Fig. 94.). The fragments in the picture above are in the Imperial Treasury in Vienna, Austria.

Fig. 95.). Jesus wore this during his passion and crucifixion. This is kept at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris,
France.
Fig. 96.). This is claimed to be the seamless robe of Christ that the Roman soldiers gambled off during his
crucifixion. It is kept at the Cathedral of Trier in Trier, Germany.
Fig. 97.). The Holy Lance (Spear of Destiny), displayed in the Imperial Treasury at the Hofburg Palace in Vienna,
Austria

185
Fig. 98.). The 'Sandals of Jesus' displayed in Prüm Abbey in Germany
Fig. 99.). This chalice is believed to be the one used by Christ at the Last Supper to institute the Eucharist. It is kept
at Valencia Cathedral in Valencia, Spain.

Fig. 100.). Chrystus Emmanuel (Jesus as a child) bySzymona Uszakowa, 1686

Fig. 101.). The Mandylion, Church of Saint Bartholomew of the Armenians, Genoa Holy Face Genoa

186
Fig. 102). St Anne The Mother of the infant Virgin Mary Chartres Cathedral BAY 121 The North Transept Rose
Window France (c. 1220) · Saint Anne
Fig. 103.). Reliquary of the skull of John the Baptist
Fig. 104.). Reliquary of the skull of the Holy Forerunner of the Lord Saint John the Baptist
Mary Magdalen and black madonnas are intertwined in popular understanding; both are subversive of
canonical church doctrine. Mary Magdalen was the first to see the risen Jesus; the apostles did not believe her
because she was a woman. Although church fathers branded her a fallen woman, Mary Magdalen may be the
most beloved saint of France. She is popularly connected to black madonnas, sometimes directly, sometimes
subtly; e.g., the figure of the whitened Madonna, in the church of Sainte Marie Madeleine at Aix en Provence in
France, has a black hand. Of the hanful of other religious figures depicted as black, perhaps the most significan is
saint Anne, mother of Mary, and grandmother of Jesus, who is painted black in the 13th century window of
Chartres. [199]
720: Who would’ve known it huh. Everything Jesus has touched has been saved by the catholic church. You
would’ve thought,if these possessions are so powerful why don’t we show the world and make the world submit?
Everybody questions the validity of Jesus and his stories. If there is archeaoligical evidence then why isn’t National
Geographic all over this. We have it all here, his holy sandals, tunic, the spear that stabbed him, the post he got
whipped on, a thorn from the crown of thorns and then the actual crown of thorns, not to forget the sign that was
above his head on the cross. The Mandylion photos are supposedly the original shrouds of Jesus face imprint from
the cloth that wrapped him in the tomb. John the Baptist is the saint that baptized Jesus who was beheaded.
We must remember that all of this activity occurred over 2000 years ago. For relics to still survive from
those time periods is very unlikely. If it was true all of this information would also be used to support Christianity
in America and it is not. So there must be a lack of confidence in the story or America is unworthy or the church
has accumulated enough power and finance where there is no need for an inquisition or any other form of
pressure on the people. The fear has been instilled in the people for centuries. It is embedded in the words and
other social vices. America has no collecitive spiritual intelligence. They once did right after slavery. It is the
science of Hoo Doo. The 3 Magi were definetly black men well at least 2 of them. The 3rd magi represents the
Judaic/celtic principle. Its also peculiar to note that when I was child they called these men the 3 kings not the
magi. The word magi brings us to close to magic.
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 The Holy Prepuce
The Holy Prepuce, or Holy Foreskin (Latin præputium or prepucium) is one of several relics attributed to
Jesus, a product of the circumcision of Jesus.
At various points in history, a number of churches in Europe have claimed to possess Jesus' foreskin,
sometimes at the same time. Various miraculous powers have been ascribed to it.
History and rival claims
All Jewish boys are required by Jewish law to be circumcised on the eighth day following their birth; the
Feast of the Circumcision of Christ, still celebrated by many churches around the world, accordingly falls on
January 1. Luke 2:21 (King James Version), reads: "And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of
the child, his name was called JESUS, which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb."
The first reference to the survival of Christ's severed foreskin comes in the second chapter of the apocryphal
Arabic Infancy Gospel which contains the following story:
1. And when the time of his circumcision was come, namely, the eighth day, on which the law commanded
the child to be circumcised, they circumcised him in a cave.
2. And the old Hebrew woman took the foreskin (others say she took the navel string), and preserved it in an
alabaster box of old oil of spikenard.
3. And she had a son who was a druggist, to whom she said, "Take heed thou sell not this alabaster box of
spikenard ointment, although thou shouldst be offered three hundred pence for it."
4. Now this is that alabaster box which Mary the sinner procured, and poured forth the ointment out of it
upon the head and feet of our Lord Jesus Christ, and wiped it off with the hairs of her head.

Fig. 105.). Circumcision of Christ (detail), by Friedrich Herlin

Fig. 106). Circumcision of Christ, fresco from the Preobrazhenski Monastery, Bulgaria
Foreskin relics began appearing in Europe during the Middle Ages. The earliest recorded sighting came on
December 25, 800, when Charlemagne gave it to Pope Leo III when the latter crowned the former Emperor.
Charlemagne claimed that it had been brought to him by an angel while he prayed at the Holy Sepulchre, although
a more prosaic report says it was a wedding gift from the Byzantine Empress Irene. Pope Leo III placed it into the
Sancta Sanctorum in the Lateran basilica in Rome with other relics. Its authenticity was later considered to be
confirmed by a vision of Saint Bridget of Sweden. David Farley says the foreskin was then looted during the Sack of
Rome in 1527. The German soldier who stole it was captured in the village of Calcata, 47 km north of Rome, later
the same year. Thrown into prison, he hid the jeweled reliquary in his cell, where it remained until its rediscovery

188
in 1557. Many miracles (freak storms and perfumed fog overwhelming the village) are claimed to have followed.
Housed in Calcata, it was venerated from that time onwards, with the Church approving the authenticity by
offering a ten year indulgence to pilgrims. Pilgrims, nuns and monks flocked to the church, and "Calcata [became]
a must see destination on the pilgrimage map." The foreskin was reported stolen by a local priest in 1983.
According to David Farley, "Depending on what you read, there were eight, twelve, fourteen, or even 18 different
holy foreskins in various European towns during the Middle Ages." In addition to the Holy Foreskin of Rome (later
Calcata), other claimants included the Cathedral of Le Puy en Velay, Santiago de Compostela, the city of Antwerp,
Columbus in the diocese of Chartres, as well as Chartres itself, and churches in Besançon, Metz, Hildesheim,
Charroux, Conques, Langres, Fécamp, Stoke on Trent, Calcata, and two in Auvergne.
One of the most famous prepuces arrived in Antwerp in the Brabant in 1100 as a gift from King Baldwin I of
Jerusalem, who purchased it in the Holy Land in the course of the first crusade. This prepuce became famous when
the bishop of Cambray, during the celebration of the Mass, saw three drops of blood blotting the linens of the
altar. A special chapel was constructed and processions organised in honour of the miraculous relic, which became
the goal of pilgrimages. In 1426 a brotherhood was founded in the cathedral "van der heiliger Besnidenissen ons
liefs Heeren Jhesu Cristi in onser liever Vrouwen Kercke t' Antwerpen"; its 24 members were all abbots and
prominent laymen. The relic disappeared in 1566, but the chapel still exists, decorated by two stained glass
windows donated by King Henry VII of England and his wife Elizabeth of York in 1503.
The abbey of Charroux claimed the Holy Foreskin was presented to the monks by Charlemagne. In the
early 12th century, it was taken in procession to Rome where it was presented before Pope Innocent III, who was
asked to rule on its authenticity. The Pope declined the opportunity. At some point, however, the relic went
missing, and remained lost until 1856 when a workman repairing the abbey claimed to have found a reliquary
hidden inside a wall, containing the missing foreskin. The rediscovery, however, led to a theological clash with the
established Holy Prepuce of Calcata, which had been officially venerated by the Church for hundreds of years.
According to David Farley, in 1900, the Roman Catholic Church resolved the dilemma by ruling that anyone
henceforward writing or speaking of the Holy Prepuce would be excommunicated. Again, according to Farley, in
1954, after much debate, the punishment was changed to the harsher degree of excommunication, vitandi
(shunned); Farley also says that the Second Vatican Council later removed the Day of the Holy Circumcision from
the Latin church calendar, although Eastern Catholics and Traditional Roman Catholics still celebrate the Feast of
the Circumcision of Our Lord on January 1. In reality, it was more than two years before 11 October 1962, the date
when the Second Vatican Council began, that a 25 July 1960 decree of Pope John XXIII enacted a wide ranging
revision of the General Roman Calendar, which included changing the name of the 1 January feast from
"Circumcision of the Lord and Octave of the Nativity" to "Octave of the Nativity", with no change of the Gospel
reading about the circumcision of the child Jesus.[200]
Holy Prepuce Holy Foreskin (Latin præputium or prepucium) is one of several relics attributed to Jesus, a
product of the circumcision of Jesus. At various points in history, a number of churches in Europe have claimed to
possess Jesus' foreskin, sometimes at the same time. Various miraculous powers have been ascribed to it.
Churches and abbeys at Charroux, Paris, Boulogne, Metz, Le Puy, Nancy, Besançon, Coulombs and Conques in
France, Hildesheim in Germany, Antwerp and Bruges in Belgium, and Calcata in Italy all at some stage claimed to
own Jesus's foreskin, or a piece of it.
"There are so many Holy Prepuces [foreskins]," says Prof Francesca Stavrakopoulou, a professor of ancient
religion at the University of Exeter. "It's like John the Baptist had at least three heads, if not more like eight. And
it's the same as the Holy Foreskin. There are loads of them – probably so many more in existence than we actually
know about."

189
 There were two schools of thought on this. Some thinkers said Christ's body must have been whole,
because that was how God designed it – David Friedman, in his book A Mind of Its Own: A Cultural History of the
Penis, says anti Semitism played a role, and that to medieval minds, circumcision was proof that "the Jew's penis
sinned against creation". Therefore Jesus must have been a Cavalier.
But others disagreed. A medieval book called The Golden Legend said the day of Jesus's circumcision was
the day "he began to shed his blood for us. … [It] was the beginning of our redemption." Saint Thomas Aquinas
shared this view: that Jesus was a Roundhead.
The no turtleneck Jesus hypothesis has scriptural support. Luke 2:21 says: "And when eight days were
accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called JESUS, which was so named of the angel before
he was conceived in the womb." (From the King James Bible.)
In The First Gospel of the Baby Jesus, a piece of writing roughly contemporary with much of the New
Testament but which was not included in the final Bible, there is a verse that says Jesus's foreskin was not only
removed, but kept: "the old Hebrew woman took the foreskin (others say she took the navel string), and preserved
it in an alabaster box of old oil of spikenard".
Stavrakopoulou says, "Of course, Jesus was Jewish." And for him to have been seen as superseding
Judaism, she says, he had to be seen by his later followers as an especially observant Jew: "Just as he goes in and
teaches in the synagogues, and just as he preaches and is called rabbi, obviously he would have been circumcised."
The first Holy Roman Emperor, Charlemagne, presented Pope Leo III with Jesus's severed prepuce as a gift.
According to St Birgitta's De Praeputio Domini ("The Lord's Foreskin"), the Virgin Mary kept the Holy Foreskin in a
leather pouch, before giving it to St John. For the next seven centuries, it remained in the pouch, before someone
– possibly an angel – brought it to Charlemagne's court at Aix la Chappelle. (That story is recounted in Marc Shell's
essay The Holy Foreskin; or, Money, Relics and Judaeo Christianity, in Jonathan and Daniel Boyarin's Jews and Other
Differences: The New Jewish Cultural Studies.)
By the 13th century, Charlemagne's gift, by this time the "best known foreskin" in Christendom, was on
display in the Vatican, according to Leonard B Glick's book Marked in Your Flesh: Circumcision from Ancient Judea
to Modern America. It was stolen when Rome was sacked in 1527, but was eventually found again. Another
"renowned foreskin" (Glick again) was displayed once every seven years in a monastery in Charroux. It was lost in
the 16th century, during the wars of the Reformation, but was rediscovered in 1856. Glick mentions another in
Coulombs, near Chartres – which was taken to England for the marriage of Henry V to Catherine of Valois and
placed in their bed on their wedding night as a fertility charm – and more in Belgium, Germany, and Italy. The last
known surviving Holy Prepuce resided in Calcata, Italy, until it was stolen in 1983.
Consuming the flesh of Christ was, and remains, an important part of Catholic doctrine – the Catholic
Church's position is that the wafer of the Eucharist literally becomes Jesus's actual flesh after being eaten. But the
Holy Foreskin had (allegedly) always been Jesus's flesh, and was therefore especially holy (according to Shell), in
the same way that the Grail, which had held Jesus's blood as it dripped from him on the cross, was more holy than
the Eucharist wine.
St Birgitta, a Swedish nun, had a vision in which she ate the Foreskin. "So great was the sweetness at the
swallowing of this membrane that she felt a sweet transformation in all her members and the muscles of her
members," it says in her book Revelations. More commonly, though, people tasted the alleged Holy Foreskins to
verify that they were real. There was an industry, "particularly in the medieval period, throughout Europe, in the
production and veneration of holy relics", says Stavrakopoulou. "Churches could earn a lot of money from pilgrims,
who would pay a lot of money to look at these things and touch them and kiss them and everything, so there was a
huge industry in forgeries."

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 The most accepted test of the veracity of a Foreskin was tasting. Shell says that "A properly trained
physician chosen by the local priest would taste the shrivelled leather in order to determine whether it was wholly
or partly human skin." Surgeons who had thus consumed the body of Christ were known as croques prépuces.
Leo Allatius, in his work De Praeputio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Diatriba (A Discussion of the Foreskin of Our Lord
Jesus Christ), reportedly said that because Jesus's body ascended into Heaven, his foreskin must have done too. In
G.W. Foote and J.M. Wheeler's book Crimes of Christianity, the authors say Allatius believed that once in the
heavens, the Holy Foreskin expanded to become one of Saturn's rings.Shell records that relics claiming to be the
"sweat, tears, baby teeth, hair, umbilical cord, fingernails, urine, faeces and other bodily excrescences" of Jesus
Christ were discovered at various points. "Anything from a saint's blood to semen, any kind of bodily stuff" could
be a relic, says Stavrakopoulou. "Breast milk from the Virgin, that kind of thing."
"There's one little strange text in Exodus 4 that talks about how it looks like Moses gets possessed by
Yahweh and tries to kill his son," says Stavrakopoulou, "so Moses' wife circumcises their son and rubs the bloody
foreskin on Moses' genitalia." She says that circumcision was an "apotropaic" ritual, meaning it warded off harm or
evil, and that it appears to have taken the place of child sacrifice in early, pre Judaic religions.
At another point, in Samuel 1, David kills 200 Philistines and presents their foreskins as a gift to his future father in
law.
Stavrakolou points out, incidentally, that in Exodus, it doesn't say "genitals", it says "feet". "'Feet', in the
Hebrew Bible, is a euphemism," she says. "There's a bit where Ruth's mother in law tells Ruth that she has to go
and seduce Boaz when he's drunk after a big feast, and she goes to where this feast has taken place and she
'uncovers his feet'. So I always tell my students that she's basically giving him oral sex." However, "feet isn't a
euphemism in the New Testament. So when Jesus is washing his disciples' feet, that's not a euphemism,
unfortunately."
Martin Luther, the founder of the Protestant reformation, wondered at the number of foreskins doing the
rounds in Europe. He also questioned how there could be 26 apostle burial places in Rome when there were only
11 apostles.
He wasn't the only sceptic of the whole relic industry. John Calvin, the French Protestant reformer and
founder of Calvinism, wrote in his A Treatise on Relics in 1543 that "if we were to collect all these pieces of the true
cross exhibited in various parts, they would form a whole ship's cargo". Memorably, he also said, of the many vials
purporting to be full of the Virgin Mary's breast milk, "Had Mary been a cow all her life, she could not have
produced such a quantity."
As far back as the 14th century, Geoffrey Chaucer, in the prologue to The Pardoner's Tale, writes about a
dishonest clergyman who sells old sheep's bones as holy relics. The Church noticed, eventually, that all the
discussion of Holy Foreskins might be unintentionally amusing. So in 1900, Leo XIII issued an order that anyone
talking about Jesus's foreskin would be immediately thrown out of the church.[201]
720: So till this very day the church claims that they still have Jesus’s foreskin. I don’t know if a dried piece of skin
coming off of an infant is going to survive 2,000 years. Ive also encountered holy urine and jesus’s holy feces. I
didn’t come across enough facts to present it so it is mentioned here to show the extent gone to in order to make
one believe. I like facts and I don’t think any of this information is fact. Their whole existence has a possibility to be
a hoax because that’s the way they set it up. This isn’t this and that aint that. When its all a bunch of bable bullshit.
And theres not an individual underneath the sun that can tell me other wise. You minus well had made these relics
at matel. They know its bullshit and that’s why the world doesn’t know.

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 Chapter 9
Tis’ The Season to be Folly
The Holy Days & Other Pagan Customs
720: In this section you will have to pay very close attention and get your highlighters out. All of the holidays are
connected in an odd form. There is a gap of about 40 days inbetween each holiday on our current calendar. This
40 day loop is based on the witchs calendar which is a kind of almanac of pagan dates that may come from a
multitude of different cultures. Of course these holidays are saturated with the saints but they also allow the Gods
and Goddesses of the ancient worlds to be fused into them. That will be the basis of this chapter to get to the root
of all holidays, how they began, the rituals that maintain them and identifying the gods and goddesses that may be
tangled in them. Either way it goes the energy behind these dates will always have ceremony regardless of the
circa or culture of people. All people on the planet including Caucasians are what we would like to call
earthbound. By being earthbinded by default, humans are also galactically binded. This galacitcal bind are the
strings of our destiny coming from planets, energies, solar systems, cosmo and solar rays.

There were very few free schools in England before the Reformation. Youths were generally taught
Latin in the monasteries, and young women had their education, not at Hackney, as now (1678 a.d.), but at
nunneries, where they learned needlework, confectionary, surgery, physic, writing, drawing &c. Anciently, before
the Reformation, ordinary men’s houses had no chimenys, but flues like louvre holes. In the halls and parlours of
great houses were written texts of Scripture, on painted cloths.
“Before the late civil wars, at Christmas, the first dish that was brought to the table was a boar’s head, with
a lemon in his mnouth. At Queens College, in Oxford, they still retain this custom; the bearer of it brings it into the
hall, singing to an old tune an old Latin rhyme Caput apri defero, &c. [The boar’s head in bring I.] The first dish that
was brought to table on Easter day was a red herring riding away on horseback i.e., a herring arranged by the cook,
something after the manner of a man on horseback, set in a corn salad. The custom of eating a gammon of bacon
at Easter was this namely, to shew their abhorrence of Judaism at that solemn commemoration of our Lord’s
resurrection.
‘The use of “Your humble servant,” came first into England on the marriage of Queen Mary, daughter of
Henry IV. Of France [to King Charles 1.]. The usual salutation before that time was, “God keep you!” “God be with
you!” “God be with you!’ and, among the vulgar, “How dost do?” with a thump on the shoulder. Until this time,
the court itself was unpolished and unmannered. King James’s court was so far from being civil to women, that
the ladies, nay, the queen herself, could hardly pass by the king’s apartment without receiving some affront.
‘In days of yore, lords and gentlemen lived in the country like petty kings: had their castles and their
boroughs, and gallows within their liberties, where they could try, condemn, and execute. They never went to
London but in parliament time, or once a year to do their homage to their king. They always ate in Gothic halls, at
the high table or oriel (a little room at the upper end of the hall, where stands a table), with the folks at the
sidetables. The meat was served up by watchwords. Jacks are but of late invention; the poor boys did turn the
spits, and licked the dripping for their pains. The beds of the men servants and retainers were in the hall, as now

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in the grand of the privy chamber. The hearth was commonly in the middle, whence the saying. “Round about our
coal fire.”
‘The halls of the justices of the peace were dreadful to behold; the screen was garnished with corslets and
helmets gaping with open mouths, with coats of mail, lances, pikes, halberts, brownbills, and bucklers. Public inns
were rare. Travellers were entertained at religious houses for 3 days together, if occasion served. The meetings of
the gentry were not at taverns, but in the fields or forests, with hawks and hounds, and their bugle horns in silken
baldrics.
“In the last age, every gentleman like man kept a sparrow hawk, and a priest kept a bobby, as Dame Julian
Berners teaches us (who wrote a treatise on field sports, temp. Henry VI. ); it was also a diversion for young
gentlewomen to man sparrow hawks and merlins.
“Before the Reformation, there were no poor rates; the charitable doles given at religious houses, and the
church ale in every parish, did the business. In every parish there was a church house, to which belonged spits,
pots, crocks &c., met and were merry, and gave their charity. The bowling, and shooting at butta. Mr. Antony
Wood assures me, there were few or no alms houses before the time of King Henry VIII.; that at Oxford, opposite
Christ Church, is one of the most ancient in England. In every church was a poor man’s box, and the like at great
inns.
‘Before the wake, or feast of the dedication of the church, they sat up all night fasting and praying that is
to say, on the eve of the wake. In the Easter holidays was the clerk’s “ale,” for his private benefit and the solace of
the neighbourhood.
‘Glass windows, except in churches and gentlemens houses, were rare before the time of Henry VIII. In my
own rememberance, before the civil wars, copyholders and poor people had none in Herefordshire,
Monmouthshire, and Salop: it is so still (1678 a.d.)
‘About 90 years ago, noblemans and gentlemens coats were {like those} of bedels and yeomen of the
guards i.e., gathered at the middle.
‘Captain Silas Taylor says, that in days of yore, when a church was to be built, they watched and prayed on
the vigil of the dedication, and took that point of the horizon where the sun arose , for the east, which makes the
variation that so few stand true, except those built between the two equinoxes. I have experminted [with] some
churches, and have found the line to point to that part of the horizon where the sun rises on the day of that saint
to whom the church is dedicated.
‘In Scotland, especially among the Highlanders, the women make a courtesy to the new moon; and our
English women, in this country, have a touch of this, some of them sitting astride on a gate or stile the first evening
the new moon appears, and saying, “A fine moon, God bless her!” The like I observed in Herefordshire.
‘From the time of Erasmus [temp. Henry VIII.] till about 20 last past, the learning was downright pedanstry.
The conversation and habits of those times were as starched as their bands and square beards, and gravity was
then taken for wisdom. The gentry and citizens had little learning of any kind, and their way of breeding up their
children was suitable to the rest. They were as severe to their children as their schoolmasters as masters of the
house of correction. Gentlemen of 30 and 40 years old were to stand, like mutes and fools, bareheaded before
their parents; and the daughters –grown women were to stand at the cupboard side during the whole time of the
proud mothers visit, unless leave was desired, forsooth that a cushion should be given them to kneel upon,
brought them by the serving man, after they had done sufficient penance in standing. The boys had their
foreheads turned up and stiffened with spittle. The gentlewomen had prodigious fans, as is to be seen in old
pictures; and it had a handle at least half a yard long: with these the daughters were oftentimes corrected. Sir

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Edward Coke, Lord Chief Jusitice, rode the circuit with such a fan; Sir William Dugdale told me he was an eye
witness of it; the Earl of Manchester also used such a fan.
‘At Oxford (and, I believe, at Cambridge) the rod was frequently used by the tutors and deans; and Dr
Potter, of Trinity College, I know right well, whipped his pupil with his sword by his side, when he came to take his
leave of him to go to the Inns of Court.[202]
Vancandard, pp. 443 445; MPL, LXXXVII, 528 529. The sermon also refers to the January I festival. The
synod of Rouen,c. 650 (Hef L, III, 288; Mansi, I, 1199ff.) canons 4, 13, and 14, condemn the January I rites,
incantations to preserve animals, and other pagan practices. The Penitential of Theodore assigns a penance of 3
years to those who go about as a stag or a bull, dressing in the animal’s skin or donning its head. St. Aldhelm of
Malmesbury and Sherbourne wrote in condemnation of people worshiping goats and stags (MPL, LXXXIX, 93). San
Paciano of Barcelona wrote a book called Cervus (“The Stag”), now lost, in which he attacked the custom of
dressing up as animals.[203]
The later fixing of the witch rites on Christian feast days, such as November 1, February 1, May 1 and
August 1, was less an effort to parody Christianity than a consequence of the fact that those Christian feasts fell
upon the same days as the old pagan festivals. There is no reason why the feast of All Souls, let alone that of St.
Walpurgia or the Circumcision, should have attracted the mockery of the witches more than Easter or any of the
numerous feast days in the Christian calendar. From November 1 to February 1, the pagans made special ritual
efforts to restore the vigor of the sun. Long before October 31 became Hallowe’en, the Eve of All Saints’ Day, it
was Winter Eve, when the nod fyr (“needfire”) was kindled to provide hope of the rebirth of the light after the
winter darkness to come. Guy Fawkes’ Day is a secular replacement of this old fire festival. Between Christmas and
Epiphany the medieval Feast of Fools was often held, where a ritual return to chaos was enacted in the form of
licentious reveling; this was essentially a winter solstice rite signifying the beginning of a new year and a new life.
The Roman Saturnalia of December 17 24 was such a cosmic renewal rite; the birth of Mithra occurred on
December 25, and that of Osiris on January 6, later the Christian Epiphany. On the 1st of January northern
Europeans in the early Middle Ages practiced Paleolithic rites designed to preserve and augment the supply of
beasts for the hunt during the coming year, rites that called for the waring of the animal skins, horns, or masks.
Another ancient fire festival that occurred on February 1 was transformed into the Christian Candlemas. April 30
happened to be the eve of St. Walpurgia, an inoffensive 8th century Anglo Saxon missionary to Germany, was more
significantly the eve of May Day, which the Romans had celebrated (from April 28 May 3) as the fertility festival of
the Florialia, while in the north it was greeted by the renewal rites associated with the maypole and the “green
man.” June 23, which happened to be the eve of St. John the Baptist, was Midsummer Eve, the climax of the fire
and fertility rites celebrating the triumph of the sun and renewed vegetation.[204]
There is no part of France more conservative and more devout than Brittany. Here happily linger yet the
old traditions, the old courtesies, and the old homely Saints, elsewhere wellnigh forgotten. And so at the little
gothic Chapel of Notre dame du haut, near Moncontour, they still pray to S. Mamert, who cures gastric disorders;
to Sain Livertin, who with S. Urlou, heals migraine; to S. houarniaule, who makes cowards brave; and S. Meen, who
chases away rheumatism and sciatica. S. Cornelius, S. Nicodemus, S. herbot, and S. Thegonnec, watch over flocks
and cattle; S. Eloi protects the horses; until recently S. Herve was invoked to guard the wayfarer from wolves, of
which one who attacked a peasant was killed not longer than some 40 years ago. The village maidens still stick pins
into the statue of S. Guirec at Ploumanach to remind him to bring them a husband soon; S. Tremeur carries his
head in his hand; mothers hang tiny shirts and caps before the shrine of S. Languy at Plougastel Daoulas if their
children are languishing from any ailment or slow of wit; in the little willage church of Guimilau their patron, the

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murdered prince, S. Guimilaru has his altar, rich with carven figures and fruit and foliage, all bright with colour and
gold, albeit the legend grow faint with years.[205]
Another fire festival, later associated with the Christian feast of Candlemas, was celebrated about 1
February. Another occurred on 30 April, the eve of May Day, which had always been a common date for the
celebration of the return of spring. 30 April happened by chance to become the Christian feast of an obscure Anglo
Saxon missionary named St. Walpurga, and from this coincidence derives the name Walpurgisnacht or
Walpurgisnight. Then, on 30 June, Midsummer’s Eve, the return of the sun and the bounty of summer were
celebrated. A Midsummer Night’s Dream preserves the magical atmosphere of this festival.[206]
Boniface found a priest sacrificing to Jupiter, and Gregory III forbade sacrifice to demons at fountains and
trees.
The indiculus superstitionum attached to the canons of the synod of Leptinnes in 744 prohibits sacrifice to
saints instead of to God, an indication that the saints were being confused in the popular mind with the old deities.
A baptismal formula attached to the same council indicates that the old gods still lived:
Do you renounce the demon? \ I renounce the demon.\ And all relations with the demon? \ I renounce all relations
with the demon. \ And all the works of the demon? \ I renounce all the works of the demon, and all his words, and
Thor, and Odin, and Saxnot, and all evil beings that are like them .
Charlemagne issued for the control of the newly conquered and forcefully converted province of Saxony.
th
The 9 chapter says: “ If anyone sacrifices a human being to the Devil and offers sacrifice to demons as is the
custom of the pagans, let him be put to death.” Chapter 6 assigns a like punishment to those eating the flesh of
witches. This one reference is no justification for assuming that the sinister practices existed elsewhere in Europe.
The most common accusation is that people went about on New Year’s dressed as stags or calves, though
an interesting variant is “in a cart.” Other kinds of disguises are suggested by a Spanish penitential that condemns
wearing skins or disguising oneself as a woman. The indiculus superstitionum mentions a rite whose particulars
include dressing as women or in torn clothes or skins to represent animals.
In addition to the New Year’s feasts, festivals honoring Wuotan or Mercury on Wednesday, and Thor or
Jupiter on Thursday, are also condemned, as were the Spuyrcalia, an old German feast sacrificing pigs in honor of
the vernal equinox, and the Brumalia, a Bacchic feast on December 25. A verb used occasionally for the celebration
of these old festivals was sabbatizare, which may have influenced the later development of the term “witches’
sabbat.” The only evidence for shapeshifting apart from these penitential any synodal condemnations is Boniface’s
condemnation of the Saxon belief in werewolves and strigae and superstitious.
Orgiastic feasts occurred in the festivals of the Spurcalia and Brumalia, but the specific accusations of
sexual license that were to become standard in the later witch trials were leveled for the 1st time in the 740s
against the heretic Aldebert.
Aldebert was a preacher in northern France who, affecting apostolic humility in speech and dress,
wandered thorugh the towns and countryside calling for a reform of the Church under his leadership. He claimed
that Jesus had sent him a letter from heaven patenting his claim to be the equal of the apostles; he was widely
venerated as a sant and distributed his nail parings and hair clippings to the faithful. Many of his followers were
women, and in a letter to St. Boniface, Pope Zachary accused him of immorality with his female followers.[207]
Condemnations of pagan festivals, like injuctions against paganism in general, were usually repetitions of
the old rules against dressing as a stag or a calf on the 1st of January. Some penitentials mention other practices,
including dances in which the revelers are disguised as women, and the dring of a potion on the 1st of May.* For
almost the first time, some instances of shapeshifting occur independent of the kalends of January festivals.

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Writing about 936, Rather, Bishop of Liege and then of Verona, condemns those who believe that Herodias rules
one third of the world. This is the earliest mention of Herodias as a leader of evil spirits of persons, and though
Rather explicitly identifies her with the murderess of John the Baptist, he may unwittingly have been accepting a
popular transformation of the unfamiliar name of Hecate into a Biblical name know to every Christian.[208]
Another festival designed to bring back the sun and insure fertility was practised about the time of the
winter solstice, and in the early Middle Ages some people were still dressing as stags and bulls on 1 Januarys and
performing a ritual dance to insure the plentitude of game.[209]
One custom demanded that a number of animals deemed harmful cats, foxes, toads, vipers, and so forth
be sealed up alive in a sack, which was hung above the fire until the animals burned to death. This sacrifice was
believed to dispel bad luck. The specific animals sacrificed varied by region: snakes were sacrificed in Luchon, cats
in Gap and Metz, horses in Thuringia and Lyon, bulls in Savoy, and wolves in Jumieges. Sometimes people burned
simply the bones of dead animals to drive away ghosts. One legend explains this cruel custom of burning alive
certain animals: A terrible epidemic raged in a city when a knight claimed to have seen the devil in the shape of a
cat and sought to kill it. Once he drew his sword, however, the devil cat vanished with a howl and the epidemic
disappeared with it. It was concluded that the cat was responsible for the plague, and to exorcise the threat of any
future illness, henceforth 13 cats were burned in the public square every year. [210]
The Mummers:
The mummers, or, as they are styled in Scotland, the guisers or guizards, occupied a prominent place in the
Christmas revels of the olden time, and their performances, though falling, like the other old customs of the seaso,
into desuetude, are still kept up in several parts of the country. The passion for masquerade, like that for dramatic
representation, seems an inherent one in human nature; and though social progress and fashion may modify and
vary the peculiar mode of development, the tendency itself remains unaltered, and only adopts from age to age a
new, and, it may be, more intellectual phase. Thusthe rude and irreverent mysteries and miracle plays which
delighted our ancestors, have been succeeded in the gradual course of improvement by the elaborate stage
mechanism and displa of our own times; and the coarse drolleries which characterized the old Christmas
festivities, have made way for the games charades, and other refined amusements of modern drawing rooms. But
in all these changes we only find an expression under altered and diversified forms of certain essential feelings and
tendencies in the constitution of humanity.
Looking back to the Roman Saturnalia, from which so many of our Christmas usages are derived, we find
that the practice of masquerading was greatly in vogue at that season among the people of Rome. Men and
women assumed respectively the attire of the opposite sex, and masks of all kinds were worn in abundance. The
early Christians, we are informed, used, on the Feast of the Circumcision or New Years Day, to run about in masks
in ridicule of the pagan superstitions; But there can be no doubt that they also frequently shared in the frolics of
their heathen neighbours, and the fathers of the church had considerable difficulty in prevailing on their members
to refrain from such unedifying pastimes. Afterwards, the clergy endeavoured to metamorphose the heathen
revels into amusements, which, if not really more spiritual in character than those which they supplanted, had at
least the merit of bearing reference to the observances, and recognizing the authority of the church and it
ministers. The mysteries or miracle plays in which even the clergy occasionally took part as performers, were the
results, amid numerous others, of this policy. These singular dramas continued for many centuries to forma
favourite amusement of the populace, both at Christmas and other seasons of the year; and in the first volume of
this work will be found an account of the celebration of the Whitsuntide mysteries at Chester. The Christmas
mumming was in many respects a kindred diversion, though it appears to have partaken less of the religious
element, and resemebled more nearly those medieval pageants in which certain subjects and characters, taken

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from pagan mythology or popular legends, were represented. Frequently, also, it assumed very much the nature
of a masquerade, when the sole object of the actors is to disguise themselves, and excite alternately laughter and
admiration by the splendid or ridiculous costumes in which they are arrayed.
The term mummer is synonymous with masker, and is derived from the Danish , mumme, or Dutch,
momme. The custom of mumming at the present day, such as it is, prevails only at the Christmas season, the
favourite and commencing night for the pastime being generally Christmas Eve. Formerly, however, it seems to
have been practised also at a splendid ‘mummerie,’ which, in 1377, was performed shortly before Candlemas by
the citizens of London, for the amusement of Prince Richard, son of the Black Prince, and afterward the
unfortunate monarch Richard II. In the year 1400, we are informed that Henry IV., holding his Christmas at Eltham,
was visited by 12 aldermen and their sons as mummers , and that these august personages ‘had great thanks’ from
his majesty for their performance. But shortly afterwards, as Faby tells us, a conspiracy to murder the king was
organized under the guise of a Twelfth night mumming. The plot was discovered only a few hours before the time
of putting it in execution. Henry VIII., who ruthlessly demolished so many ancient institutions, issued an ordinance
against mumming or guising declaring all persons who wet about to great houses arrayed in this fashion, liable to
be arrested as vagabonds, committed to jail for 3 months, and fined at the kings pleasure. The reason assigned for
this edict, is the number of murders and other felonies which have arisen from this cause. But we hear of no
permanent or serious check sustained b the mummers in consequence.
In thetract, Round about our Coal fire, or Christmas Entertainments, already quoted, the following passage
occurs in reference to the practice of mumming at a comparatively recent period: ‘Then comes mumming or
masquerading, when the squire’s wardrobe is ransacked for dresses of all kinds. Corks are burnt to black the faces
of the fair, or make deputy moustaches, and every one in the family, except the squire himself, must be
transformed.’

Fig. 107.). UK stamp medieval mummers from folklore

Fig. 108.). Masquerade ball 14th century. Source National Endowment For The Humanities
The grand and special performance of the mummers from time immemorial, has been the representation
of a species of drama, which embodies the time honoured legen of St. George and the dragon, with sundry
whimsical adjuncts, which contribute to give the whole affair an aspect of ‘very tragicalmirth.’ The actors, chiefly
young lads, having arrayed themselves in the costumes proper to the allegorical characters which they are to
support, sally forth in company on Christmas Eve, to commence their round of visitsto the houses of the principal
inhabitants of the parish. Arriving at the first residence in their way, they knock at the door, and claim the
privilege of Christams in the the admission of St George and his ‘merrymen.’ The accompanying engraving
delineates a motley group on such an occasion as we are describing. First is seen Old Father Christmas, bearing, as

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emblematic devices, the holly bough, wassail bowl, &c. Besie him stands a pretty little girl, carrying a branch of
mistletoe. Then come the Grand Turk, the gallant knight, St. George, and the latters antagonist, the devouring
dragon. A doctor is also present with a large box of pils to cure the wounded. Drums and other music accompany
the procession, which, moreover, in the above engraving is represented as accompanied bythe parish beadle,
whose command of the stocks, in days gone by, rendered him a terror to evil doers, and insured the maintenance
of order and decorum.[211]

Fig. 109.). Roitschaeggaetae Mask. Loetsch Valley, Wallis Canton, Switzerland. dress in mottled furs covered in a
mixture of soot, blood and manure, and then chase the frightened villagers. The mask is also called a shrovetide
mask.
Fig. 110.). The Dorset Ooser is the name of a horned mask that has been a part of folklore in the town of
Dorchester, in the county of Dorset in southern England, for several centuries.
Masquerades and disguises are among our first associations with Mardi gras. Indeed, the mask is the
obligatory companion to this festival. To ruly grasp the significance of this costume piece we must refer to Walter
von Wartburg’s scholarly study of this word in his Etymological Dictionary of French. The root of the word mask
seems to be pre Indo European, designating the spirits and creatures of the Otherworld who reveal themselves to
humans at certain times of the year.
We find 11th century corroboration of the word mask in the Latin talamasca. In the text that mentions this
term, Hincmar, the bishop or Reims, condemns the disguises used at masquerades in the company of bears.
May he [the Christian] avoid the noisy displays of joy and vulgar laughter, may he neither tell nor sing
useless stories, may he not consent that in his presence others indulge in the obscene games of the bear; may he
not on that occasion wear the masks of demons that the vulgar call talamasca, because these involve diabolical
practices condemned by the canons of the church.
These masquerades no doubt involved ritual customs in which the belief in ghosts was combined with
spectacular or grotesque dances. The Carnival like parades found almost everywhere in Eurasia are organized

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around this traditional core. In fact, the pagan customs stigmatized by the archbishop do not arise merely from
the simple amusements that stage the vulgar displays of bear leaders. Instead, they involve pagan customs he
prudishly describes as “obscene games” in which individuals that are disguised and associated with bears go under
the name talamasca. These probably participated in a facetious masquerade, complete with dances and mimicry,
which we might best envision from our modern bear festivals, such as the one held in Prats de Mollo in the
Catalonian Pyrenes. Indeed, the traditional farces of Carnival include men disguised as bears who smear with
soothe faces of those they catch that is, the bears craft for their victims a black mask that carries them back into
the world of the revenants.
Interestingly, Claude Lecouteux has noted that “the laws frequently state that masca is the vulgar name for
the striges, and Gervase of Tilbury wrote around 1210 that mask is the vulgar and Gallic name for Lamia.” Carnival
was thus presented as a festival of the intrusion of revenants, the moment when the beings of the Otherworld
came to mingle among humans for a time. Lamia are Latin forms of a female vampire who particularly fed on
poets.[212]
720: To pick up where the last scholar left off. Id like to state that I do believe the word lamia is also the root
word or a metaphysical transformation into the word labia. That’s for labia major and labia minor of the vaginal
lips. Hence, feeding on poets, as women love artists/creators. We must pay very close attention to what is being
said from here on out in this book.
As we see with figure 109 & 110 it is obvious that there has been a specific derogatory element added to
the caracitarizing of black men. The imagery used for figure 110 is directly related to imagery of the Baphomet
head or Nature God. These masks are used to scare people which in essence instills a fear towards black men. It is
very clear that the fear or projected violence that is committed today upon blacks by white people has a history
that goes back over 1000 years. It was highly ritualistic to demean dark skinned people, before they went on full
assault across the world. These demeaning rituals may be a form of revenge from activity done to them by the
Moors and other Islamic groups. Other practices such as plays, songs and food activites were also programmed
with a hatred towards and a demonizing of dark skinned people. These forms of hatred have even been practised
on the Gypsies who are considered swarthy Caucasians.
All civilizations and cultures have some form of mask, usually used during a ceremony or ritual of some
sort. Never have I encountered a people who make masks to imitate or intentionally devalue another group of
people. There maybe other reasons for this. On another note, in the European mind they may be using these
masks to disguise ones self as a provision of confusion to beings of the otherworld. We must understand that the
otherworld is the land of trolls, gnomes, fairies, dragons and the like. These entities possess the power of both
good and evil and distribute their wills based upon how they are treated. The otherworld is not to be confused
with the underworld which is hell. As, I was stating the masks could be an imitation of black people in order to
have full access and maybe also protection from the elements inside the other world. When we include the high
hallucination that was discussed in vol. 2, there are wide possibilities on how their nervous system maybe wired,
you see evidence in this in the medical oddities. Not to forget the experiences of the plague which plays a large
role on their perception of life and trust/social factors.
The death experiences of the plague both influenced and maximized rituals of the old civilizations and
cultures which would be the Byzantine, Merovingian and Frankish Empires, inclusive with Jewish and Celtic
almalgamization and influence. At all times we never forget Mother Rome and Father Greece. In my opinion, The
Black Death was the time warp/blackhole that sucked the Caucasian soul in and spit it back out a new, worst than
before. But also extremely attentive, individualistic and powerfully violent. Not only did death get embedded into
the whole thinking structure of Europeans. This blackhole was also the doorway of understanding to the true

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philosophies of balance, medicine, astrology, magic and all other arts of the living and control of the invisible
elements such as principles. This information coming from entities of both the Otherworld and Underworld.
Comparitive with the Egyptians who basically transcribed the journeys in the Otherworld and they lived their
entire existence based on preparing for the after life. The Europeans transcribed the journeys, activites, conjuring
and characters of the different locations and entities of both the Otherworld and the Underworld. In which is also
a compilation of the conclusions of sciences of many civilizations. With the knowledge of a mass amount of
different peoples and magic systems and large numbers of the race being involved and dedicated, they were able
to discover in the span of 1000 years what took others maybe 2-3000.
Not to forget the Mummers. Who I believe our modern day mumble rappers come from. This practice
takes place with all carnivals. It would even occur at weddings and other communal events such as the chari vari.
The Mummers, today would be considered a nuisance. America has its own Mummer festivals specifically
commemorating and keeping them alive in Philladelphia. We must understand that Philladelphia is the front door
of America and Washington D.C. is the backdoor. As when this country was established the White House was in
Philadelphia. Metaphysical proof of this is the White Houses address is 1600 Pennsylvania. The mummers can also
be the built character to identify the element of murmuring which is considered sinful in the bible. Here are some
verses: Jude 1:16 These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and their mouth speaketh
great swelling [words], having men's persons in admiration because of advantage. Exodus 15:24 And the people
murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink? 1 Corinthians 10:10 Neither murmur ye, as some of them
also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer.
Basically, murmuring, mummering or mumbling is speaking underneath your breath. A form of
complaining or talking back. I remember as a child when white people would complain about some shit. Id just
look at them like, “If you don’t shut the fuck up, your people rule the world.” They complain about democrats &
republicans, the corporations, the banks, theyre always complaining about their shit. Its to the point now, with
everybody thinking theyre Caucasians, people will complain loud and publicly if there is any waiting at the register
for them to be checked out and expect you to chime in on their sorrowful shit. Mummbling around me gets one
smacked, because your obviously illiterate and cant speak correctly in which incoherency disturbs me. Besides
this, you must not have the courage to convey your message. If mummbling was done by an elderly woman
without a mask on in anyday Old Europe she would be classified as a witch casting a spell and sent to the stake.
The practice of mummers at the carnival acting unruly is in synch with demons dancing the march to hell. The Lord
of Misrule would be the host and leader of the event. The Lod of Misrule is todays Master of Ceremonies.

Fig. 111.). Pictures from the Jab Jab ritualistic dance that occurs before The Mardi Gras Carnival

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720: These 2 pictures were taken during a modern day Mardi Gras Carnival. Jab Jab means “Diable” in French, so
basically we are saying double devil. It is not to be disconnected from the Job book of the bible. This ritual was
created supposedly by slaves to commemorate their freedom. I believe that’s extreme bullshit. The Islanders of
all the carribean take place in and support this nonsense in which they don’t know the true roots of. It is clear that
these practices are french in origin as the words being used are. The French dominated and had slaves and made
their slaves do whatever they pleased obviously. This includes any ritualistic practices that we didn’t understand
at the time as all the rituals were programmed with imagery, vices and words that was at least 200-300 years
strong before the African American slave trade started. This ritual is inculcating us to be animals/devils and slaves
and I also believe it is a stabilizing maintainence for all other sub rituals that have created the African American
culture over time. Of course the perfect location would be the intermediary zone between Africa and America
which would solidify, the children of those in the carribean zone to be slaves and devils. Basically locked
underneath generational magic and a maintainance ritual called the Jab Jab. Im pretty sure the islanders don’t
know what the hell they are doing theyre just there for a good time while at the same time ensuring their
stagnation and demise. Nobody pays attention when theyre shaking their ass.
The Lord of Misrule
The functionary with the above whimsical title played a important part in the festivities of Christmas in the
olden time. His duties were to lead and direct the multifarious revels of the season, or, as we should say at the
present day, to act as Master of the Ceremonies. The following account of him is give by Stow: “In the feast of
Christmas, there was in the king’s house, wheresoever he lodged, a Lord of Misrule, or Master of Merry Disports,
and the like had ye in the house of every nobleman of honour or good worship, were he spiritual or temporal. The
Mayor of London, and either of the Sheriffs, had their several Lords of Misrule, ever contending, without quarrel or
offence, who should make the rarest pastime to delight the beholdres. These lords beginning their rule at
Allhallows Eve, continued the same till the morrow after the Feast of the Purification, commonly called Candlemas
Day, in which space there were fine and subtle disguisings, masks and mummeries, with playing at cards for
counters, nayles and points, in every house, more for pastimes than for gain.
In the University of Cambridge, the functions of the Lord of Misrule were performed by one of the masters
of Arts, who was regularly eleced to superintend the annual representation of Latin plays by the students, besides
taking a general charg of their games and diversions during the Christmas season, and was styled the Imperator or
Perfectus Ludorum. A similar Master of Revels was chosen at Oxford. But it seems to have been in the Inns of
Court in London that the Lord of Misrule reigned with the greatest splendor, being surrounded with all the parade
and ceremony of royalty, having his lord keeper and treasurer , his guard of honour, and even his 2 chaplains, who
preached before him on Sunday in the Temple Church. On 12th Day, he abdicated his sovereignty, and we are
informed that in the year 1635, this mock representative of royalty expended in the exercise of his office about
2,000 pounds from his own purse, and at the conclusion of his reign was knighted by Charles I. at Whitehall. The
office, indeed, seems to have been regarded among the Templars as a highly honourable one, and to have been
generally conferred on young gentlemen of good family.
The following is an extract from the ‘articles’ drawn up by the Right Worshipful Richard Evelyn, Esq., Father
of the author of the Diary, and deputy lieutenant of the counties of Surrey and Sussex, for appointing and defining
the functions of a Christmas Lord of Misrule over his estate at Wotton: “Imprimus, I give free leave to Owen Flood,
my trumpeter, gentleman, to be Lord of Misrule of all good orders during the 12 days. And also, I give free leave to
the said Owen Flood to command all and every person or persons whatsoever as well servants as others, to be at
his command whensoever he shall sound his trumpet or music, and to do him good service, as though I were
present myself at their perils…..I give full power and authority to his lordship to break up all locks, bolts, bars,

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doors, and latches, and to fling up all doors out of hinges, to come at those who presume to disobey his lordships
commands. God save the king!’
In the accompanying engraving, one of these Lords of Misrule is shewn with a fools bauble as his assistant
or confederate in conducting the jocularities. We are informed that a favourite mode for his lordship to enter on
the duties of his office was by explaining to the company that he absolved them of all their wisdom, and that they
were to be just wise enough to make fools of themselves. No onw wsa to sit apart in pride or self –sufficiency, to
laught at others. Moreover, he (the Lord of Misrule) came endowed with a magic power to turn all his auditory
into children, and that, while his sovereignty lasted, he should take care that they conducted themselves as such.
So fealty was sworn to the ‘merry monarch,’ and the reign of fun and folly forthwith commenced. In the
pantomime of the present day, we see in the mischievous pranks of the Clown, who parodies all the ordinady
occupations of grave and serious life, a reproduction under a modern form of the extravagances of the Lord of
Misrule.
There can be no doubt that scandalous abuses often resulted from the exuberant llicence assumed by the
Lord of Misrule and his satellites. It need, therefore, occasion no surprise to find their proceedings denounced in
no measured terms by Prynne and other zealous Puritans. ‘If,’ says the author of the Histrio Mastix, ‘we compare
our Bacchanalian Christmasses and New year’s Tides with these Saturnalia and Feasts of Janus, we shall find regard
of time ( they being both in the end of December and on the first of January) and in their manner of solemising
(both of them being spent in reveling, epicurisme, wantonesse, idlenesse, dancing, drinking, stage plaies, masques,
and carnall pompe and jollity), that we must needs concluds the one to be but the very ape or issue of theother.
Hence, Polydore Virgil affirmes in express termes that our Christmas Lords of Misrule (which custom, saith he, is
chiefly observed in England), together with dancing, masques, mummeries, stageplayes, and such other Christmass
disorders now in use with Christians, were derived from these Roman Saturnalia and Bacchanalian festivals; which
(concludes he) should cause all pious Christians eternally to abominate them.’

Fig. 112.). The Lord of Misrule

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 In Scotland, previous to the Reformation, the monasteries used to elect a functionary of a similar
character, for the superintendence of the Christmas revels, under the designation of the Abbot of Unreason. The
readers of the Waverley Novels wil recollect the graphic delineation of one of these mock ecclesiastics in The
Abbot. An ordinance for suppressing this annual burlesque, with other festivities of a like kind, was passed by the
Scottish legislature in 1555. In France, we find the congener of the Lord of Misrule and the Abbbot of Unreasonin
the Abbas Stultorum the Abbot or Pope of Fools.[213]
An officer of the Christmastide revels in the Middle Ages, who directed the festivities of the holiday
season, and who ruled over his “subjects” so absolutely that he might do or command almost anything without
censure. The Lord of Misrule held office at least during the twelve days from Christmas to Epihpany, and often
from Allhallows (Oct. 31 Nov.1) to Candlemas (Feb. 2). This latter period, for example, corresponds to the period of
rule of the King of the Bean (another name for the Lord of Misrule) at Merton College, Oxford. The Abbas
Stultorum thus ruled over the Feast of Fools (Jan. 1) in France; the Boy Bishop was in charge of the Innocents Day
(Dec. 28) celebrations in France and England; in Scotland his name was the Abbot of Unreason, of Misrule, of Bon
Accord; in France there was an Abbe de la Malgouverne. These masters of the revels held forth in the royal
household, in the houses of the nobles, in the colleges, in the Inns of Court. Depending upon the place, they were
elected or appointed. From the period of the year (winter solstice) and the pomp surrounding the Lord of Misrule,
Frazer supposes that he was a survival of the ancient Roman Saturn who ruled over the Saturnalia, one of the
temporary kings whose reigns were short and sweet and who died when their functions had been fulfilled. Frazer
further hypothesizes that the suspension of the normal course of events occurred in the intercalary days, when
time itself ran off the calendar. The ability to relax then the normal progress of things, and the occurrence at the
same time itself ran off the calenday. The ability to relax then the normal progress of things, and the occurrence at
the same time of the yearly revolution in the sun’s course, made for a grand festival and a burlesquing of what
during the rest of the year was held holy and sane.[214]
Twelfth Night and the Christianization of Carnival
Early Christianity was itself an ecstatic religion, a suppressed cult in which enraptured dancing,
carnivalesque behavior and charismatic forms of worship, i.e., speaking in tongues, were accepted. Subordinate
members of the clergy claimed their own feast day, commonly known as the Feast of Fools, a sort of imitation of
Saturnalia that included cross dressing and blasphemous buffoonery.
With antecedents dating back to ancient religious festivals, the ritual slaughter of the boeuf gras (French
for “fatted calf” or ox) came to symbolize the last meat and feasting enjoyed by Christians prior to the Lenten
season of atonement and abstinence. In Paris, butchers would compete to see who could raise the biggest and
most glorious boeuf gras. The winning beast would be paraded through the streets on Mardi Gras.
Boeuf Gras float in the Rex parade
The task of purging ecstatic and unruly behavior preoccupied Church leaders for much of the Middle Ages.
Gradually, a sort of accommodation emerged: Christians could still celebrate with abandon on holy days, so long as
the revels didn’t invade the sanctity of Church property. The diffuse elements of the old festive habits began to
coalesce into a secularized holiday that would become known as Carnival.
The etymology of “carnival” suggests a dynamic in which pagan customs were subsumed into Judeo
Christian tradition. In its earliest usage in medieval Europe, the Latin word carnelevare, from which “carnival” is
derived (literally meaning “to lift up” or relieve from “flesh” or “meat”), may have referred to the beginning of the
Lenten season of atonement and abstinence rather than the festive customs that preceded Lent. In any case, the
Church in effect rationalized Carnival as an expression of the occasional need for carefree folly. Because the day
before Ash Wednesday, which marked the beginning of Lent, was a day of feasting — as symbolized by the ritual

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slaughter of a fatted bull or ox (boeuf gras) — it came to be known as Fat Tuesday or, as the French would say,
Mardi Gras.
Mardi Gras became an “official” Christian holiday in 1582, when Pope Gregory XIII instituted the namesake
Gregorian calendar still in use today. By recognizing Mardi Gras as an overture to Lent, the idea was for all the
partying and foolery to be over with when it came time to observe the requisite austerities.
Mardi Gras History
In medieval times, the feast of the Epiphany (January 6) — also known as Kings’ Day or Twelfth Night (it’s
the twelfth day of Christmas, the day the gift bearing Magi visited the Christ child) — evolved into a major
celebration alongside Carnival. Monarchs would don their finest regalia, maybe even wager in a game of dice.
Children received presents to commemorate the gifts given by the kings to the baby Jesus. In the great houses of
Europe, the holiday became a glittering finale to a 12 day Christmas cycle, with elaborate entertainments featuring
conjurers, acrobats, jugglers, harlequins and other humorous characters — notable among them the Lord of
Misrule, whose task was to orchestrate the festivities. He is kin to Carnival’s King of the Fools (most famously
represented by the character Quasimodo in Victor Hugo’s novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame).
Jesters in Carnival represent the license to poke fun with abandon, just as jesters in the medieval courts of
Europe could speak truth to power with impunity. In New Orleans at Carnival time, omnipresent jester imagery
serves as a constant reminder that true Carnival custom involves the spirit of merry mockery and reverence for the
wisdom of fools.
Jesters on Fat Tuesday
While the Twelfth Night customs that spread throughout Europe were subject to numerous variations, one
element transcended virtually every culture that observed the holiday: the choice of a mock king for the occasion.
“The way he was chosen might vary,” explains Bridget Ann Henisch in her book Cakes and Characters: An English
Christmas Tradition, “but it was always a matter of chance and good fortune: lots could be drawn or, in the most
widespread convention, a cake would be divided. The person who found a bean, or a coin, in his piece was the
lucky king for the night. Sometimes he picked his own queen, sometimes chance chose her for him, and a pea
secreted in the cake conferred the honor on its finder. The temporary change in status was sustained with
ceremony; the king was given a crown, the authority to call the toasts and lead the drinking and, sometimes, the
more dubious privilege of paying the bill on the morning after.”
Adopting the old pagan “luck of the draw” ritual dating back to Saturnalia, Twelfth Night thus became a
holiday imbued with royal associations. Christians, in turn, transformed it a symbolic reenactment of Epiphany. In
France, a bean sized baby Jesus eventually replaced the bean (la feve); its discovery memorialized the discovery of
Jesus’ divinity by the Magi.
Over time, Carnival became established as the season of merriment that begins on Twelfth Night and
climaxes on Mardi Gras. Occurring on any Tuesday from February 3 through March 9, Mardi Gras is tied to Easter,
which falls on the first Sunday after the full moon that follows the Spring Equinox. Mardi Gras is always scheduled
47 days preceding Easter (the 40 days of Lent plus seven Sundays).
If the festivities were to some degree be sanctioned by the Church, according to Ehrenreich, “the uplifting
religious experience, if any, was supposed to be found within the Church controlled rites of mass and procession,
not within the drinking and dancing. While ancient worshipers of Dionysus expected the god to manifest himself
when the music reached an irresistible tempo and the wine was flowing freely, medieval Christians could only
hope that God, or at least his earthly representatives, was looking the other way when the flutes and drums came
out and the tankards were passed around.”

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Modernity and the Suppression of European Festivities
This “secularization of pleasure,” Ehrenreich speculates, may help account for the unbridled, chaotic
nature of pre modern Carnivals in Europe, in which traditional conventions were suspended and the common folk
ran wild in the streets — indulging in mass inebriation, insubordination and mockery at the expense of the ruling
elites. It was a ribald, topsy turvy realm that might include dancers costumed as priests and nuns, saucy comedic
characters in naughty parodies of religious ritual, fools impersonating nobles, and the public harassment of Jews.
Rich in allegorical detail, the 1559 painting contrasts somber Lenten penance, charity and abstinence from
meat with Carnival feasting, masking, games and foolery. In the foreground is a mock jousting contest between
figures representing Carnival and Lent. Propelled by an entourage of musicians and costumed revelers, a jolly fat
man, personifying Carnival, sits astride a large wine barrel holding a long cooking skewer threaded with a pig’s
head, sausages and a chicken. Bearing two small fish on a baker’s paddle, Lent — dour, pale and gaunt — sits on a
church chair and advances on a trolley drawn by a friar and a nun. Following behind, children eat flatbread and
burghers give alms to beggars.

Fig. 113.). Battle between Carnival and Lent

The Fight Between Carnival and Lent by Flemish painter Pieter Bruegel the Elder
At least into the 15th century, writes Ehrenreich, “nobles and members of the emerging bourgeoisie”
participated in public festivities such as Carnival “as avidly as the peasants and urban workers, and the mixing of
classes no doubt enhanced the drama and excitement of the occasion.” They also partook in parallel, private revels
that “had often been as uninhibited as the celebrations of the poor.”

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 But beginning in the 16th century, the upper classes began to distance themselves from the traditional
free for alls. Especially in France, Carnival began to take on a more menacing, political aspect — as an occasion for
protest and the fermentation of rebellion. The upper classes, meanwhile, were becoming increasingly concerned
with etiquette, the art of polite conversation and “cultured” entertainment such as opera, ballet and classical
music. Regarding the rowdy public escapades of the hoi polloi as déclassé, if not “vulgar,” they retreated into more
refined forms of Carnival merriment such as masquerade balls.
In Europe, the Protestant Reformation, Age of Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution, along with the
disciplinary demands of military preparedness in an era of gun based fighting, would take their toll on communal
pleasures such as Carnival and Twelfth Night celebrations. The revels were seen as a distraction from work and a
waste of resources, if not outright dangerous. “Protestantism — especially in its ascetic, Calvinist form — played a
major role in convincing large numbers of people not only that unremitting, disciplined labor was good for their
souls, but that festivities were positively sinful, along with idleness,” observes Ehrenreich. Obedience, self denial
and deferred gratification were the new order of the day, and surviving expressions of the old Dionysian spirit
became targets for suppression.
“The Catholic south of Europe held on to its festivities more tightly than the north,” relates Ehrenreich,
“though these were often reduced to mere processions of holy images and relics through the streets….
Everywhere the general drift led inexorably away from the medieval tradition of carnival.” She goes on to cite
Peter Stallybrass and Allon White, authors of The Politics and Poetics of Transgression. “In the long term history
from the 17th to the 20th century…,” they write, “there were literally thousands of acts of legislation introduced
which attempted to eliminate carnival and popular festivity from European life….”[215]
The winter celebrations were perhaps the most abhorrent. The Winter Feast, once held during the middle
of November, was moved to the end of December, so that both the Roman Saturnalia and the New Year Festival of
the Kalends of January were incorporated into the Christian festival of the Nativity of Christ; these 3 great pre
Christian festivals coincided more or less with the date of the greatest of all Christian celebrations, and not
unnaturally, they influenced it very much, as they still do. All sorts of customs were enacted, like the hobby horse
rites which often involved the participants, with beast masks, or the Feast of Fools and the Lord of Misrule. The
Feast of Fools even became an ecclesiastical event, chiefly in cathedrals but also in monasteries. People wore caps
bearing asses’ ears, perhaps a relic of animal sacrifice or a practice of the Roman period in France. The custom is
remembered in the paper hats worn round the party table at Christmas. The traditional fools cap was eared, and
sometimes also bore a coxcomb, and the fool wore bells and particoloured garments all features of the kalendic
Feast of Fools. The wearing of masks was a widespread custom at such ceremonies. These festivities survived as
12th Night, with the Rey de Habas, the Bean king, i.e. the child appointed to rule over the activities. Mock masses,
the worship of an ass upon the altar, and other unseemly acts in churches, were, needless to say, grounds for high
ecclesiastical disapproval. Yet they continued at least until the 15th century, and one wonders how willing a part
the local priest (whose living and popularity depended on the goodwill of his flock) played in such harmless – but
to a Christian utterly blasphemous – merrymaking. It has been suggested that the Church turned a blind eye to
carnival during the 12th century, knowing that under the pressures of life men needed a safety valve, and that, in
any case, after a period of unfettered licence they returned more joyfully to the service of God. The goings on of
these medieval festivals has considerable relevance not only to the appearance of masks, beast masks and
acrobats on churches, but also to the caving of exhbitionists. Sexual activities cannot have been infrequent at
these times, much to the discomfiture of the clergy.
Masks and heads of humans and animals are probably the most frequent subjects for corbels, but atlas
figures and those of acrobatic entertainers run a close second, also appearing on capitals, many of them

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exhibitionist in character, displaying their sex or making gestures and grimaces. Some are elegant and beautifully
carved, so that it is not always clear if the viewer is to admire or disapprove, and the duality of Romanesque
symbolism one more comes to the fore. Outstanding muscular co ordination keeping ten balls in the air at once,
or bending backwards to place the head between the knees requires, in common belief, supernatural aid from Hell
or heaven. On the whole, though, we may take it that carvings illustrating such acts on church buildings, were
intended to make a moral point: that one must regard the world of entertainement with suspicion, and take care
not to be tainted by it. We have the teachings of Saint Augustine to inform us. As widely read and quoted in
medieval times as the Bible itself, he continued the tradition of Clement of Alexandrias’s Protrepticus, a work
which fulminated against the ‘obscenity’ of performances on the late Classical stage. Saint Augustine likewise
apostrophized circus acts of all kinds, writing:
‘He who said I desire you not to have traffic with devils’ (Corinthians I, X. 20) meant that believers must
distinguish themselves by their pleasure in popular songs, in frivolous display, in the manifold immoralities of the
theatre.[216]
Jean Juvenal des Ursins wrote: ‘And it was common knowledge that the said jousts were accompanied by
indecent things in the way of flirtations (amourettes), from which many evils have since which many evils have
since come.’ In the early 15th century the Augustinian monk, Jacobus Magnus, preached at the Hotel Royal,
declaring, ‘the goddess Venus reigns at your court; drunkenness and debauchery serve as her suite and turn night
into day amid the most dissolute dancing. People everywhere are talking of this disorderly conduct.’ Monks who
supported reforms and the Burgundian cause contributed much to publicizing such behaviour.[217]
Thus, we read of vassals descending to the humiliating occupation of beating the water of the moat of the
castle, in order to stop the noise of the frogs, during the illness of the mistress; we elsewhere find that at times the
lord required of them to hop on one leg, to kiss the latch of the castle gate, or to go through some drunken play in
his presence, or sing a somewhat broad song before the lady. [218]
While the word carnival appears in several forms with various endings, it always begins with the same
root: carn(e). This seems to indicate that the clerics reinterpreted the end of the word they were using, either
because they could not indentify it (which made it necessary to make known the unknown by replacing the end of
the world with other terms that were clearer and more familiar to them) or because they were seeking to
camouflage a taboo word that called to mind overly impious realities that were unacceptable to the Christian faith.
Carnival could thus have been Christianized into carne levare, which attaches the meaning “taking away meat” to
aide the church in justifying Lent in the face of pagan rites and beliefs. In a sense, it was trying to eliminate Carnival
by giving it the meaning of Lent. Originally, however, the two periods were perfectly distinct and even
diametrically opposed; thus, our confusion surrounding this term is perfectly justified. It is significant that the
manipulated forms of the word carnival can be found in clerical texts or those written by ecclesiastics.
One more interesting aspect to the word’s alteration is the fact that behind this linguistic tinkering there
lies a form of superstition that is typical of primitive mentalities. To name a deity (and Carnival would then have
been a deity) could be dangerous, because it amounted to giving him a potentially harmful power over humans
and the world. Conversely, disguising the deity’s name rendered it inoffensive and permitted its use in any context.
The memory and the tradition to which this name refers are therefore further muddied.[219]
There are some who believe that the month of June took its name from Junius Brutus, the first Roman
consul, because as the expulsion of Tarquin transpired this month (during the calends of June), Bruts would have
sacrificed to Carna on the Caelian Hill in fulfillment of an oath. It was believed that Carna ruled over man’s vital
organs. Consequently, it was she to whom one turned to ask that the liver, the heart, and the viscera of the body in
general be kept in good health, and as it was thanks to her heart and the dissimulation she had contrived that

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Brutus had succeeded in changing an evil reign of government, it was also to this goddess, patron of the vital
organs, that he dedicated a temple. One also offers as a sacrifice to Carna a pureeof beans and lard, food that
contributes more than any other to the body’s strength. As ripe beans were used in this month’s worship, the
calnds of June were also vulgarly known as the “calends of the beans.”
Cicero (in De Divinatione) thought the bean was impure and that it spoiled the blood, caused the stomach
to swell, excited sensuality, and caused bad dreams. The bean, then, could be said to be the Carnival food par
excellence, given that it causes the stomach to swell and can therefore make a man resemble a pregnant woman.
There are a great number of Carnival food par excellence, given that it causes the stomach to swell and can
therefore make a man resemble a pregnant woman. There are a great number of Carnival brotherhoods that find
amusement in the ambiguity brought on by this bloating.
Claude Gaignebet furthermore recalls that, according to the Pythagorean literature, the bean takes 40
days to germinate. It therefore follows the exact same interval of Carnival time based on the 40 day period (Lent =
40 days before Easter; Ascenision = 40 days after Easter). It is no cause for surprise, then, that the bean can be
found in the rites of Carnival most particularly, those of Epihpany, for the bean, as we know, appearsin the king’s
cake.* The person who finds the bean becomes, as a joke, the temporary king of the of the feast within the the
time of Carnival. It is customary in Europe, particularly in France, to serve a cake named after the three Magi in
which has been cooked a bean or other object. The person who finds the bean in his of her slice is considered to
be the beneficiary of good luck for the following year. [220]
The medieval romance La Manekine recounts certain rites of the medieval Carnival and dates them in
accordance with the annual calendar. Interestingly, these rites of the Middle Ages display very little difference
from those of modern Carnival. Among them we find that of the mannequin destined to be burned the first
Sunday of Lent (Firebrand Sunday). These rites of both medieval times and the present were in some cases much
older than the Middle Ages, if we can take Julius Caesar at his word when he mentions similar sacrificial practices
among the Gauls. Furthermore, the giant of Carnival cannot help but bring to mind the gigantic figure of
Gargantua, which provides further corroboration of the long medieval tradition surrounding him.[221]
In Portugal there is the custom if the piniatta that Claude Gaignebet quite correctly puts back in the cycle
of Carnival, in relation to the folklore of the cock: “On the day of Mardi Gras, a man with his eyes covered must kill
a paper rooster that is filled with oranges and is called a piniatta (a word of Italian origin designating a pot).”[222]
720: Well, how about that. You eat the pork and beans and youre worshipping a Goddess, especially if you do it
at a Carnival. She is a fertility goddess. Beans have a high fiber content and are the vegetarian substitute for meat,
they arent necessarily an aphrodisiac but are known to make one sensual. Due to their health and digestive
properties inclusive with gas creation in the body in combination with meat and liquor consumption there is a
euphoria created that assists with sexual activity. If this congestion high, is repetitive it will create erectile
dysfunction. The show must go on. Carnea also confused and almagamated with Cardea (Goddess of Door Hinges)
are both related with festivities and meat one way or the other. Hence the words we use today car (human as
meat being moved), carcass, carnal, carnivorous, carnation, incarnate, carnage, carry, carnelian(flesh blood color),
caress, carol (meat singing), carrot, carouse, cardinal. After seeing all these other words we can definetly see the
association with the color red. We also can see that the root word car(n) is spread out amongst many other words
which give the Goddess life and strong representation in all the base areas that are relative to life. There is also a
heavy science behind the mannequin, as of recently there was a mannequin challenege that surfaced online.
Another science that get s look over entirely is the the fools staff, the lord of misrules staff, broom sticks, the stake
and magic wands may all have a similarity in definition or in application.

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 Hallow’s Eve
Hallewijn or Heer Halowyn
The title of a Dutch ballad, deriving from the Apocryphal tale of Judith and Holofernes (whence Hallewin),
known in all parts of Europe from Italy to Scandinavia, Hungary to England: probably composed not earlier than
the 15th century. The ballad, as derived from its ancient source, shows the closest correspondence to the original
in the Netherlands version, for only in that ballad does the heroine tell Hallewijn’s mother that she is carrying the
head and then bring the head to her fathers hall. All Biblical reference is however lost. In the ballad, the girl is
lured from her castle by the music of the knight. He threatens to kill her as he had her sisters. In the various
versions, she kills him, or she is killed and avenged by her brothers, or she is rescued by the brothers.
In the German versions, the knight is Ullinger, Ulrich, etc., and the girl is killed and avenged or she escapes.
The Hungarian Molnar Anna is an offshoot of the German. The English Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight or May Collin
(Child #4) has preserved in some versions the supernatural character of the knight, a mischievous, malevolent
nature added as the ballad migrated through Scandinavia. In France Renaud is the killer; in Italy the ballad is
known as Monferrina; in Spain and Portugal it is Rico Franco. The death of the girl is avenged by her 3 brothers in
the Czech ballad The Murderer. The ballad is said to be very popular in Poland. Taken all in all, the Hallewijn
ballads be the most widespread in Europe.[223]
There is perhaps no night in the year which the popular imagination has stamped with a more peculiar
character than the evening of the 31st of October, known as All Hallow’s Eve, or Halloween. It is clearly a relic of
pagan times, for there is nothing in the church observance of the ensuing day of All Saints to have originated such
extraordinary notions as are connected with this celebrated festival, or such remarkable practices as those by
which it is distinguished.
The leading idea respecting Halloween is that it is the time, of all others, when supernatural influences
prevail. It is the night set apart for a universal walking abroad of spirits, both of the visible and invisible world; for,
as will be afterwards seen, one of the special characteristics attributed to this mystic evening, is the faculty
conferred on the immaterial principle in humanity to detach itself from its corporeal tenement and wander abroad
through the realms of space. Divination is then believed to attain its highest power, and the gift asserted by
Glendower of calling spirits ‘from the vasty dep,’ becomes available to all who choose to avail themselves of the
privileges of the occasion.
There is a remarkable uniformity in the fireside customs of this night all over the United Kingdom. Nuts
and apples are everywhere in requisition, and consumed in immense numbers. Indeed the name of Nutcrack
Night, by which Halloween is known in the north of England, indicates the predominance of the former of these
articles in making up the entertainments of the evening. They are not only cracked and eaten, but made the
means of vaticination in love affairs.[224]
Another ceremony much practised on Halloween, is that of the Three Dishes or Luggies. Two of these are
respectively filled with clean and foul water, and one is empty. They are ranged on the heart, when the parties,
blindfolded, advance in succession, and dip their fingers into one. If they dip into the clean water, they are to
marry a maiden; if into the foul water, a widow; if into the empty dish, the party so dipping is destined to be either
a bachelor or an old maid. As each perso takes his turn, the position of the dishes is changed.
The ceremonies above described are all of a light sportive description, but there are others of a more
weird like and fearful character, which in this enlightened incredulous are have fallen very much into desuetude.
One of these is the celebrated spell of eating an apple before a looking glass with the view of discovering the
inquirers future husband, who it is believed will be seen peeping over her shoulder.

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 Grany’s warning as by no means a needless one, as several well authenticated instances are related of
persons who, either from the effects of their own imagination, or some thoughtless practical joke, sustained such
severe nervous shocks, while essaying these Halloween spells, as seriously to imperil their health.
Another of these, what may perhaps be termed unhallowed, rites of All Hallows Eve, is to wet a shirt
sleeve, hang it up to the fire to dry, and lie in bed watching it till midnight, when the apparition of the individual’s
future partner for life will come in and turn the sleeve.
Other rites for the invocation of spirits might be referred to, such as the sowing of hemp seed, and the
winnowing of three wechts of nothing, i.e., repreating three times exposing corn to the wind. In all of these the
effect sought to be produced is the same the appearance of the future husband or wife of the experimenter. A full
description of them will be found in the poem of Burns, from which we have already so largely quoted. It may here
be remarked, that popular belief ascribes to children born on Halloween, the possession of certain mysterious
faculties, such as that of perceiving and holding converse with supernatural being.
Samhain: Halloween, Winter Nights, All Hallows Eve October 31st
Samhain (*Note: Samhain is pronounced sowen, soween, saw win, saw vane or sahven, not sam hayne)
Other names for Samhain include Samhuin, Samain, Saman, Oidhche Shamhna, Hallowe'en, Halloween, Hallows,
Hallowtide, Shadow Fest, Allantide, Third Harvest, Harvest Home, Geimredh, Day of the Dead (Feile na Marbh),
Feast of the Dead, Spirit Night, Candle Night, November Eve, Nutcrack Night, Ancestor Night and Apple Fest.
Christian names for it include All Hallows Eve (although some churches fix that as November 7), Hallows
Eve, Santos, Devil Night and Mischief Night. It is also called Martinmas, but that is properly the name for the actual
cross quarter day which occurs when the sun reaches its power point in Scorpio. Some church calendars fix
November 11 as Martinmas.
Samhain (Summer's End) is one of our four Greater Sabbats, the highest holy day of witches. It is a cross
quarter day, situated between Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice. Samhain is a major festival with several
aspects. It is new year's eve for witches, as well as our third and final harvest festival. Samhain inaugurates Winter,
is the final chance to dry herbs for winter storage, and a night when fairies supposedly afoot working mischief. It is
also the Day of the Dead for us as it was for the Celts, Egyptians and ancient Mexicans, the night when we
remember our loved ones and honour our ancestors. We also celebrate reincarnation and note the absence the
Sun (the god), who will be reborn at Winter Solstice as the Child of Promise. Astrologically, Samhain marks the
rising of the Pleiades.
Late October was the nut harvest for Celts, and the time for salting winter's supply of meat. Scholars
disagree on this, but many fix this date as the Celtic New Year. November 1 is the actual date of Samhain but like
other Celtic derived festivals it is celebrated on its eve. November 1 is New Year's Day for witches, as it was for the
Babylonians.
One of the four greater Sabbats, of the Wiccan/pagan year. For the Celts, Samhain was the feast of the
dead in Pagan and Christian times, its arrival signalled the close of harvest and the start of the winter season.
Fairies were imagined as particularly active at this season. Also called Feile Moingfinne (Snow Goddess). The
Scottish Gaelic Dictionary defines it as "Hallowtide. The Feast of All Souls. Sam + Fuin = end of summer." Eliade's
Encyclopaedia of Religion states as follows: "The Eve and day of Samhain were characterized at a time when the
barriers between the human and supernatural worlds were broken... Not a festival honoring any particular Celtic
deity, Samhain acknowledged the entire spectrum of nonhuman forces that roamed the earth during that period."
Samhain is the Wiccan New Year. This is the time of year when the veil between the world of the dead and
the world of the living is said to be it's thinnest. Spirits and souls of loved ones are said to have more power and
ability to visit us. This is the time of year for remembering and honouring our dead, and many people will leave a

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plate of food and a glass of wine out for wandering sprits. (This is often called the Feast of Hecate) Samhain is also
a time for personal reflection, and for recognizing our faults and flaws and creating a method for rectifying them.
In the Celtic Tradition, the year begins at Samhain, this is the most powerful night of the year to perform
divination. Divination is done in many forms but all seek to establish a look ahead, whether the answer appears
good or bad. Samhain is also considered to start the reign of the God or the dark time of the Year when the Sun
goes lower each day and begins to weaken.
Decorate your altar with photographs of dead loved ones, pumpkin lanterns, oak leaves, apples, nuts and
sage. Incenses associated with this festival include nutmeg, mint and sage, and the colours black and oranges.
Samhain is celebrated as the Dia de los Muertos in Mexico (Day of the Dead usually held on November 1) and All
Saints Day (also on November 1) by the Catholic church.[225]
Samhain (pronounced Sow en), dates back to the ancient Celts who lived 2,000 years ago. Contrary to
what some believe, is not a celebration of a Celtic god of the dead. Instead, it is a Celtic word meaning "summer's
end." The Celts believed that summer came to an end on October 31st and the New Year began on November 1st
with the start of winter. But the Celts also followed a lunar calendar and their celebrations began at sunset the
night before.
Many today see Halloween as the pagan holiday. But that's not really accurate. As the pagan holiday of
Samhain is on November 1st. But their celebrations did and still does start at sunset on October 31st, on Samhain
Eve. During the day on October 31st, the fires within the home are extinguished. Often families would engage in a
good "fall" cleaning to clear out the old and make way for the new. Starting the winter months with fresh and
clean household items. At sunset on October 31, clans or local villages begin the formal ceremonies of Samhain by
lighting a giant bonfire. The people would gather around the fire to burn crops and animals as sacrifices to the
Celtic deities. It was a method of giving the Gods and Goddesses their share of the previous years herd or crops. In
addition these sacred fires were a big part of the cleansing of the old year and a method to prepare for the coming
new year.
During the celebration, the Celts wore costumes, and danced around the bonfire. Many of these dances
told stories or played out the cycles of life and death or commemorated the cycle of Wheel of Life. These costumes
were adorned for three primary reasons. The first was to honor the dead who were allowed to rise from the
Otherworld. The Celts believed that souls were set free from the land of the dead during the eve of Samhain.
Those that had been trapped in the bodies of animals were released by the Lord of the Dead and sent to their new
incarnations. The wearing of these costumes signified the release of these souls into the physical world. Not all of
these souls were honored and respected. Some were also feared as they would return to the physical world and
destroy crops, hide livestock or 'haunt' the living who may have done them wrong. The second reason for these
traditional costumes was to hide from these malevolent spirits to escape their trickery.
The final representation was a method to honor the Celtic Gods and Goddesses of the harvest, fields and
flocks. Giving thanks and homage to those deities who assisted the village or clan through the trials and
tribulations of the previous year. And to ask for their favor during the coming year and the harsh winter months
that were approaching. In addition to celebrations and dance, it was believed that this thin veil between the
physical world and the Otherworld provided extra energy for communications between the living and the dead.
With these communications, Druid Priests, and Celtic Shamans would attempted to tell the fortunes of individual
people through a variety of methods. For a people entirely dependent on the volatile natural world, these
prophecies were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter.
These psychic readings would be conducted with a variety of divination tools. Such as throwing bones, or
casting the Celtic Ogham. There is some historical evidence that additional tools of divination were also used. Most

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of this comes from writings recorded by Roman invaders, but there are stories of reading tea leaves, rocks and
twigs, and even simple spiritual communications that today we'd call Channeling. Some historians have suggested
that these early people were the first to use tiles made from wood and painted with various images which were
the precursor to Tarot Cards. There's no real evidence to support this, but the 'story' of these tiles has lingered for
centuries.
When the community celebration was over, each family would take a torch or burning ember from the
sacred bonfire and return to their own home. The home fires that has been extinguished during the day were re lit
by the flame of the sacred bonfire to help protect the dwelling and it's inhabitants during the coming winter. These
fires were kept burning night and day during the next several months. It was believed that if a home lost it's fire,
tragedy and troubles would soon follow.
With the hearth fires lit, the families would place food and drink outside their doors. This was done to
appease the roaming spirits who might play tricks on the family. The Romans began to conquer the Celtic
territories. By A.D. 43 they had succeeded in claiming the majority of the Celtic lands. They ruled for approximately
four hundred years combining or influencing many Celtic traditional celebrations with their own. Two Roman
holidays were merged with Samhain.

1. Feralia, a day in late October when the Romans traditionally commemorated the passing of the dead.
2. Pomona's Day of Honoring, the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona is the apple and
the incorporation of this celebration into Samhain probably explains the tradition of "bobbing" for apples
that is practiced today on Halloween.
Samhain to Halloween
With the coming of Christianity in the 800s AD, the early Church in England tried to Christianize the old
Celtic festivals. Pope Boniface IV designated the 1st of November as "All Saints Day," honoring saints and martyrs.
He also decreed October 31 as "All Hallows Eve", that eventually became Hallow'een. Scholars today widely accept
that the Pope was attempting to replace the earlier Celtic pagan festival with a church sanctioned holiday. As this
Christian holiday spread, the name evolved as well. Also called All hallows Eve or All hallowmas (from Middle
English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints' Day). 200 years later, in 1000 AD, the church made November 2 All
Souls' Day, a day to honor the dead. It is celebrated similarly to Samhain, with big bonfires, parades, and dressing
up in costumes as saints, angels, and devils. Together, the three celebrations, the eve of All Saints', All Saints', and
All Souls' day, are called Hallowmas.
November 1st or May 13th?
Some people confuse Samhain being originally celebrated in May with other pagan and early Christian
holidays. Samhain comes from the Gaelic word samain. "Sam" summer and "fuin" end. It literally means
Summer's End. The early Irish and Brythonic cultures believed the year was divided in half. The dark half and the
light half. Samhain marked the end of the light half and the beginning of the Celtic new year or the dark half.
According to Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia (1979 Vol 12 p 152), The Druids originated the holiday. It was a
celebration of Saman Lord of the Dead who was the God of Evil Spirits. There is some debate about this origination
as the Druids were not the only, or the first spiritual pagans of Ireland.
Some of the earliest archaeological evidence of the Celts come from their trade routes with the Greeks.
Their culture can be followed with great precision from the 5th Century BC through the La Tène culture. From
these early records with the Greeks we know of some of their great festivals and in particular one of their biggest
Samhain the new years festival. Certainly we can gain information from Julius Caesar who wrote extensively about
the Gauls during his invasion campaigns in Ireland during 4th Century BC. Eventually Rome is sacked by the Celts in

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3rd Century BC, around 390BC. The Romans in general wrote of their warlike inhabitants and many of their
barbaric celebrations. Which included Samhain.
In most if not all of these accounts, Samhain is immersed in blood and sacrifice. Often in the earliest of
times, those sacrifices were human. One Greek account states these early Celts sacrificed prisoners captured
during a battle during their New Years festival of Samhain. In The History and Origins of Druidism by Lewis Spencer
writes about the Druids stating they burned their victims in holy fire which had to be consecrated by a Druid priest.
The confusion of May to November 1st probably comes from the Christians and pagan Roman festivals. The Roman
Empire was a pagan culture. During their reign they held many pagan festivals and celebrations, one being the
Feast of the Lemures on May 13th. During this time malevolent and restless spirits of the dead were appeased and
festival participants would attempt to gain the favor of the spirits. The feast covered a three day period that
honored "all the dead" with food, drink and sacrifice.
At the same time Pope Boniface IV consecrated the Pantheon at Rome to the Blessed Virgin and all the
martyrs. This was celebrated in the west from May 13, 609 to 610. Pope Gregory III (731–741) during an oratory in
St. Peter's for the relics "of the holy apostles and of all saints, martyrs and confessors, of all the just made perfect
who are at rest throughout the world", moved All Saints Day to November 1. This is further confused by the early
Irish churches who did not celebrate All Hallows Day in November or May, but rather in early spring on April 20th
during the Felire of Oengus and the Martyrology of Talaght. A festival of All Saints was already widely celebrated in
the days of Charlemagne in November. But it took a decree at the insistence of Pope Gregory IV to all the bishops,
that the celebration be confirmed on November 1st.
These early similar celebrations come together around 835AD. The Roman pagan festival is over taken by
the early Church, the Irish Church conforms it's celebrations with Rome, and everyone seems to move their day of
the dead to coincide with early Irish pagans and their celebration of Samhain on November 1st. There's no doubt,
however, that the Irish festival of Samhain has always been at the end of summer on November 1st, and has been
one of the prominent harvest festivals for Celtic pagans from the past and the present.
The Evolution Of Halloween
"Trick or treating" is a modern tradition that probably finds it's roots in the early All Souls' Day parades in
England. During the festivities, poor citizens would beg for food and families would give them pastries called "soul
cakes" in return for their promise to pray for the family's dead relatives. The distribution of soul cakes was
encouraged by the church as a way to replace the ancient practice of leaving food and wine for roaming spirits.
The practice, which was referred to as "going a souling" was eventually taken up by children who would visit the
houses in their neighborhood and be given ale, food, and money.
"Dressing up" for Halloween gets it roots from dressing up around the sacred bonfire during the original
Celtic festival. Some suggest, this practice originates from England, when it was believed that ghosts came back to
the earthly world on Halloween. People thought that they would encounter ghosts if they left their homes, so to
avoid being recognized people would wear masks after dark so that the ghosts would mistake them for fellow
spirits. In addition, these early English people, would place bowls of food outside their homes to appease the
ghosts and prevent them from attempting to enter or cause harm to their homes. A tradition obviously taken from
the ancient Celtic pagans.
As European came to America, they brought their varied Halloween traditions with them. Celebration of
Halloween in colonial times was much more common in Maryland and the southern colonies. Primarily because
Celtic immigrants settled more in these regions than in the north. As the beliefs and customs of different
European ethnic groups meshed together a distinctly American version of Halloween began to emerge. The first
celebrations included "play parties," public events held to celebrate the harvest, where neighbors would share

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stories of the dead, tell each other's fortunes, dance, and sing. Colonial Halloween festivities also featured the
telling of ghost stories and mischief making of all kinds. By the middle of the nineteenth century, annual autumn
festivities were common, but Halloween was not yet celebrated everywhere in the country.
In the second half of the nineteenth century, America entered an age of mysticism. What was more often
termed spiritualism. Metaphysical groups and clubs began to spring up throughout the Golden Age and the
wealthier set of Americans. At the same time, America was welcoming a new group of immigrants, especially the
millions of Irish fleeing Ireland's potato famine of 1846. This new cultural influence brought with it a melding of
Irish and English traditions, and a new Americans culture was born. People began to dress up in costumes and go
house to house asking for food or money, a practice that eventually became today's "trick or treat" tradition.
Young women believed that, on Halloween, they could divine the name or appearance of their future husband by
doing tricks with yarn, apple parings, or mirrors.
In the late 1800s, there was a move in America to mold Halloween into a holiday more about community
and neighborly get togethers, than about ghosts, pranks, and witchcraft. At the turn of the century, Halloween
parties for both children and adults became the most common way to celebrate the day. Parties focused on
games, foods of the season, and festive costumes. Parents were encouraged by newspapers and community
leaders to take anything "frightening" or "grotesque" out of Halloween celebrations. Because of their efforts,
Halloween lost most of its superstitious and religious overtones by the beginning of the twentieth century.
By the 1920s and 1930s, Halloween had become a secular, but community centered holiday, with parades
and town wide parties as the featured entertainment. Despite the best efforts of many schools and communities,
vandalism began to plague Halloween celebrations in many communities during this time. By the 1950s, town
leaders had successfully limited vandalism and Halloween had evolved into a holiday directed mainly at the young.
Due to the high numbers of young children during the fifties baby boom, parties moved from town civic centers
into the classroom or home, where they could be more easily accommodated.
Between 1920 and 1950, the centuries old practice of trick or treating was also revived. Trick or treating
was a relatively inexpensive way for an entire community to share the Halloween celebration. In theory, families
could also prevent tricks being played on them by providing the neighborhood children with small treats. A new
American tradition was born, and it has continued to grow. By the 1990s, Americans have made Halloween one
of the largest commercial holidays. Spending an estimated $6.9 billion annually on Halloween costumes,
accessories, decorations and pumpkins.
Samhain Traditions
To pagans the world over, November 1st, still marks the beginning of the New Year. To Witches and
Pagans, Samhain is the Festival of the Dead, and for many, it is the most important Sabbat (Holiday) of the year.
Although the Feast of the Dead forms a major part of most Pagan celebrations on this eve, and at Samhain
voluntary communications are expected and hoped for. The departed are never harassed, and their presence is
never commanded. The spirits of the dead are, however, ritually invited to attend the Sabbat and to be present
within the Circle.
Orange and Black
The colors of this Sabbat are black and orange. Black to represent the time of darkness after the death of
the God (who is represented by fire and the sun) during an earlier sabbat known as Lughnasadh, and the waning of
light during the day. Orange represents the awaiting of the dawn during Yule (Dec. 21st to Jan. 1st) when the God
is reborn.

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Jack O'Lanterns
There is some debate about the origination of Jack o lanterns. One line suggests this custom originated
from the lighting of candles for the dead to follow as they walked the earth. These candles were placed in
hallowed out gourds and put on the ground to light the way. Others suggest the practice originates from a
Christianized Irish myth about a man nicknamed "Stingy Jack." Stingy Jack and the Devil enter a pub to have a
drink. Jack convinces the Devil to turn himself into a coin to pay for the drinks. But instead of using the coin, Jack
slipped it into his pocket and next to a silver cross. The cross prevented the Devil from changing back into his
original form. But Jack eventually freed the Devil, under the condition that he would not bother Jack for one year.
And if Jack should die during that year, the Devil would not claim his soul. And the Devil agreed to these terms.
Jack again tricked the Devil. This time, the Devil climbed into a tree to pick a piece of fruit. While he was up
in the tree, Jack carved a sign of the cross into the tree's bark so that the Devil could not come down. Once again,
Jacked struck a bargain with the Devil. He would free the Devil from the tree if he promised not to bother Jack for
ten more years. And if Jack died during those years, the Devil would not claim his soul. And the Devil again agreed
to these terms. Not long after this, Jack did indeed died. But because of his trickery, God would not allow him into
heaven. In keeping his word not to take his soul, the Devil also would not allow Jack into hell. Instead, the Devil
sent Jack out into the darkness of the world between worlds with nothing but a burning piece of coal. Jack placed
the coal into a carved out turnip and has been roaming the Earth ever since. The Irish began to refer to Jack's
ghostly figure as "Jack of the Lantern," and then, simply as "Jack O'Lantern." The Irish and Scottish people began
making lanterns by carving scary faces into turnips or potatoes and placing them into windows or near doors to
frighten away the wandering evil spirits. In England, large beets were used. Immigrants from these countries
brought the tradition to America where they found the pumpkin, a fruit native to America, that made the perfect
jack o'lanterns.
Tricks & Treats
Treats also originated from an old custom of leaving cookies and other foods out for those relatives to
enjoy as they shared this one night of feasting. The 'trick' portion of "Trick or Treat" was an invention of the
Christians. The tricks were supposedly caused by the dead who didn't receive a treat of food left for them when
they arrived at your door.
The Contraversary of Samhain and Halloween
Sad to say there have been many fundamentalists who are inciting ignorance and bigotry into the
celebrations of Halloween. No longer is Halloween a religious festival here in the US. It has become
commercialized as an event for kids to have fun, play dress up and be scared by ghouls and ghosts. It has become
nothing more than a secular holiday. Those who have tried to link Halloween to Samhain are also missing the
boat. As Halloween, All Hallows Eve are Christian created holidays devised by the early Churches of Europe as a
means to convert pagans to Christianity. The celebrations were indeed taken from pagan practices, but their
purposes have long since been corrupted and are no longer pagan in nature. Right down to being practiced on
October 31st. Some one asked me if I cared that a nearby town was attempting to change Halloween from
October 31st to the last Friday of each October. My response is why should I mind? Halloween is a Christian
holiday, do with it what you will.
The modern celebrations of Halloween do not take away or alter the spiritual significance of Samhain for
pagan practitioners. Our Sabbat is still intact and still honored with reverence and in the traditional methods
practiced by our ancient pagan ancestors. Though we don't make animal sacrifices any longer, there are some who
will toss a steak into a bonfire as a symbolic gesture. The main focus of the holiday for pagans is still to honor our

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loved ones who have passed on and to share in communication with them during this time when the veil between
worlds is narrowed. [226]
Jack O’ Lantern
The phosphorescent light frequently seen moving in the air over marsh places; the corposant or will o’ the
wisp that retreats from those who try to reach or follow it. It is the the proverbial misleader of belated travelers
who fall into swamps and marshes or ponds and are drowned. It is also often called ignis fatuus, foolis fire: the
implication being that only a fool would follow it, and that the light is foolish to flee from a fool. In Lancashire folk
speecj, it is called either Jack o’ lantern of Peg o’ lantern of German folklore, especially in Lower Saxony, is the
Dickepoten. This is often the soul of someone condemned thus to wander for having moved or disregarded a
boundary mark. In Ireland the phenomenon is variously known as teine sionnniic, fox fire; teine side, fairy fire;
Sean na gealaige, Jack of the bright light; Liam na lasoige, William with the little flame, etc.; it is commonly
believed to be the wandering soul of one who has been refused entrance into both heaven and hell. He often
terrifies night travelers; sometimes he warns them. He is famous for leading them astray, but has been known to
direct those in trouble.[227]
A phosphorescent light seen over marshes, etc,. called variously ignis fatuus, jack o’ lantern, corposant,
and by other names. The mysterious phenomenon of strange lights seen at different places and at different times
in the British Isles and elsewhere has been explained as caused by, possibly, an atmospheric condition or gaseous
emanation from the ground. These lights are seen in the air and near the earth, in the house and out of doors, on
lake or on the sea, sometimes white, red, or blue. They are fickle and erratic; they recede if a person approaches
them , then reappear behind.
A light of this sort betokens death. Sometimes the light goes from the churchyard to the house of
personsick or near death; sometimes one is seen on the breast of a dying person; often, it appears on the rooftop
signifying a death in the family of the house overwhich it hovers. Many stories are related of the appearance of
these lights in connection with the death omen. In this capacity and in their elusive wanderings they parallel the
ignis fatuus. [228]
During the witch craze, 5 festivals most frequently appear in the sources. The first was 31 October. The
purpose of the original pagan rite on this day was to restore the power of the waning sun. Among the Anglo
Saxons this rite was called the ‘need fire’, because great bonfires were kindled to lend strength to the sun through
imitative magic. When the Christians established 1 November as All Saints’ Day or All Hallows’ Day, the need fire
festival fell on All Hallows’ Eve and was transformed into Hallowe’en. In England, this religious displacement of the
holiday was followed in the 17th century by a political displacement. After the arrest of Guy Fawkes for plotting to
blow up Parliament, [the date of his apprehension, 5 November, became a national holiday. On that day bonfires
are still lit and rockets set off. In America, Hallowe’en became a kind of Saturnalia for children, a night when the
rules were suspended for a while and children ventured out, like elves, to demand treats and threaten reprisals
against the stingy. It has since become commercialized,. But still the memory of strange spirits weird fires
lingers.[229]
On All Hallowmas Eve, they assembled to the number of upwards of two hundred, including Gellie Duncan,
Agnes Sampson, Euphemia Macalzean, one Barbara Napier, and several warlocks; and each embarking in a riddle
or sieve, they sailed “over the ocean very substantially.” After cruising about for some time, they met with the
fiend, bearing in his claws a cat, which had been previously drawn nine times through the fire. This he delivered to
one of the warlocks telling him to cast it into the sea and cry “Hola!” This was done with all solemnity, and
immediately the ocean became convulsed, the waters hissed loudly, and the waves rose mountains high, “Twisting
their arms to the dun coloured heaven.”[230]

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 In the ancient Irish calendar the celebration of November 1 is called Samhain, and the night of November 1
to November 2 is rich in legends that feed on an old reserve of myth that even today is particularly vital in certain
regions. This is the time when the beings of the Otherworld have temporary permission to visit the living and is
also the moment when the living gain furtive access to the Otherworld.[231]
First and foremost, Samhain and Halloween pose the existence of an Otherworld (which should not be
confused with the world of the Dead or with hell or heaven). The Samhain Otherworld, the source of meaning for
all the Samhain rites and myths, is inhabited by fairies and revenants. As with the seven other major dates of the
calendar, Samhain and Halloween make it possible to establish a dialogue with the Otherworld by authorizing the
emergence of a more or less dangerous magic linked to a reversal of the seasons and a kind of fracture in
time.[232]
The life of Saint Hubertus, son of Bertand, duke of Aquataine, is well known to hunters, who have chosen
him as their patron saint. Hubertus had such a passion for hunting that even on Good Friday he devoted himself to
his favorite pastime in the Ardennes forests. As legend tells, on this particular day, as if to sigify to Hubertus the
sacrilege he is committing, a large stag he is pursuing turns around and faceshim. Between its antlers the stag
bears the image of Christ on the cross with this inscription: “How long will you allow this vain passion to lead you
to neglect the salvation of your soul?” At the same moment a voice cries out: “Contemplate your salvation.
Abandon this worldly life.” Overwhelmed, the young prince throws away his hunting weapon and, grasping the
enormity of his sin, seeks to repent through a life of mortification at the monastery of Stavelot in Belgium.
Hubertus subsequently became the bishop of Tongres and Masstright, was elevated sainthood, and became an
eminent healer of rabies in men and animals.
The legend of Saint Hubertus appears as the Christian rewriting or a tale that can be corroborated
countless times in the medieval literature of Celtic origin. These tales concern the encounter of a human and an
animal (a white doe or stag) that is the animal guise of a creature from the otherworld that is, a fairy. Here we see
again the animal consort that we find in the stories of Saint Martin. The tale of Guigemar goes to the forest one
day to indulge in his favorite sport of hunting. All at once he spies in some thick bushes a white doe “with stag’s
antlers on her head.” He shoots an arrow that strikes the animal, but this same arrow turns back toward the
hunter and sorely wounds him. The doe then speaks, confessing her sorrow while warning Guigemar of the fate
that awaits him.
In the Christianized legend of Saint Hubertus, the stag fairy has become an avatar of Christ. Retaining its
gift of speek, it can influence the destiny of the person who encounters it by converting the sinner to the Faith or
by revealing to the young, innocent man the truths of love. In both cases the stag plays the role of an animal
psychopomp, leading an all too human figurea toward his ultimate truth. He especially has served as a mediator
between the human world and the Otherworld at a critical time of transition and passage: Samhain.[233]
Oscar means he who loves the stags. The words horn and stag are related to the Celtic god Cernunnos. On
the Gundertrup Cauldron, a veritable condensed iconographic index of Celtic mythology, we find this horned god
surrounded by various animals and numerous fertility and wealth symbols. Yet this figure may well harken to even
older, perhaps shamanic beliefs that preceded the Celtic world. The first people in the West were in fact
consumers and hunters of deer, as is testified to by cave paintins. The French word for horn is corne.
The god with the stag’s head reappears in Carnac, disguised as Saint Cornely, who is always depicted with a
horned bull.* During the pardon of Saint Cornely in the month of September, a procession takes place during

217
which horned animals are rought before the priest so they can receive his blessing. Saint Cornely is the protector
of horned animals in all ofsouthern Brittany.
The major dates of the mythical calendar allow for intense exchanges with the Otherworld, as Samhain
admirably demonstrates. All the myths connected to the feasts whose cycles are opened by Samhain recount to
one degree or another the communication between the Otherworld and the human world. Thus, the major dates
of the mythological calendar most particularly Samhain led to the emergence of the Faery into the world of
dailylife. If even today there is a trivial association of All Saints’ Day with cemeteries ad commemorating the dead,
it is because in our obscure mythical memory bank the date of November 1 remains connected to the passage of
souls and ghosts between the 2 worlds. This is the time when the cart of the dead can be seen in Brittany, and it
reappears during the second major Carnival: Christmas. Christmas Eve commemorates the apparition of a revenant
called Father Christmas, who travels through the air on a sleigh pulled by reindeer. Saint Martin thus announces
the second great stage in the mythological cycle.[234]
720: The stag reference is very important. So we see that the stag fairy is an avatar of Christ. The status of Christ
being a black man can be seen at Fig 100 & 101. Understand that these paintings as there are many more, were
painted by Europeans and are the root base elements of Christianity. The comparison of Christ and the stag in
which the stag is also called a buck may go as far back in the European psyche into the unconscious/caveman days.
It is definetly sexually related. As the stag is a nickname of the animal. The animal in which the Caucasian male
must refrain from being. In the Caucasian male mind he identifies sex as an animal/bestial act. Eventhough
sex/love is natural he fails to be able to produce it because of erectile dysfunction which in turn makes it difficult
to please his woman and be respected as a man amongst his woman and peers. Reproduction will occur of course
as this is a majority rule plight and within that you must respect acceptions to the rule. The rule is nature as they
have expressed to the world through media bearing children can be difficult for them. Therefore, he covers this
inadequacy in which he is biologically supposed to adequate for as a practice not for or of him. He labels it as
animal. To combat and disguise this he committs sex in a format in which animals don’t do to reinforce the status
of human. Which would be spanking, bdsm practices, anal, fisting. Making love and babies which can be
considered debts and burdens is natural, which is animal and also stagnant (hence the word stag). Anything
natural is animal, which in essence is uncontrolled and doesn’t have reasoning. So the black man buck/stag/Christ
is an animal showing the white man how to make love/babies to his white overtly lustful woman (maybe because
of sexual neglect) who is also classified as animal in his mind. The white woman defeats the label of animal by not
submitting her love, genetics, finances and consistently chasing after an orgasm (which defeats the lustful
classification) with a sexually adequate male who she may also identify as animal to assist the separation line. At
the end of the day Family, Business and Social appearance is more important than sex, as they last longer than sex,
inclusive with you gain more in life. This divides the line of human and animal. As animals only reproduce and
that’s all they do, consume.
Now to go in further we must understand that biologically in this cuckold experience both white male and
female have got to be experiencing high forms of euphoria throughout the entire countenance of the body. The
white womans uterus is designed for the phallus of a white male not a black male. Due to the way the vagina
muscels are designed (for survival) any human/mammalian phallus can fit. The black male standardly is 6 inchs in
length and the white is 4 inchs in length by medial statistics. This difference between the races of men inclusive
with physical strength would obviously make a white female look at a black male as superior in the natural sense.
In the unnatural sense, the material world, the black man is an animal, yet to comprehend human condition,
therefore he is to be used for what he is best at gaming, sport, manipulation, hunting (women), being hunted (by
races of other men), singing, dancing, providing of drugs and other forms of entertainment. There are those who

218
work at warehouses that keep this system moving. Not to forget the intellectual (usually unexperienced) class who
live a cold/still life, teaching at universities. I wont call black men fairies because etymologically the word fairy has
connections with the word lady. So we will call the black males elves and the women fairies, respectfully. They are
referred to as fairies and elves because they make sure the world is a big wonderland for other races and not
themselves.
When understanding the usage of the horns, we must remember that the deer antlers are the symbol of
the cuckold. Why? Because of the Bucks activities when its stuck in a rut. A rut is the what the mating season of
ruminant animals such as deer, sheep, camels, goats, pronghorns, bison and antelopes is called. When the Buck is
on his hunt for cunt nothing gets in the way. After he sews his seed he leaves. Deer bucks do not stay with the
female Doe to raise the Fawn. This reinforces the status of not being able to achieve human/family status. This
may also be the back story to white women having black babies but there is no black man to be found. Not to
forget, the Buck dancing that occurred during African American slavery which could have been ritualistic to
enforce/establish a no father principle during the creation of the African American culture. Understand that this is
all the wholistic/positive side of cuckoldry. The arcane side of cuckoldry is represented by bull or goat horns which
is the symbollogy of the Baphomet Head and The Devil of the Sabbath. It isn’t a direct definition as is the deer
antlers. The Devil of the Sabbath also ends up being a black man but this time he is referred to as being an
Ethiopian. I have never read any reference of Jesus being called an Ethiopian. But it is very clear that Christianity
has its roots in Gnostic Ethiopian Christianity. In which Egypt also names its origins as Nubia which is a location
known today as Ethiopia. Gnostic Ethiopian Christianity had to be conquered and plundered in order for the
Byzantine Empire to be built. As the last Emperor of the World a direct descendant of King Solomon had to be
removed for the western world to confirm their global dominance. You must understand that the rituals that were
done during the time period of Ptolemy, The Punic wars, Assyria, Phonecia going into the Byzantine basically
sucked all the ancient Gods and Goddesses of all the ancient civilizations into Christianity and the Saints, the
Goddesses went into the black Madonnas.
So back to the euphoria. The high that Caucasians and all other races get from having interaction with
black people whether that be sexual or otherwise especially in the areas of theatre, music and sports enforces the
highest levels of creation in their mind. Basically the horns and the masks which are prevalent amongst a large
amount of African tribes are the keys to the Otherworld while the tribal people are the key makers/gate keepers to
the Otherworld. The entities of the Otherworld which reside in African dna/dimension has the intelligence to
produce perfection. My theory is: Is that Caucasians studied Egypt to the point to understand that Egypt enslaved
tribal people as well such as the watutsi and pygmies. Through the enslavement, which allowed free sex rites, they
gained the ability or entrance into the otherworld and documented it. Once caucacsians found this out. They
studied the tribes to figure out which ones hold the keys to which dimensions. They came to conclusions and went
and got Africans from the western hemisphere (so we are told) which probably embdodied more mathematical
dimensions which fit for Caucasian understanding. They enslaved those tribes, had orgies with them here in
America, extracted their magic understanding and mixed it in with other groups, spilled their blood on the ground
(lynchings & massacres) and then whallah you have the wonderland of America. With Black Elves and Fairies that
got big private parts and make everybody feel good when we rap and sing.
You see the tribal people of Africa cant be broken in Africa. The galactical links are to strong. All of The
African tribes are mere keymakers and gatekeepers to the galactical realms. The intelligence I referred to earlier
that the tribes possess can only be channeled into this zone by African tribal blood or what many call melanin (skin
pigmentation cell). All tribes of all races have this capability for the frequency in which they read, being directly
underneath the star constellations that races of other locatiosn differ from. But, African is the strongest within this

219
capability.Why? You may ask. Is because of the homo geneaology of this planet which states that Africans are the
supreme Fathers & Mothers to all humans.
This intelligence is in such mass amount it can only be distributed by physical action. That physical action
is once again entertainment (the swinging of limbs) and not to forget our doctors, inventors and other secret
negros always working behind the scenes as the great master mind and staying quiet. Once these different
intellects are materialized into this world Caucasians or others races can attach marketing, advertising, product
placement, manufacturing and distribution. This is part of the reason white people will always get the bigger pay
out when writing a contract with the devil. This is the same for sports and other industries. So at the end of the
day, black people provide illusion, euphoria and the maintainance of a false perfection. Other races build the
objects and toys which fill the space to present the illusion of a false perfection. They make the cameras, the
green room and were the best dancers in the green rom infront of the cameras. Meaning the black race are the
elves and fairies that stock the shelves, shine the shoes and make you smile with a fresh stack of pancakes. The
best comedians and musicians, we make people scream, cry and faint in the stands. It is the euphoria, the high
that God provides that makes you feel like everything will be ok. A major passive/irresponsible statement amongst
African Americans “you gone be alright.” Which goes back to the primordial chaos of not having control or not
even attempting. This form of false perfection is the basis of all modern day religions of the west. To this day
black elves keep gold teeth, pink cadillacs, flamboyant attire and outlandish hairstyles. They speak fast to instill
confusion in which all provides a euphoria or otherworld atmosphere for other races.
Our Ladies the Black fairies which all represent the Black Madonnas assist in many areas of Otherworld
fantasy. Id first like to talk about Harriet Tubman who took slaves from the underworld to the otherworld. She
also helped Abraham Lincoln as a spy, in which gave President Lincoln information of the underworld. Which had
to be destroyed in order to provide the otherworld/beauty mania that we live in now. We can also consider Aunt
Jemima. Hattie McDaniel would be next which merged into Dorothy Dandridge and then to apply the light skinned
to most heartedly make white people feel comfortable Lena Horne. This is of the old generation, the new
generation with Cicely Tyson being the transformation piece would be Hattie goes to Oprah. Dorothy Dandrige
went into Whitney Houston which transferred into Beyonce. The energy from Lena Horne went into Mariah Carey
which transferred into Rhianna. Besides entertainment and music the black fairies provide euphoria by sex, in
which any major event occurring in America especially business/industry conferences of any sort the black vagina
will be there for sale/pleasure. In the prostitution ranks of America black women are at the bottom scale this is
also for the stripping world. This deprevation is needed to keep the women spread out and needy everywhere.
We cannot forget that due to the poverty stricken status a lot black women fall into, they choose the occupation of
nursing, in which they carry on their fairy work by taking care of the sickly and the degenerates.
When speaking of Samhain, its pretty confirmed that all ancient civilizations understood this day as a day
when the walls were thin. The patron saint over this day is Saint Quentin. The same saint that a California state
penitentarey is named after which is incarnating the building to be a literal hell hole. It was obviously named with
this intent. Besides this the walls getting thin can be an occurrence that happens off of intoxication. As the walls
may be psychological and not necessarily literal. In a quantum physic dimensional thinking structure all thins are
capable. If this is the case as tribes also use intoxicants during their rituals. We all maybe freely getting attacked
and inviting other beings of an unknown motive and nature into our world as on Halloween it is socially known to
get intoxicated. There is a connection and similarity with all civilizations, their concepts of reality, their astrology
and also their holidays. Customs may vary, but the root reasonings which lay in the blackness of the unconscious
human thinking will always remain. Therefore all of these holdiays will always remain. In relation to the otherworld
and entities, you can never tell a man what he can or cannot see, you are not in his brain, always remember this.

220
Fig. 114.). Mursi South Ethiopian Tribal woman dressed up for the Donga stick fighting ceremony
Fig. 115.). A Classical Baphoment image(Arms read SOLVE COAGULA) ( Bottom reads Eliphas Levi Del)
In the ancient Irish calendar the celebration of November 1 is called Samhain, and the night of November 1
to November 2 is rich in legends that feed on an old reserve of myth that even today is particularly vital in certain
regions. This is the time when the beings of the Otherworld have temporary permission to visit the living and is
also the moment when the living gain furtive access to the Otherworld. [235]
First and foremost, Samhain and Halloween pose the existence of an Otherworld (which should not be
confused with the world of the Dead or with hell or heaven). The Samhain Otherworld, the source of meaning for
all the Samhain rites and myths, is inhabited by fairies and revenants. As with the seven other major dates of the
calendar, Samhain and Halloween make it possible to establish a diualogue with the Otherworld by authorizind the
emergence of a more or less dangerous magic linked to a reversal of the seasons and akind of fracture in
time.[236]
The major dates of the mythical calendar allow for intenst exchanges with the Otherworld, as Samhain
admirably demonstrates. All the myths connected to the feasts whose cycles are opened by Samhain recount to
one degree or another the communication between the Otherworld and the human world. Thus, the major dates
of the mythological calendar most particularly Samhain led to the emergence of the Faery into the world of daily
life. If even today there is a trivial association of All Saints’ Day with cemeteries and commemorating the dead, it is
because in out obscure mythical memory bank the daye of November 1 remains connected to the passage of souls
and gosts between the two worlds. This is the time when the cart of the dead can be seen in Brittany, and it
reappears during the second major Carnival: Christmas. Christmas Eve commemorates the apparition of a
revenant called Father Christmas, who travels through the air on a sleigh pulled by reindeer. Saint Martin thus
announce the second great stage in the mythological cycle.[237]
At the feast of Samain, which was the Celtic New Year, when one looked both forward and back on a day
which belonged to neither year, the boundaries between the world of the living and that of the gods and the dead
were blurred. Similarly, in Christian times, those who have died in the parish during the year walk in procession to
the graveyard on All Soul’s Day, before returning to the earth.
Symbolically, at this end and beginning of the year, the lord of the dead and the dark goddess unite to
ensure that the earth will once more be fruitful after the dead season, when they will reemerge as the new light
and blessed greenness of early February. The Church’s calenday for the period of Samain includes, as well as All
Saints and All Souls, the following feasts: Christ the King, the Holy Relics, St. Hubert (the wild huntsman of the
Ardennes), the black St. Martin de Porres, St Malachy of Armagh, St. Flour and a number of others with
Merovingian, Teutonic and Black Virgin associations. [238]

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720: I know by now your probably asking what the hell is the otherworld. Well like I said earlier its not the
underworld. I also said this is where the fairies, gnomes and other magical entities go about their wills. Its stated
in this format for the children. In childrens minds these entities create the space of endless possibilities and
wonderous achievements that can be acquired to them. They can get assistance from invisible beings as long as
they follow the rules of engagement with them. This type of schema of thinking sets sound courage and
exploration in the entire makeup of the human. It also unifies a culture on the level of unconscious suggestion. By
time you become a teenager you either still have the voyage capability or experiences could have stripped them
away from you. If you still got it, you can make it to the otherside of the rainbow and get your pot of gold, which is
becoming rich.
You see when you master your artistry for the world to enjoy, so they can receive the greatest euphoria,
such as Michael Jordan, Jackson, Tyson did you will be given access to the wonderland. Wonderland is life in
America or anywhere for that matter when your finances are anywhere fro 100k annually to say 100 million. In
wonderland you have access to fast cars, unicorns and horny midgets. While in the wonderland which can be
compared to a purgatory limbo type of status, you must conduct orderly and love all equally. You will have to
serve your penance, you will fall, you will be attacked and ridiculed. After your metaphysical death/penance you
will be rich and in heaven for ever. This zone of the penance can also be considered the stair way to heaven which
is 100-500 million worth. Heaven is 500 million worth and beyond. In which your “name” or “bloodline” stays
forever. So in essence wonderland is a magical land that you can be in one day and be out of the next. Its not
controlled by finance but it is controlled by access. Finance will get you in but wont keep you there. So can charm,
who you know, work ethic. But if you do not become the flagellant and take the public penance you will not see
heaven. This happened in the careers of Michael Jordan(gambling), Jackson(sex crimes) and Tyson(rape). While
Im talking about Michael Jackson, I should mention when I was studying the castrati and explained the scenario to
a friend he immediately asked me if Michael Jackson was one with the repetitive grabing of the genitals and the
high pitch voice. All I could say was hhhhhhhhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmmm peculiar?

Christmas Eve, Christmas Day & New Years

The summer solstice occurs when the sun (L sol: sun; whence solar, solarium) seems to stand still before
the turn from the longest day and shortest night for the half year journey to the winter solstice. This second stand
and turn, lifting primitive man from his fear of everlasting dark to the glad return of brightness, is the season of the
greatest festivals of joy. The happiest holidays, in many faiths, come at the time when primitive man rejoiced that
the sun had won its fight, and was lengthening its hold upon the hours. Thus even the Christ mass. In A.D. 386
Pope Siricius decreed that Jesus’ birthday be celebrated on Dec. 25. Speculation sets it, historically, “between May
and August”; but st. John Chrysostum (Gk khrusostos: golden mouthed) explained: “The worshipers of Mithra
[Persian god of light] call December 25 the birthday of the sun; but is not our Lord the sun of righteousness?” Thus
the primitive joy received the Catholic sanction.[239]
St. Nicholas: One tells how during a terrible famine, a malicious butcher lured three little children into his house,
where he killed them, placing their remains in a barrel to cure, planning to sell them off as ham. Nicholas, visiting
the region to care for the hungry, not only saw through the butcher's horrific crime but also resurrected the three
boys from the barrel by his prayers. Another version of this story, possibly formed around the 11th century, claims
that the butcher's victims were instead three clerks who wished to stay the night. The man murdered them, and
was advised by his wife to dispose of them by turning them into meat pies. The saint saw through this and brought
the men back to life.

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 According to another story, during a great famine that Myra experienced in 311–312, a ship was in the
port at anchor, loaded with wheat for the Emperor in Constantinople. Nicholas invited the sailors to unload a part
of the wheat to help in the time of need. The sailors at first disliked the request, because the wheat had to be
weighed accurately and delivered to the Emperor. Only when Nicholas promised them that they would not suffer
any loss for their consideration, the sailors agreed. When they arrived later in the capital, they made a surprising
find: the weight of the load had not changed, although the wheat removed in Myra was enough for two full years
and could even be used for sowing.

Fig. 116.). Saint Nicholas, Bishop of Myrrh

While yet a young man, Nicholas followed the example of his uncle, the abbot, by making a pilgrimage to
the birthplace of Christianity—the Holy Land. Desiring a serene time of preparation, Nicholas set sail on an
Egyptian ship where the other pilgrims did not know who he was. The first night he dreamed a storm would put
them all at peril. When he awoke in the morning he warned the sailors that a severe storm was coming, but they
need not fear, for "God will protect us." Almost immediately the sky darkened and strong winds roared round the
ship. The wind and waves made it impossible to keep the ship under control. Even with lowered sails, the sailors
feared for their very lives and begged Nicholas to pray for safety. One sailor climbed the main mast, tightening the
ropes so the mast would not crash onto the deck. As he was coming back down, the sailor slipped, fell to the deck,
and was killed. While Nicholas prayed, the storm did quiet, relieving the sailors. Their comfort, however, was
dampened by grief over their comrade's death. As Nicholas prayed over the dead sailor, he was revived, "as if he

223
had only been asleep." The man awakened without pain and the ship finished the journey to the Holy Land.
Nicholas then embarked on his pilgrimage to the holy places, walking where Jesus had walked.
One night while staying with a family in Jerusalem, he wanted to pray at the only church remaining in
Jerusalem at that time. It was the Church of the Room of the Last Supper on Mount Zion. As he approached the
heavy, locked doors, they swung open of their own accord, allowing him to enter the church. Nicholas fell to the
ground in Thanksgiving.
In his most famous exploit, Nicholas aided a poor man who had three daughters, but could not afford a
proper dowry for them. This meant that they would remain unmarried and probably, in absence of any other
possible employment, would have to become prostitutes. Even if they did not, unmarried maidens in those days
would have been assumed as being a prostitute. Hearing of the girls' plight, Nicholas decided to help them, but
being too modest to help the family in public (or to save them the humiliation of accepting charity), he went to the
house under the cover of night and threw three purses (one for each daughter) filled with gold coins through the
window opening into the house.
One version has him throwing one purse for three consecutive nights. Another has him throwing the
purses over a period of three years, each time the night before one of the daughters comes of age. Invariably, the
third time the father lies in wait, trying to discover the identity of their benefactor. In one version the father
confronts the saint, only to have Nicholas say it is not him he should thank, but God alone. In another version,
Nicholas learns of the poor man's plan and drops the third bag down the chimney instead; a variant holds that the
daughter had washed her stockings that evening and hung them over the embers to dry, and that the bag of gold
fell into the stocking.
The stories with the most likely historical basis are the stories of Nicholas helping three girls and stories of
Nicholas coming to the aid of sailors. Others, especially that of the three murdered children, are much later
additions to Nicholas lore, historian Dr. Adam English concludes in a new biography of Nicholas for Baylor
University Press based on a four year study of current historical research into Nicholas of Myra.
Among the Greeks and Italians he is a favorite of sailors, fishermen, ships and sailing. As such he has
become over time the patron saint of several cities maintaining harbours. In centuries of Greek folklore, Nicholas
was seen as "The Lord of the Sea", often described by modern Greek scholars as a kind of Christianized version of
Poseidon. In modern Greece, he is still easily among the most recognizable saints and 6 December finds many
cities celebrating their patron saint. He is also the patron saint of all of Greece and particularly of the Hellenic
Navy.
In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Saint Nicholas' memory is celebrated on almost every Thursday of the
year (together with the Apostles) with special hymns to him which are found in the liturgical book known as the
Octoechos. Soon after the transfer of Saint Nicholas' relics from Myra to Bari, a Russian version of his Life and an
account of the transfer of his relics were written by a contemporary to this event. Devotional akathists and canons
have been composed in his honour, and are frequently chanted by the faithful as they ask for his intercession. He is
mentioned in the Liturgy of Preparation during the Divine Liturgy (Eastern Orthodox Eucharist) and during the All
Night Vigil. Many Orthodox churches will have his icon, even if they are not named after him. In Oriental
Orthodoxy, the Coptic Church observes the Departure of St. Nicholas on 10 Kiahk, or 10 Taḫśaś in Ethiopia, which
corresponds to the Julian Calendar's 6 December and Gregorian Calendar's 19 December.
Nicholas had a reputation for secret gift giving, such as putting coins in the shoes of those who left them
out for him, a practice celebrated on his feast day, 6 December. For those who still observe the Julian calendar the
celebration will currently take place thirteen days later than it happens in the Gregorian calendar and Revised
Julian calendar.

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 Saint Nicholas became the model for Santa Claus, whose modern American name comes from the Dutch
Sinterklaas, itself from a series of elisions and corruptions of the transliteration of "Saint Nikolaos". When the
Dutch originally came to America and established the colony of New Amsterdam, they brought the legend and
traditions of Sinterklaas with them. The New Amsterdam Dutch later shortened "Sinterklaas" to "Santa Claus".
In late medieval England, on Saint Nicholas' Day parishes held Yuletide "boy bishop" celebrations. As part
of this celebration, youths performed the functions of priests and bishops, and exercised rule over their elders.
Today, Saint Nicholas is still celebrated as a great gift giver in several Western European and Central European
countries. According to one source, in medieval times nuns used the night of 6 December to deposit baskets of
food and clothes anonymously at the doorsteps of the needy. According to another source, on 6 December every
sailor or ex sailor of the Low Countries (which at that time was virtually all of the male population) would descend
to the harbour towns to participate in a church celebration for their patron saint. On the way back they would stop
at one of the various Nicholas fairs to buy some hard to come by goods, gifts for their loved ones and invariably
some little presents for their children. While the real gifts would only be presented at Christmas, the little presents
for the children were given right away, courtesy of Saint Nicholas. This and his miracle of him resurrecting the
three butchered children made Saint Nicholas a patron saint of children and later students as well.
In Albania, the bones of Albania's greatest hero, George Kastrioti, were interred in the Church of Saint
Nicholas in Lezha, Albania, upon his death.[240]
Saint Nicholas confirms his pagan ancestor’s aspect of abundance. In Siberia, Mikoula is a god of both
harvests and the beer that is linked to drunkenness. The Russian verb nicolitsja means to “get intoxicated.” As part
of the posterity of Mikoula, Nicholas and subsequently Santa Claus have become carnivalesque figures who
distribute abundance during the heart of winter.[241]
720: So here we see Christmas is encoded with congestion and intoxication. Understand that the reversing of
roles is to remove arrogance and to balance the power thinking structures of authority. Everybody has their day
basically, that’s good and bad. The Lord of Misrule as we read earlier was a serious office. He was involved in all
festivities of the times. This dwindeled overtime, of course.
In addition, since the Middle Ages people have hung spruce branches called Weihnachtsmeyen, equivalent
to Christams boughs, at this time of year. There was also a well known custom of raising sprucetrees decorated
with red apples, which were said to commemorate the fall of Adam and Eve, on the parvis of Rhenish churches.
Here again biblical allegory merges with a rite of pagan origin, which is no surprise, especially in this instance: The
tree of the world of Faery became the tree of the earthly Paradise. With is foliage that remains green even during
the cold season, the spruce tree naturally became a symbol of immortality, perennial nature, and the Nativity of
the Savior.
The spruce is one of many in the large family of spiny trees or bramble bushes around which have
gravitated numerous legends sharing a common origin in a great myth. The rites of Christmas related to such
plants can be understood fully only in light of the rites of May that enhance the valueof plants and trees.
Weihnachtsmeyen can be translated fairly literally as the May of Christmas. In fact, the custom of Christmas
reproduces the rites of May 1 that consist of planting trees in front of certain houses.
Generally speaking, the worship of trees was particularly hardy in the West before the coming of
Christianity. One episode in Saint Martin’s life as told by Sulpicius Severus provides particular corroboration of the
substantial worship of pine tree in Celtic society: Martin had just destroyed an old, impious temple without
encountering any resistance. Yet when he sought to uproota pine tree dedicated to a local deity, the pagans
initially opposed his efforts, then suggested a kind of bargain. They said, “If you have trust in your god, remain
under that tree while we cut it down.” Martin accepted and was bound beneath the tree on the side toward which

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it was already leaning. When the tree was at the point of falling, Martin made the sign of the cross. Instead of
collapsing on him, the pine fell in the opposite direction, just missing the pagans. With supreme skill the Christian
text clearly mentions the mythic pagan role played by the pine before diverting to the Christian God the magical
power attributed to this tree by the pagans.
In England the hawthorn is considered to be the ancestor of the Christmas tree. A pious legend explains
the notoriety enjoyed by this shrub: Joseph of Arimathea, who had taken the body of Christ following the
Crucifixion, was said to have ended up in Glastonbury, England, a major site in the Arthurian legend. According to
legend he planted his staff in the soil on Christmas Eve, and subsequently a flowering hawthorn immediately grew
on the spot. Until around the 16th century the English offered each other as a Christmas gift a branch of the
Glastonbury hawthorn that had allegedly grown from the staff of Joseph of Arimathea. It was said that is always
flowered on Christmas Eve.
Christmas clearly belongs to an echanted time that allows the Otherworld to break into and enter the
human world. The Christian translation of this set of myths allows the archaic memory that orientsthis holiday to
poke through to the surface. In truth, Christianity extended paganism by introducing another kind of logic into the
pagan elements it preserved or by scattering the exploded symbols of myth over the Wheel of Time.[242]
Sinterklaas is based on the historical figure of Saint Nicholas (270–343), a Greek bishop of Myra in present
day Turkey. He is depicted as an elderly, stately and serious man with white hair and a long, full beard. He wears a
long red cape or chasuble over a traditional white bishop's alb and sometimes red stola, dons a red mitre and ruby
ring, and holds a gold coloured crosier, a long ceremonial shepherd's staff with a fancy curled top. He traditionally
rides a white horse. In the Netherlands, the horse is called Amerigo, and in Belgium, it is named Slecht Weer
Vandaag, meaning "Bad Weather Today". Sinterklaas carries a big, red book in which is written whether each child
has been good or naughty in the past year.
Sinterklaas is assisted by many mischievous helpers with black faces and colourful Moorish dresses. These
companions are called Zwarte Piet ("Black Pete"). Zwarte Piet first appeared in print as the nameless servant of
Saint Nicholas in Sint Nikolaas en zijn knecht ("St. Nicholas and His Servant/Apprentice"), published in 1850 by
Amsterdam schoolteacher Jan Schenkman; however, the tradition appears to date back at least as far as the early
19th Century.
Zwarte Piet's colourful dress is based on 16th century noble attire, with a ruff (lace collar) and a feathered
cap. He is typically depicted carrying a bag which contains candy for the children. The Zwarte Pieten toss their
candy around, a tradition supposedly originating in the story of Saint Nicholas saving three young girls from
prostitution by tossing golden coins through their window at night to pay their dowries.
Traditionally, he would also carry a birch rod (Dutch: roe), a chimney sweep's broom made of willow
branches, used to spank children who had been naughty. Some of the older Sinterklaas songs make mention of
naughty children being put in Zwarte Piet's bag and being taken back to Spain. This part of the legend refers to the
times that the Moors raided the European coasts, and as far as Iceland, to abduct the local people into slavery. This
quality can be found in other companions of Saint Nicholas such as Krampus and Père Fouettard. In modern
versions of the Sinterklaas feast, however, Zwarte Piet no longer carries the roe and children are no longer told
that they will be taken back to Spain in Zwarte Piet's bag if they have been naughty.
Over the years many stories have been added, and Zwarte Piet has developed from a rather unintelligent
helper into a valuable assistant to the absent minded saint. In modern adaptations for television, Sinterklaas has
developed a Zwarte Piet for every function, such as a head Piet (Hoofdpiet), a navigation Piet (Wegwijspiet) to
navigate the steamboat from Spain to the Netherlands, a gift wrapping Piet (Pakjespiet) to wrap all the gifts, and
an acrobatic Piet to climb roofs and chimneys.

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 Traditionally Zwarte Piet's face is said to be black because he is a Moor from Spain. Today, some prefer to
say that his face is blackened with soot because he has to climb through chimneys to deliver gifts for Sinterklaas.
The figure of Zwarte Piet is considered by some to be racist. As such, the traditions surrounding the holiday
of Sinterklaas have been the subject of numerous editorials, debates, documentaries, protests and even violent
clashes at festivals. Many large cities and television channels now only display Zwarte Piet characters with some
soot marks on the face rather than full blackface, so called roetveegpieten or schoorsteenpieten ("chimney
Petes"). Nevertheless, both Zwarte Piet and the holiday remain popular in the Netherlands. In a 2013 survey, 92%
of the Dutch public did not perceive Zwarte Piet as racist or associate him with slavery, and 91% were opposed to
altering the character's appearance.[243]

Fig. 117.). A picture of Grýla painted by: Þrándur Þórðarsson (to catch your eye)
Grýla is a mythical giantess living in the mountains of Iceland. Most of the stories told about Gryla were to
frighten bad children, and her name is mentioned in Snorri Sturluson's thirteenth century Edda.
Grýla was not directly linked to Christmas until the 17th century. By that time she had become the mother
of the Yule Lads. Terry Gunnell hypothesizes that the medieval custom of dressing as Grýla may be related to other
visiting traditionssuch as Julebukk or the Yule Goat and that her name may mean "threat" or "threatening".
She has the ability to detect children who are misbehaving year round. During Christmas time, she comes
from the mountains to search nearby towns for her meal. She leaves her cave and hunts for the children. She
devours children as her favorite snack. Her favorite dish is a stew of naughty kids for which she has an insatiable
appetite. According to legend, there is never a shortage of food for Gryla.
According to folklore Grýla has been married three times. Her third husband Leppalúði is said to be living
with her in their cave in the Dimmuborgir lava fields, with the big black Yule Cat and their sons. As Christmas
approaches, Grýla sets off looking for naughty boys and girls. The Grýla legend has appeared in many stories,
poems, songs and plays in Iceland and sometimes Grýla dies at the end of the story.[244]
Mistle Toe Origin:
In The translation of a rare book called A Dissertation Upon the Druids (“printed at Gouda by the Widow
heyne, 1650”), M. Esaias Pufendorff says that traces of the reverence this sect reserved for the mistletoe plant still
remained in Gaul, notably in Burgundy where at the beginning of the year people visited their friends and invoked
blessings with the words au guy l’on neuf (“new year of the mistletoe”). Mistletoe, he explains, could not be
planted, being reproduced by passing through the stomachs of wood pigeons or thrushes, and when it was made
into a dough with acorn oil took fast hold of the wings of birds unlucky enough to touch it and thus was used as a
snare. The Druids believed mistletoe was a panacea and that a potion distilled from it would make sterile animals

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fertile. He quotes Ovid’s description of the ceremony in which a druid priest in a white robe climbed the oak tree
and cut the mistletoe with a golden sickle. Beneath the tree was the altar on which 2 white bulls, their horns
wreathed in oak leaves, were sacrificed. [245]
In folklore, Krampus is a horned, anthropomorphic figure described as "half goat, half demon", who,
during the Christmas season, punishes children who have misbehaved, in contrast with Saint Nicholas, who
rewards the well behaved with gifts. Krampus is one of the companions of Saint Nicholas in lands including Austria,
Bavaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovenia and Northern Italy. The origin of the figure is unclear; some
folklorists and anthropologists have postulated its pre Christian origin.
In traditional parades and in such events as the Krampuslauf (English: Krampus run), young men dressed as
Krampus participate; such events occur annually in most Alpine towns. Krampus is featured on holiday greeting
cards called Krampuskarten.
There seems to be little doubt as to his true identity for, in no other form is the full regalia of the Horned
God of the Witches so well preserved. The birch – apart from its phallic significance – may have a connection with
the initiation rites of certain witch covens; rites which entailed binding and scourging as a form of mock death. The
chains could have been introduced in a Christian attempt to 'bind the Devil' but again they could be a remnant of
pagan initiation rites.
The Saint Nicholas festival we are describing incorporates cultural elements widely distributed in Europe,
in some cases going back to pre Christian times. Nicholas himself became popular in Germany around the eleventh
century. The feast dedicated to this patron of children is only one winter occasion in which children are the objects
of special attention, others being Martinmas, the Feast of the Holy Innocents, and New Year's Day. Masked devils
acting boisterously and making nuisances of themselves are known in Germany since at least the sixteenth century
while animal masked devils combining dreadful comic (schauriglustig) antics appeared in Medieval church plays. A
large literature, much of it by European folklorists, bears on these subjects. ... Austrians in the community we
studied are quite aware of "heathen" elements being blended with Christian elements in the Saint Nicholas
customs and in other traditional winter ceremonies. They believe Krampus derives from a pagan supernatural who
was assimilated to the Christian devil.
The Krampus figures persisted, and by the 17th century Krampus had been incorporated into Christian
winter celebrations by pairing Krampus with St Nicholas.
Countries of the former Habsburg Empire have largely borrowed the tradition of Krampus accompanying St
Nicholas on 5 December from Austria.
Although Krampus appears in many variations, most share some common physical characteristics. He is
hairy, usually brown or black, and has the cloven hooves and horns of a goat. His long, pointed tongue lolls out,
and he has fangs.
Krampus carries chains, thought to symbolize the binding of the Devil by the Christian Church. He thrashes
the chains for dramatic effect. The chains are sometimes accompanied with bells of various sizes. Of more pagan
origins are the ruten, bundles of birch branches that Krampus carries and with which he occasionally swats
children. The ruten may have had significance in pre Christian pagan initiation rites. The birch branches are
replaced with a whip in some representations. Sometimes Krampus appears with a sack or a basket strapped to his
back; this is to cart off evil children for drowning, eating, or transport to Hell. Some of the older versions make
mention of naughty children being put in the bag and taken away. This part of the legend refers to the times that
the Moors raided the European coasts, and as far as Iceland, to abduct the local people into slavery. This quality
can be found in other Companions of Saint Nicholas such as Zwarte Piet.[246]

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Fig. 118.). 3 different Krampus greeting cards

To investigate the origin of many of our Chistmas customs, it becomes necessary to wander far back into
the regions of past time, long ere Julius Caesar had set his foot on our shores, or St. Augustine preached the
doctrines of Christianity to the men of Kent. We have frequently, in the course of this work, had occasion to
remark on the numerous traces still visible in popular customs of the old pagan rites and ceremonies. These, it is
needless here to repeat, were extensively retained after the conversion of Britain to Christianity, partly because
the Christian teachers found it impossible to wean their converts from their cherished superstitions and
observances, and partly because they themselves, as a matter of expediency, ingrafted the rites of the Christian
religion on the old heathen ceremonies, believing that thereby the cause of the Cross would be rendered more
acceptable to the generality of the populace, and thus be more effectually promoted. By such an amalgamation,
no festival of the Christian year was more thoroughly characterized than Christmas; the festivities of which,
originally derived from the Roman Saturnalia, had afterwards been intermingled with the ceremonies observed by
the British Druids at the period of the winter solstice, and at a subsequent period became incorporated with the
grim mythology of the ancient Saxons. 2 popular observances belonging to Christmas are more especially derived
from the worship of our pagan ancestors the hanging up of the mistletoe, and the burning of the Yule log.
As regards the former of these practices, it is well known that, in the religion of the Druids, the mistletoe
was regarded with the utmost veneration, though the reverence which they paid to it seems to have been
restricted to the plant when found growing on the oak the favourite tree of their divinity Tutanes who appears to
have been the same as the Phoenician god of Baal, or the sun, worshipped under so many different names by the
various pagan nations of antiquity. At the period of the winter solstice, a great festival was celebrated in his
honour, as will be found more largely commented on under our notice of Christmas Day. When the sacred
anniversary arrived, the ancient Britons, accompanied by their priests, the Druids, sallied forth with great pomp
and rejoicings to gather the mystic parasite, which, in addition to the religious reverence with which it was
regarded, was believed to possess wondrous curative powers. When the oak was reached on which the mistletoe
grew, 2 white bulls were bound to the tree, and the chief Druid, clothed in white (the emblem of purity), ascended,
and, with a golden knife, cut the sacred plant, which was caught by another priest in the folds of his robe. The

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bulls, and often also human victims, were then sacrificed, and various festivities followed. The mistletoe thus
gathered, was divided into small portions, and distributed among the people , who hung up the sprays over the
entrances to their dwellings, as a propitiation and shelter to the sylvan deities during the season of frost and cold.
These rites in connection with the mistletoe, were retained throughout the Roman dominion in Britain, and also
for a long period under the sovereignty of the Jutes, Saxons, and Angles.
The following legend regarding the mistletoe, from the Scandinavian mythology, may here be introduced:
Balder, the god of poetry and eloquence, and second son of Odin and Friga, communicated one day to his mother
a dream in which he had, intimating that he should die. She (Friga), to protect her son from such a contingency,
invoked all the powers of nature fire, air, earth, and water, as well as animals and plants and obtained an oath
from them that they should do Balder no hurt. The latter then went and took his place amid the combats of the
gods, and fought without fear in the midst of showers of arrows. Loake, his enemy, resolved to discover the secret
of Balders invulnerability, and accordingly, disguising himself as an old woman, he addressed himself to Friga with
complimentary remarks on the valour and good fortune of her son. The goddess replied that no substance could
injure him, as all the productions of nature had bound themselves by an oath to refrain from doing him any harm.
She added, however, with that awkward simplicity which appears so often to characterize mythical personages,
that there was one plant which, from its insignificance, she did not think of conjuring, as it was impossible that it
could inflict any hurt on her son. Loake inquired the name of the plant in question, and was informed that it was a
feeble little shoot, growing in the bark of the oak, with scarcely any soil. Then the treacherous Loake ran and
procured the mistletoe, and having entered the assembly of the gods, said to the blind head: ‘Why do you not
contend with arrows of Balder’ Heda replied: “I am blind, and have no arms.’ Loake then presented him with an
arrow formed from the mistletoe, and said: ‘Balder is before thee.’ Head shot, and Balder fell pierced and slain.
The mistletoe, which has thus so many mystic associations connected with it, is believed to be propagated
in its natural state by the missel thrush, which feeds upon its berries. It was long thought impossible to propagate
it artificially, but this object has been attained by bruising the berries, and by means of their viscidity, causing them
to adhere to the bark of fruit trees, where they readily germinate and take root. The growth of the mistletoe on
the oak is now of extremely rare occurrence, but in the orchards of the west midland counties of England, such as
the shires of Gloucester and Worcester, the plant flourishes in great frequency and luxuriance on the apple trees.
Large quantities are annually cut at the decoration of houses and shops. The special custom connected with the
mistletoe on Christmas Eve, and an indubitable relic of the days of Druidism, handed down through a long course
of centuries, must be familiar to all our readers. A branch of the mystic plant is suspended from the wall or ceiling,
and any one of the fair sex, who, either from inadvertence, or, as possible may be insinuated, on purpose, passes
beneath the sacred spray, incurs the penalty of being then and there kissed by any lord of the creation who
chooses to avail himself of the privilege.
From a contributor to Notes and Queries, we learn that on Christmas Eve, in the town of Chester and
surrounding villages, numerous parties of singers parade the streets, and are hospitably entertained with meat and
drink at the different houses where they call. The farmers of Cheshire pass rather an uncomfortable season at
Christmas, seeing that they are obliged, for the most part, during thisperiod, to dispensewith the assistanceof
servants. According to an old custom in the county, the servants engage themselves, while they (the servants)
resort to the towns to spend their holidays. On the morning after Christmas Day hundreds of farm servants (male
and female) dressed in holiday attire, in which all the hues of the rainbow strive for the mastery, throng the streets
of Chester, considerably to the benefit of the tavern keepers and hopskeepers. Having just received their year’s
wages, frocks, cotton dresses, plush waistcoats, and woolen shawls. Dancing is merrily carried on at various public
houses in the evening. In the whole of this custom, a more vivid realization is probably presented than in any

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other popular celebration at Christmas, of the precursor of these modern jovialities the ancient Roman Saturnalia,
in which the relations of master and servant were for a time reversed, and universal licence prevailed.
Among Roman catholics, a mass is always celebrated at midnight on Christmas Day, and a third last a
subsequent hour in the morning. A beautiful phase in popular superstition, is that which represents a thorough
prostration of the Powers of Darkness as taking place at this season, and that no evil influence can then be exerted
by them on mankind. The cock is then supposed to crow all night long, and by his vigilance to scare away all
malignant spirits.
A belief was long current in devon and Cornwall, and perhaps still lingers both there and in other remote
parts of the country, that at midnight, on Christmas Eve, the cattle in their stalls fall down on their knees in
adoration of the infant Saviour, in the same manner as the legend reports them to have done in the stable at
Bethlehem. Bees were also said to sing in their hives at the same time, and bread baked on Christmas Eve, it was
averred, never became mouldy. All nature was thus supposed to unite in celebrating the birth of Christ, and
partake in the general joy which the anniversary of the Nativity inspired.
In Germany, Christmas Eve is for children the most joyous night in the year, as they then feast their eyes
on the magnificence of the Christmas tree , and rejoice in the presents which have been provided for them on its
branches by their parents and friends. The tree is arranged by the senior members of the family, in the principal
room of the members of the family, in the principal room of the house, and with the arrival of evening the children
are assembled in an adjoining apartment. At a given signal, the door of the great room is thrown open, and in rush
the juveniles eager and happy. There, on a long table in the centre of the room, stands the Christmas tree, every
branch glittering with little lighted tapers, while all sorts of gifts and ornaments are suspended from the branches,
and possiobly also numerous other presents are deposited separetly on the table, all properly labelled with the
names of the respective recipients. The Christmas tree seems to be a very ancient custom in Germany, and is
probably a remnant of the splendid and fanciful pageants of the middle ages. Apparently since the marriage of
Queen Victoria with Prince Albert, previous to which time it was almost unknown in this country, the custom has
been introduced into England with the greatest success, and must be familiar to most of our readers. Though
thoroughly an innovation on our old Christmas customs, and partaking, indeed, somewhat of a prosaic character,
rather at variance with the beautiful poetry of many of our Christmas usages, he would be a cynic indeed who
could derive no pleasure from contemplating the group of young and happy faces who cluster round the Christmas
tree to share its pleasant fruit.
S. T. Coleridge, in a letter from Ratzeburg, in North Germany, published in the Friend, and quoted by Hone,
mentions the following Chirstmas customs as observed in that locality. Part of them seems to be derived from
those ceremonies proper to St. Nicholas Day, already described under 6th December. ‘There is a Christmas, the
girls are all busy, and the boys save up their pocket money to buy these presents. What the present is to be , is
cautiously kept secret; and the girls have a world of contrivances to conceal it such as working when they are out
on visits, and the others are not with them; getting up in the morning before daylight, &c. Then, on the evening
before Christmasday, one of our parlous is lighted up by the children, into which the parents must not go; a great
yellow bough is fastened on the table at a little distance from the wall, a multitutde of little tapers are fixed in the
bough, but not so as to burn it till they are nearly consumed, and coloured paper, &c., hangs and flutters from the
twigs. Under this bough the children lay out, in great order, the presents they mean for their parents, still
concealing in their pockets what they intend for each other. Then the parents are introduced, and each presents
his little gift; they then bring out the remainder, one by one, from their pockets, and present them with kisses and
embraces. Where I witnessed this scene, there were 8 or 9 children, and the eldest daughter and the mother wept
aloud for joy and tenderness; and the tears ran down the face of the father, and he clasped all his children so tight

231
to his breast, it seemed as if he did it to stifle the sob that was rising within it. I was very much affected. The
shadow of the bough and its appendages on the wall, arching over on the ceiling, made apendages on the wall, and
arching over on the celiling, made a pretty picture; and then the raptures of the very little ones, when at last the
twigs and their needles began to take fire and snap O! It was a delight to them! On the next day (Christmas –day),
in the great parlour, the parents lay out on the table the presents for the children; a scene of more sober joy
succeeds; as on this day, after an old custom, the mother says privately to each of her daughters, and the father to
his sons, that which he has observed most praiseworthy, and that which was most faulty, in their conduct.
Formerly, and still in all the smaller towns and villages throughtout North Germany, these presents were sent by all
the parents to some one fellow, who, high buskings, a white robe, a mask, and an enormous flax wig, personates
Knecht Rupert i.e., the ervant Rupert. On Christmas night, he goes round to every house, and say that Jesus Christ,
his Master, sent him thither. The parents and elder children receive him with great pomp and reverence, while the
little ones are most terribly frightened. He then inquires for the children, and, according to the character which he
hears from the parents a rod, and in the name of his master recommends them to use it frequently. About 7 or 8
years old, the children are let into the secret, and it is curious how faithfully they keep it.’
In the state of Pennsylvania, in North America, where many of the settlers are of German descent,
Christmas Eve is observed with many of the ceremonies practised in the Fatherland of the Old World. The
Christmas tree branches forth in all its splendor, and before going to sleep, the children hang up their stockings at
the foot of the bed, to be filled by a personage bearing the name of Krishkinkle (a corruption of Christ Kindlein, or
the Infant Christ), who is supposed to descend the chimnbey with gifts for all good children. If, however, any one
has been naughty, he finds a birch rod instead of sweetmeats in the stocking. This implement of correction is
believed to have been placed there by another personage, called Pelsnichol, or Nicholas with the fur, in allusion to
the dress of skins which he is supposed to wear. In this notion, a connection is evidently to be traced with the well
known legendary attributes of St. Nicholas, previously described, though the benignant character of the saint is in
this instance woefully believed. It is further to be remarked, that though the general understanding is that
Krishkinkle and Pelsnichol are distinct personages the one the rewarder of good children, the other the punisher of
the bad they are also occasionally represented as the same individual under different charactes, the prorotype of
which was doubtless the charitable St. Nicholas.[247]
The day adopted by the Church as the anniversary of the birth of Christ was the day of the winter solstice,
December 25, which the Romans celebrated in connection with the worship[ of the Sun god Mithra, wherefore it is
called “Dies Natalis Solis Invicti,’ the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. The festival of December 25 is of solar and
not of Christian origin.[248]
It may be observed here, en passant, that the figure of Knecht Ruprecht (the German Santa Claus) owes his
name to the priest Rupertus in the Koelbigk dancing legend.[249]
As an integral part of life, religion was both subjected to burlesque and unharmed by it. In the annual
Feast of Fools at Christmas time, every rite and article of the Church no matter how sacred was celebrated in
mockery. A dominus festi, or lord of the revels, was elected from the inferior clergy the cures, subdeacons, vicars,
and choir clerks, mostly ill educated, ill paid, and ill disciplined whose day it was to turn everything topsy turvy.
They installed their lord as pope or bishop or Abbot of Fools in a ceremony of head shaving accompanied by bawdy
talk and lewd acts; dressed him investments turned inside out; played dice on the altar and ate black puddings and
sausages while mass was celebrated in nonsensical gibberish; swung censers made of old shoes emitting “stinking
smoke”; officiated in the various offices of the priest wearing beast masks and dressed as women or minstrels;
sang obscene songs in the choir; howled and hooted and jangled bells while the “Pope” recited a doggerel
benediction. At his call to follow him on pain of having their breeches split all rush violently from the church to

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parade through the town, drawing the dominus in a cart from which he issues mock indulgences while his
followers hiss, crackle, jeer, and gesticulate. They rouse the bystanders to laughter wit “infamous performances”
and parody preachers in scurrilous sermons. Naked men haul carts of manure which they throw at the populace.
Drinking bouts and dances accompany the procession. The whole was a burlesque of the too familiar, tedious, and
often meaningless rituals; a release of “the natural lout beneath the cassock.”[250]
Every year, during Lent, whole troops of apprentices stormed the best known brothels and threw stones at
the harlots in the streets. Although the fury of these young men was only directed, incomprehensibly enough,
against prostitutes, it alarmed the court as much as if a revolution had broken out.[251]
In Italy, in Gaul, in parts of Germany, in England, and in Spain men decked themselves for licentious
assemblies and obscene rites which they performed at Christmas and early in the New Years, shielding themselves
under the kindly aegis of the Church’s festivals. They clad themselves in hairy and horned skins, in hides with
immense tails, they smutted their faces of bedaubed them with filth, and donned the most hideous masks
imagination could conceive. These performances seem, indeed, almost universal, and they are denounced again
and again. “Lo, the day is close at hand,” writes Severian, “yea , the Kalends are here, and the whole devilish
procession will come forth, the very fountain head and workshop of idols will go in full parade. The new year is
hallowed by old blasphemies. They appear as Saturn, they show us Jupiter, they display Hercules, they present
Diana with her huntress train, they exhibit Vulcan spouting the vilest obscenities, and many more beside, whose
names I will not utter, for they are monstrous lewd. Of a verity those beastlinesses which are unknown to nature
do they endeavor to fashion by their craft and purblind skill, abnormal, epicene. Moreover men are dressed like
herd animals , they turn men into women, I say, they laugh at decency, they break all laws, they laugh, at public
opinion, they riot and roister whilst the whole world looks on, and those who commit these abominations declare
‘tis but a jest. No jest, forsooth, but black sin and shame. Men are transformed into idols. And, if it be a crime to
resort to idols, what think ye is it to become an idol?’...For when they would assume the likeness of these heathen
gods, if pigments and charcoal, wherewith to caulk and smear their faces, are found to be lacking, that they may
make their appearance more quaint and horrid, they not only tire themselves in hides, in rags and tatters, but deck
themselves out with straw and bedaub their countenances all over with excrement or any other filthy ordure
which they can light upon anywhere.” S. Maximus of Turin (c. 412 65) repeatedly reprobates similar ceremonies:
“Are not indeed,” he cries, “all those rites and ceremonies which the devil’s own servants enact on those days
frantic folly?...What is it but frantic folly when men created by God and in the image of God transform themselves
to herd animals or to wild beasts or to some monstrous shapes?....These gecks and losels say that they are
observing omens and judging of the length of their lives from some empty and idle signs, for how shall the events
of the coming year be ascertained by the vague betokenings of beast or bird.” S. Peter Chrysologus (406 50),
Doctor of the Church, writes in the same strain: “The man who puts on the guise of an idol has no wish to be in
the image and likeness of God. Who jests with the Devil cannot rejoice with Christ… Wherefore let the father
strive to convert his son, the master his servant, the kinsman his relation, the citizen his fellowcitizen, each man his
fellow man, and the Christian all, all who have masqueraded in the likeness of animals, who have metamorphed
themselves as draught cattle, who have assumed the shape of herd animals, who have turned themselves into
devils.”
S. Caesarius of Arles (470 542) is not one whit less emphatic: “Is there any sensible man,” he asks with
biting irony, “who could ever believe that there are actually rational individuals willing to put on the appearance of
a stag to transform themselves into wild beasts? Some dress themselves in the skins of herd animals; others put on
the heads of horned beasts; swelling and wildy exulting if only they can so completely metamorphose themselves
into the animal kind that seem to have entirely abandoned the human shape.” And again he warns the fathful:

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“Wherefore if ye abhor any participation in their sins, ye will not suffer these human stags or bull calves or other
monsters to approach you, nay, not so much as to come nigh your dwellings.” He also writes: “I would fain believe
that so foul a tradition, so evil a custom…hath been abolished; but if ye know of any who practice this most
heinous abomination of guising themselves as a roebuck or a musonned stag … do ye chaste such with sore
stripes.”
In spite of the denunciations of the Fathers and Doctors these buffoon but evil rites persisted although
shorn to some degree of their primitive offence, and they are found intermixed with the medieval Feast of Fools,
festum stultorum or fatuorum, the Feast of Asses, asinatian festa, with which the inferior clerics in cathedrals and
collegiate churches were wont riotously to usher in the new year. At these outrageous and extraordinary festivals
hideous and repulsive masks were often worn, personsa, or monstra lauarum as they are termed by Pope innocent
III, who issuing a decretal to the archbishop and bishops of the province of Gnesen in Poland, directed that all such
grotesque clowning should be at once discontinued. No dought there were beast masks, furnished with the most
fantastice corniculate projections, a remnant of the actual skins and hides of animals. Some writers have found an
Oriental origin for the Feast of Fools, but this does not seem probable, although similar mock revels were held in
Constantinople, and in the 12th century the Patriarch Balsamon unavailingly combated an ancient custom which
the clergy of S. Sophia refused to abandon. They claim the right at Christmas and Candlemas to wear masks, and
to enter the sanctuary in the guise of soldiers, or of monks, or of 4 footed beasts. There was no abuse amid all the
indecorum of these burlesque celebrations which was reporved with greater severity and visited with sterner
censure by the Chruch, and this, no doubt, because such a masquerade was definitely traceable to the old
superstitions of Witchcraft, although the evil of the connexion had in actual fact and practice entirely disappeared,
and on the face of it at worst it was mere ribald mumming.[252]
The medieval chronicles in Latin offer a quantity of facts that the authors sometimes reltate to a ritual date
with mythical value. In the Norman chronicle of the 11th century, there is, for example, the encounter with the
Mesnie Hellequin,* a parade of revenants led by a sinister, club wielding figure behind whom is concealed a major
deity of the Otherworld. THis procession is very precisely placed on the night of December 31 into January 1,
during the calends of January, which are well known for their supserstitions.[253]
Thus it seems entirely natural to fix the Nativity of Chrits on this night of the Mothers (or night of the
fairies) on which the birth of profane heroes was already celebrated. The setting of Christmas on December 25
seems a clear association with the pagan custom of attaching the fairy repasy to the birth of an exceptional
individual. Indeed many rites of Christmas find mythical counterparts in the folk memoy th associated this
predestined date with the world of Faery. [254]
Santa Claus is nothing other than the benefit figure of the Wild Man, the fairy figure from the Otherworld
who periodically visits men to give them gifts.[255]
720: Once again we have the magical animal the reindeer. Who brings the gifts. Im pretty sure white males go
out hunting for a black buck to come fuck his wife down especially around the Christmas season or any other
Holiday. Why the reindeer is magical? The only guess I can make is cave drawings which show zoophilia activity
with deers. Not to fret, young grasshopper I will being do a work on the subject of cuckoldry. There is to mch
involved in the subject and this is where the white race and the black race meet fully nude. The origins have
nothing to do with race to my knowledge but race has damn near become the basis of the practice today. Besides
this, the givings of gifts is good for the nature of all. Charity is highly interwoven into thinking pattern and culture
of Caucasians, as they know from experience everybody has hard ships. Charity is sympathy at its highest level,
whatever you give came from apart of you and not to expect anything removes burden from the receiver. It
becomes a problem when the receiver doesn’t understand that charity is a common courtesy unspoken rule.

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 New Years
The festivals most important for the development of the witch idea were the fertility rites associated with
Diana or Hecate, the festivals on Thursday, which later became a favorite day for witch meetings, and the hunting
celebrations on the 1st of January. That some regarded the hunting festival not merely as a ritual masquerade but
as a real transformation of man into beast is clear from Caesarius’ condemnation: “What rational person would
believe that he would find men of sound mind who would wish to change themselves into a stag or other wild
beast? The synods and Caesarius also bear witness to the custom of transvestitism at the same New Year’s festival,
where men dressed as women, a masquerade probably originating in a fertility rite of some kind. The orgiastic
banquets accompanied by song, dance and sexual revels were both continuations of the ancient bacchanals and
precursors of the witches’ sabbat.
Other components of the witch idea appear in the 6th century. According to Jordanes’ History of the
Goths, the original Huns were the offspring of women and icubi, a story that was often repeated in the Middle
Ages. Incubi, lustful angels who sleep with women, appear in many works of the church Fathers, and their ultimate
origins are in the numerous stories of the Greeks, Romans, and postexilic Jews about intercourse between men
and spirits. In the Teutonic laws of the 6th and 7th centuries, the striga and lamia, those wandering and
bloodsucking night spirits of the ancients, are always completely distinguished from the maleficus or herbarius,
indicating that sorcerers were infrequently associated with evil spirits. This is true in Spain, for example, where
lamias, far from being considered human, are identified with nymphs and even with Minerva. Yet the distinction is
already beginning to break down. “Lamia’ is sometimes used as a translation of the Teutonic hagazussa, which is a
person, and in some of the laws striae and strigae are classified with other evil women such as prostitutes.[256]
Chapter 62 of the Penitential of Burchard, the bishop of Worms (965 1025), mentions several pagan rites
associated with January 1.
Have you celebrated the calends* of January according to pagan customs? Have you undertaken an
exceptional or uncommon task on the occasion of the New Year, a taks that you work on neither before or after to
wit: arranging stones on your table or giving a feast, leading dancers and singers through the streets and squares,
taking a seat upon your roof while wearing your sword in order to see and know what will happen to you in the
new year, sitting atop bull’s hide where the roads cross to read the future on the night of January 1 cooking bread
for yourself to know whether the new year will be prosperous depending on whether the dough rises? If yes,
because you have abandoned God your creator, and have turned to vain idols and become apostate, you will fast
on all the official days for 2 years.
And chapter 104 offers this: “Have you done like some during the calends of January, the 8th day of the
Nativity? During this holy night, they spin, weave sew, begin all manner of works at the instigation of the devil on
the occasion of the new year. If yes, [you must] fast 40 days on bread and water.”[257]
The medieval chronicles in Latin offer a quantity of facts that the authors sometimes relate to a ritual date
with mythical value. In the Norman chronicle of the 11th century, there is, for example, the encounter with the
Mesnie Helleqin, a parade of revenants led by a sinister, club wielding figure behind whom is concealed a major
deity of the Otherworld. This procession is very precisely placed on the night of December 31 into January 1,
during the calends of January, which are well known for their superstitions. The Mesnie hellequin is the French
term for the Wild Hunt.
Contemporary Romans celebrate Saint Sylvester’s Day and New Years Day by throwing out the window
their chipped and broken dishes. They also set off firecrackers or shoot guns, much as other Europeas do on this

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day. We can note the same custome in Denmark, but their stated purpose is to drive away the elves and all the evil
spirits that are particularly active on this night and to keep them from causing harm during the year to come.
Another saint whose feast day is celebrated at year’s end (December 25) is Saint Anastasia, and her story
might explain in part the din (breaking china, firecrackers) associated with the celebration of Saint Sylvester’s Day.
The Gold Legend somewhat humoursly recounts her imaginary rape by a Roman prefect: “Believing he was
assaulting the Virgin, he embraced the casseroles, the stwew pots, the cauldrons, and the cooking utensils.” All
these are utensils used during the charvari and other customs marking the arrival of the New Year. “When he
came back to his senses,” the text continues, “he emerged all black with dirt and his clothing in shreds. His
servants who were waiting for him at the door, seeing him in such a state and believing him changed into a demon,
greeted him with a storm of blows, then fled, leaving him alone. [258]
According to the medieval historian Orderic Vital, during the night of December 31 to January 1, 1092
(Saint Sylvester’s Night), the priest of Bonneval (in the Orne region) was returning home after visitng the sick when
he suddenly heard a terrifying fracas and saw a flying army coming toward him. He tried to conceal himself near
four medlar tress when a man of imposing size armed with a club forced the priest to stand at his side. An entire
wild army filed past the eyes of the terrified priest. First came the infantrymen, carrying 50 coffins; the giant with
the club accompanied them. Women on horseback followed, blaspheming and confessing their crimes; then came
clerics, abbots, and bishops pleading with the priest to pray for them. And then again still more victims. The priest
quickly grasped that this was the Mesnie hellequin in which he had never wanted to believe, despite the
testimonites he had heard concerning in it. The priest sought to step in to the procession and stop one of the
horses, but he burned his hand when he touched the harness. He subsequently fell ill, and the author of this
chronicle claims to have seen his atrocious burns.[259]

St. Valentines Day:

Brigit it especially associated with the cult of the Black Virgin through the feast Imbolc, one of the Celtic
quarter days, which occurred the feast Imbolc, one of the Celtic quarter days, which occurred on 1 February, now
the feast of St. Brigid, the Mary of the Gael, which coincides with Candlemas. Like Candlemas it was the elebration
of the reawakening of the secret fire that would purify the land and herald the return of spring. The trial marriages
that took place on that day, which lasted by mutual consent for a year, illustrate the comparative freedom of celtic
women to decide their own fate. At Beltane, on 1 May, Brigit, representing the Tuatha de Danaan, the people of
the goddess Danu, with whom she is probably identified married Bres, who was half African, a giant Fomorian
descended from Noah’s son Ham, whose people werethe earlier inhabitants of Ireland. Brigit (Irish ‘Brig’=’power’)
was a goddess of poetry, knowledge and the arts of civilization. Her shrine of the sacred fire at Kildare as
continued by her Christian namesake, St. Brigid or Bride (c.450 c.523). Bridewell, the chief women’s prison in
London, was once a convent of hers. Other features which St. Brigid shares with many Black Virigins are her ability
to raise the dead and the healing power of the cloth that has touched her, especially when applied to women
suffering from barrenness and illnesses of childbirth.
St. Bridgit, patronsaint of Seden, shares her feat day, 8 October, with 3 penitent whores, Margaret, Pelagia
and Thais, as well as with St. Bacchus. In 1346 she founded an order devoted to learning, the Birgittines, whose
members where organized in double communities of men and women, like Cassian’s foundation in Marseillles and
St. Brigids at Kildare. In the new order, however, the prioress was the superios of both houses. Syon House was
their headquarters in England. According to Robert Graves, some houses of the order ‘reverted merrily to
paganism’. The dark faced St. Mary of Egypt is associated by Graves with the Brigid/Bridgit archetype.

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 But the goddess also had a dark, devouring side, well illustrated in the legend of Black Annis or Cat Anna of
Leicester, who lived in a cave she had clawed out herself in the Dane (Danu?) Hills. She used to lie in wait for
children by a huge pollard oak where she would hang their skins to dry after clawing them to death, sucking their
blood and flaying them. She had a secret passage in later times leading from her lair to the cellars under the
castle, and as late as 1941 a small girl evacuated from the city reported that you could hear her grindin her teeth 5
miles away. Black Annis may seem a far cry from the Christian goddess until one recalls that the speciality of Black
Virgins is to grant eternal bliss to dead babies offered to them (cf. Avioth). This death aspect is also illustrated by
the Irish great goddess, the Morrigan, especially associated with war and destruction, who hovers near the battle
fieldas a crow or raven. [260]
The renewal day bouquet or the bouquet offered on St. Valentine’s Day are attested by several ordinances
between 1539 and 1546. It was in exchange for this bouquet that the king offered money to the filles.
The king was not the only one to receive a gift from a prostitute ‘queen’. Let us look briefly at the ceremony,
already mentioned, that took place in Nimes, and probably in many other cities of Provence and Languedoc. On
Ascension Day the citizenry gathered in the principal square to honour the Charite Majeur, the city agency for the
distribution of alms. The prostitutes participated in the ceremony as a group, and they did not stand with the
various paupers groups. They were not beneficiaries of public charity; they practiced charity, as did the other
urban trade associations. Thus they participated in a ritual of integration. We can find the logical complement of
this ceremony in Pernes (and the same event is attested in Arles at the beginning of the 16th century), city’s patron
saint, running races after the young people and before the children. Their little community had full membership in
the larger urban family.

Fig. 119.). Saint Valentine and the Death Penalty

Fig. 120.). Feast of St. Valentine February 14, 270
In Pernes the games celebrated twice a year (24 January and St. Bartholomews Day) included a mens foot
race, wrestling matches, and competitions in jumping, crossbow shooting and archery, after which there was a
foot race for the ‘public women’, followed by one for children. In Boulogne on St. Martins Day the city fathers
sent 4 barrels of wine to the public prostitutes.[261]

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 We must not forget that it was the city quartier, the neighbourhood community, that defined and
recognized conjugality. For the ecclesiastical authorities these ambiguous fringes of the ordo conjugatorum
represented a corruption they were powerless to combat. This is why, during the greater part of the 15th century,
prostitutes, married and unmarried, were invited to baptisms, marriages, and funerals, to carnival dances, and to
the festivities of St. Valentines Day or of the month of May.[262]
St. Valentines Day is now almost everywhere a much degenerated festival, the only observance of any note
consisting merely of the sending of jocular anonymous letters to parties whom one wishes to quiz, and this
confined very much to the humbler classes. The approach of the day is now heralded by the appearance in the
printsellers shop windows of vast numbers of missives calculated for use on this occasion, each generally
consisting of a single sheet of post paper, on the first page of which is seen some ridiculous coloured caricature of
the male or female figure, with a few burlesque verses below. More rarely, the print is of a sentimental kind, such
as a view of Hymen’s altar, with a pair undergoing initiation into wedded happiness before it, while Cupid flutters
above, and hearts transfixed with his darts decorate the corners. Maid servants and young fellows interchange
such epistles with each other on the 14th of February, no doubt conceiving that the joke is amazingly good; and,
generallyk, the newspapers do not fail to record that the London postmen delivered so many hundred thousand
more letters on that day that they do in general. Such is nearly the whole extent of the observances now peculiar
to St. Valentines Day.
At no remote period it was very different. Ridiculous letters were unknown; and, if letters of any kind
were sent, they contained only a courteous profession of attachment from some young man to some young
maiden, honeyed with a few compliments to her various perfections, and expressive of a hope that his love might
meet with return. But the true proper ceremony of St. Valentines Day was the drawing of a kind of lottery,
followed by ceremonies not much unlike what is generally called the game of forfeits. Misson, a learned traveler,
of the early part of the last century, gives apparently a correct account of the principal ceremonial of the day. ‘On
the eve of St. Valentine’s Day,’ he says, ‘the young folks in England and Scotland, by a very ancient custom,
celebrate a little festival. An equal number of maids and bachelors get together; each writes their true or some
feigned name upon separate billets, which they roll up, and draw by way of lots, the maids taking the mens billets,
and the men the maids; so that each of the young men lights upon a girls upon a young man whom she calles hers.
By this mean each has 2 valentines; but the man sticks faster to the valentine to whom he is fallien. Fortune
having thus divided the company into so many couples, the valentines give balls and treats to their mistresses,
wear their billets several days upon their bosmos or sleeves, and this little sport often ends in love.’
Notwithstanding the practice of revelling , there seems to have been a disposition to believe that the
person drawn as a valentine had some considerable likelihood of becoming the associate of the party in wedlock.
At least, we may suppose that this idea would be gladly and easily arrived at, where the party so drawn was at all
eligible from other considerations. There was, it appears, a prevalent notion amongst the common people, that
this was the day on which the birds selected their mates. They seem to have imagined that an influence was
inherent in the day on which the birds selected their mates. They seem to have imagined that an influence was
inherent in the day, which rendered in some degree binding the lot or chance by which any youth or maid was now
led to fix his attention on a person of the opposite sex. It was supposed, for instance, that the first unmarried
person of the other sex whom one met on St. Valentines morning in walking abroad, was a destined wife or a
destined husband.
The origin of these peculiar observances of St. Valentines Day is a subject of some obscurity. The saint
himself, who was a priest of Rome, martyred in the 3rd century, seems to have had nothing to do with the matter,
beyond the accident of his day being used for the purpose. Mr. Douce, in his Illustrations of Shakespeare, says: ‘It

238
was the practice in ancient Rome, during a great part of the month of February, to celebrate the Lupercalia, which
were feasts in honour of Pan and Juno, whence the latter deity was named Februata, Februalis, and Februlla. On
this occasion, amidst a variety of ceremonies, the names of particular saints instead of those of the women; and as
the festival of the Lupercalia had commenced about the middle of February, they appear to have chosen St.
Valentines Day for celebrating the new feast, because it occurred nearly at the same time. This is, in part, the
opinion of a learned and rational compiler of the Lives of the Saints, the Rev. Alban Butler. It should seem,
however, that it was utterly impossible to extirpate altogether any ceremony to which the common people had
been much accustomed a fact which it were easy to prove in tracing the origin of various other popular
superstitions. And, accordingly, the outline of the ancient ceremonies was preserved, but modified by some
adaption to the Christian system. It is reasonable to suppose, that the above practice of choosing mates would
gradually become reciprocal in the sexes, and that all persons so chosen would be called Valented from the day on
which the ceremony took place.’[263]
The carnelian heart, another of the many lifeless things to which virtue is ascribed, is a degraded imitation
of a very old charm or “fetich,” the heartshape being accidentally reached by a process of evolution. From very
early times the stone axes. And arrow hears, which are somewhat heart shaped, once used by primitive peoples,
were regarded as lucky possessions, because they gave one a certain hold over the ghosts of the people who
originally formed them, and who might be summoned by rubbing or anointing them.[264]
In February the Germans celebrated holidays honoring the progress of the sun’s ascendancy: it was
customary to sacrifice pigs on this occasion. These holidays were called Spurcalia. Even today in Holland and
lower Germany the month of February is called Sporkel. Because the Germans set great store on these holidays,
missionaries shifted them to the time of Christmas and gave them a Christian meaning. Perhaps our Carnival
celebrations are a souvenir of the Spurcalia of antiquity?
We can also note that the sacrifice of a pig constitutes one of the primordial rites of Carnival. It so
happens that the pig is associated with Saint Anthony, whose feast day is January 17, on the threshold of February
and the Spurcalia.[265]
Lupercalia:
Lupercalia was a very ancient, possibly pre Roman pastoral annual festival, observed in the city of Rome,
each year, on February 15, to avert evil spirits and purify the city, releasing health and fertility. Lupercalia
subsumed Februa, an earlier origin spring cleansing ritual held on the same date, which gives the month of
February (Februarius) its name.
The festival was originally known as Februa (Latin for the "Purifications" or "Purgings") after the februum
which was used on the day. It was also known as Februatus and gave its name to Juno Februalis, Februlis, or
Februata in her role as its patron deity; to Lupercus Februus, who presided over the holiday; and to February
(mensis Februarius), the month during which it occurred. Ovid mentions februare deriving from an Etruscan word
for "purging". Some sources connect the Latin word for fever (febris) with the same idea of purification or purging,
due to the sweating commonly seen in association with fevers.
The name Lupercalia was believed in antiquity to evince some connection with the Ancient Greek festival
of the Arcadian Lykaia, a wolf festival (Greek: λύκος, lýkos; Latin: lupus), and the worship of Lycaean Pan, assumed
to be a Greek equivalent to Faunus, as instituted by Evander. Justin describes a cult image of "the Lycaean god,
whom the Greeks call Pan and the Romans Lupercus," as nude, save for a goatskin girdle. It stood in the Lupercal,
the cave where tradition held that Romulus and Remus were suckled by the she wolf (Lupa). The cave lay at the
foot of the Palatine Hill, on which Romulus was thought to have founded Rome.

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Fig. 121.). The Lupercalian Festival in Rome (ca. 1578–1610), drawing by the circle of Adam Elsheimer, showing the
Luperci dressed as dogs and goats, with Cupid and personifications of fertility
The Februa was ancient and possibly Sabine. After the month of February was added to the Roman
calendar, Februa occurred on its fifteenth day (a.d. XV Kal. Mart.). Of its various rituals, the most important came
to be those of the Lupercalia. The Romans themselves attributed the instigation of the Lupercalia to Evander, a
culture hero from Arcadia who was credited with bringing the Olympic pantheon, Greek laws and alphabet to Italy,
where he founded the city of Pallantium on the future site of Rome, 60 years before the Trojan War.
Lupercalia was celebrated in parts of Italy and Gaul; Luperci are attested by inscriptions at Velitrae,
Praeneste, Nemausus (modern Nîmes) and elsewhere. The ancient cult of the Hirpi Sorani ("wolves of Soranus",
from Sabine hirpus "wolf"), who practiced at Mt. Soracte, 45 km (28 mi) north of Rome, had elements in common
with the Roman Lupercalia.
The Lupercalia is marked on a calendar of 354 alongside traditional and Christian festivals. Despite the
banning in 391 of all non Christian cults and festivals, Lupercalia was celebrated by the nominally Christian
populace on a regular basis, into the reign of the emperor Anastasius. Pope Gelasius I (494–96), claiming that only
the "vile rabble" were involved in the festival, sought its forceful abolition; the senate protested that the
Lupercalia was essential to Rome's safety and well being. This prompted Gelasius' scornful suggestion that "If you
assert that this rite has salutary force, celebrate it yourselves in the ancestral fashion; run nude yourselves that
you may properly carry out the mockery." The remark was addressed to the senator Andromachus by Gelasius in
an extended literary epistle that was virtually a diatribe against the Lupercalia. Gelasius finally abolished the
Lupercalia, after a long dispute.

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 Some authors claim that Gelasius replaced Lupercalia with the "Feast of the Purification of the Blessed
Virgin Mary," but researcher Oruch says that there is no written record of Gelasius ever intending a replacement
of Lupercalia. Some researchers, such as Kellog and Cox, have made a separate claim that the modern customs of
Saint Valentine's Day originate from Lupercalia customs. Other researchers have rejected this claim: they say there
is no proof that the modern customs of Saint Valentine's Day originate from Lupercalia customs, and the claim
seems to originate from misconceptions about festivities
A male goat (or goats) and a dog were sacrificed by one or another of the Luperci, under the supervision of
the Flamen dialis, Jupiter's chief priest: and an offering of salt mealcakes prepared by the Vestal Virgins. After the
sacrifice at the Lupercal, two Luperci approached its altar. Their foreheads were anointed with sacrificial blood
taken from the sacrificial knife, then wiped clean with wool soaked in milk, after which they were expected to
smile and laugh.
The sacrificial feast followed, after which the Luperci cut and wore thongs (known as februa) of the newly
flayed goatskin, in imitation of Lupercus, and ran near naked along the old Palatine boundary, which was marked
out by stones. In Plutarch's description of the Lupercalia, written during the early Empire,
...many of the noble youths and of the magistrates run up and down through the city naked, for sport and
laughter striking those they meet with shaggy thongs. And many women of rank also purposely get in their way,
and like children at school present their hands to be struck, believing that the pregnant will thus be helped in
delivery, and the barren to pregnancy.
The Luperci completed their circuit of the Palatine, then returned to the Lupercal cave. Descriptions of the
Lupercalia festival of 44 BC attest to its continuity, though in this instance, the rites ended at the Comitia, perhaps
because the Lupercal cave had fallen into disrepair it was later rebuilt by Augustus, and has been tentatively
identified with a cavern discovered in 2007, 50 feet (15 m) below the remains of Augustus' palace.
Horace's Ode III, 18 describes Lupercalia. The festival or its associated rituals gave its name to the Roman
month of February (mensis Februarius) and thence to the modern month. The Roman god Februus personified
both the month and purification, but seems to postdate both.[266]
In ancient Roman religion, Februus, whose name means "purifier", was the god of purification. He was also
worshipped under the same name by the Etruscans as the god of purification, and also the underworld. For the
Etruscans, Februus was also the god of riches (money/gold) and death, both connected to the underworld in the
same natural manner as with the better known Roman god Pluto.
Februus may have become the Roman Febris, goddess of fever (febris in Latin means fever) and malaria.
These are possibly connected with the sweating of fevers, which was considered a purgative, washing, and
purification process.
Februus is possibly named in honor of the more ancient Februa, (also Februalia and Februatio), the spring
festival of washing and purification. Februus' holy month was Februarius (of Februa), hence English February, a
month named for the Februa/februalia spring purification festival which occurred on the 15th of that month.
These spring purification activities occurred at about the same time as Lupercalia, a Roman festival in
honor of Faun and also the wolf who nursed Romulus and Remus, during which expiatory sacrifices and ritual
purifications were also performed. Because of this coincidence, the two gods (Faun and Februus) were often
considered the same entity.[267]
720: So Black history month is underneath the God Februus who is a god of money and death. We make
Americas money and die off quickly. Which is also in alignment with the word Februare which means purification
or to be purged. The usage of this word predates Greece by way of the Etruscans. Not to forget that the purging
ritual is done on goats. During the times of Rome I have encountered no mention of a Goat being a black man. But

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in the dark Ages this symbology was merged by way of the Templars for publicized confirmation. Then became the
main symbol of the Devil for all Europeans.
Valentines: The story of St Valentine’s Day begins with some unknown medieval birdwatchers, probably in France
rather than England, who reckoned that birds begin mating in mid February, and decided to give this a precise
date: 14 February. (They may have followed some folk tradition – in Slovenia this is still said to be the first day of
spring, when plants start growing, and birds mate.) As was normal at that period, they expressed the date as the
feast day of a saint; in the Catholic Church every day in the year celebrates at least one saint, and for a public who
had no printed calendars it was easier to remember dates by names than by figures. It happens that 14 February is
dedicated to one or other of two early Roman martyrs, both named Valentinus, believed to have died on that date.
This does not mean that there is anything to link the martyrs themselves to birds, or to human love; it is by
arbitrary chance that their name appears, and if the birdwatchers had picked on the 15th (St. Faustinus’s Day)
rather than the 14th, we would be now sending one another ‘Faustines’ as love tokens.
In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, it was fashionable in aristocratic circles in France and England to
celebrate Valentine’s Day with flirtatious entertainments such as ‘Courts of Love’, and several poets, including
Chaucer, Gower, and Charles Duke of Orleans, wrote elegant verses for the occasion. Chaucer’s ‘The Parliament of
Fowls’ (1381?), describes birds gathering at the bower of ‘the noble goddess Nature’ to settle their love rivalries:

For this was on Saint Valentinës day

When every fowl cometh there to chose his mate.

At the same period, one’s ‘valentine’ came to mean one’s (real or pretended) ‘sweetheart’; the poet John
Lydgate used the term both for the lady to whom he addressed a Valentine’s Day poem and as the title of the
poem itself. The Oxford English Dictionary cites a letter of 1477 from Margery Brews, addressed ‘Unto my right
welebelovyd voluntyne John Paston, Squyer’ (she later married him), and a will of 1535 where a man leaves money
‘to my valentyn Agnes Illyon’. From then on, there are many references in poetry, plays, letters and journals to
choosing valentines, drawing lots for valentines as a party game, or having to take the first person of the opposite
sex whom one sees on 14 February as one’s valentine. Particularly interesting is Shakespeare’s reference in
Hamlet. Ophelia, when mad, sings a song implying that it was customary for young people to go wooing on the eve
of the festival – in this case, with disastrous results for the girl:

Tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s day,

All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your valentine.

Then up he rose and donned his clothes

And dupped the chamber door,
Let in the maid, that out a maid Never departed more.

Quoth she, before you tumbled me

You promised me to wed.
So would I ha’ done, by yonder sun,
If thou hadst not come to my bed.[268]

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 Title 3 of the Indiculus is “De spurcalibus in februario.” One scholar who has analyzed this document
explains:
In February the Germans celebrated holidays honoring the progress of the sun’s ascendancy; it was
customary to sacrifice pigs on this occasion. These holidays were called Spurcalia. Even today in Holland and
lower Germany the month of February is called Sporkel. Because the Germans set great store on these holidays,
missionaries shifted them to the time of Christmas and gave them a Christian meaning. Perhaps our Carnival
celebrations are a souvenir of the Spurcalia of antiquity?
We can also note that the sacrifice of a pig constitutes one of the primordial rites of Carnival. It so
happens that the pig is associated with saint Anthony, whose feast day is January 17, on the threshold of February
and the Spurcalia.[269]

Easter
The people are persuaded that about Easter a youth annually disappears in the hospital for these
purposes. This tradition is, perhaps, not unconnected with the Jewish ritual sacrifices of S. William orf Norwich
(1144); Harold of Gloucester (1168); William of Paris (1177); Robert of Bury S. Edmunds (1181); s. Werner of
Oberwesel (1286); S. Rudolph of Berne (1294); S. Andreas of Rinn (1462); S. Rimon of Trent, a babe of 2 and a half
years old (1473); Simon Abeles, whose body lies in the Teyn Kirche at Prague, murdered for Christ sake on 21
February, 1694, by Lazarus and Levi Kurtzhandel; El Santo Nino de la Guardia, near Toledo 91490), and many
more.[270]
In old Aryan myth the spring tide sun was typified by a red or golden egg, which in after times was made by
the early Christians the emblem of the Resurrection. Hence the Easter egg, and the many curious customs
connected with it throughout Europe. In the household accounts of King Edward I. stands the following item
against Easter Day: “Four hundred and a half of eggs, eighteenpence.” The pope gave an Easter egg in a silver case
to Henry VIII. Quite recently Cheshire children begged (as is still the custom in The Mid lands and in Scotland) for
pace or pasch eggs (so called from the hebrew word Pasha, meaning the Passover), which are usually boiled hard
and water stained with different dyes, red, blue, or violet, and otherwise ornamented. These eggs are sometimes
hung up in the cottages till another year. In Yorkshire the coloured eggs are hidden out of doors in little nests, and
the children hunt for them. In Swabia a hare is set on the nest, and the children find the hare’s eggs. But you must
first catch your hare. In past years, in out own country, if lads could do this, and bring it to the parson of the parish
of Coleshill, in Warwickshire, before 10 a.m. on Easter Monday, he was bound to give them “a calf’s head, a
hundred eggs, and a groat in money.” In many parts of Germany eggs are made into cakes in the form of a hare.
In England long ago the clergyman and choristers actually played at ball with Easter eggs a part of the serv ice in
church. Afterwards they retired for refreshments, including a gammon of bacon and a tansy pudding. Amongst
other nations, the Parsees used to distribute eggs, coloured bright red, at their spring festival.[271]
The hare, as we have seen is associated with Easter observances. Now, the name of this Christian festival
is derived from Eostre; at any rate, it “probably played a very important part at the great Spring Festival of the
prehistoric inhabitants of this island.” The hare may have been worshipped as a tribal totem god.[272]
On Easter Day, 1335, some students of the university, who had passed the night of the anniversary of the
resurrection of our Saviour in drinking, left the table half intoxicated, and ran about the town during the hours of
service, beat pans and cauldrons, and making such a noise and disturbance, that the indignant preachers were
obliged to stop in the middle of their discourses, and claimed the intervention of the municipal authorities of
Toulouse. One of these, the lord of Gaurde, went out of church with five sergeants, and tried himself to arrest the

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most turbulent of the band. But as he was seizing him by the body, one of his comrades gave the lord a blow
dagger, which cut off his nose, lips, and part of his chin. This occurrence aroused the whole town. Toulouse had
been insulted in the person of its first magistrate, and claimed vengeance. The author of the deed, named Aimeri
de Berenger, was seized, judged, condemned, and beheaded, and his body was suspended on the spikes of the
Chateau Narbonnais.[273]
It is to the prohibition of eggs in Lent that the origin of “Easter eggs,” must be traced. These were
hardened by boiling them in a madder bath, and were brought to receive the blessing of the priest on Good Friday,
and were then eaten on the following Sunday as a sign of rejoicing. [274]
Easter the anniversary of our Lord’s resurrection from the dead, is 1 of the 3 great festivals of the Christian
year, the other 2 being Christmas and Whitsuntide. From the earlisest period of Christianity down to the present
day, it has always been celebrated by believers with the greatest joy, and accounted the Queen of Festivals. In
primitive times it was usual for Christians to salute each other on the morning of this day by exclaiming, ‘christ is
risen;’ to which the person saluted replied, appeared unto Simon;’ a custom still retained in the greek Church.
The common name of this festival in the East was the Paschal Feast, because kept at the same time as the
Pascha, or Jewish Passover, and in some measure succeeding to it. In the 6th of the Ancyran canons it is called the
Great Day. Our own name Easter is derived, as some suppose, from Eostre, the name of a sazon deity, whose feast
was celebrated every year in the spring, about the same time as the Christian festival the name being retained
when the character of the feast was changed; or, as others suppose, from Oster, which signifies rising. If the latter
supposition to be correct, Easter is in name, as well as reality, the feast of the resurrection.
Though there has never been any difference of opinion in the Christian church as to why Easter is kept,
there has been a good deal as to when it ought to be kept. It is one of the moveable feasts; that is, it is not fixed to
one particular day like Christmas Day, e.g., which is always kept of the 25th of December but moves backwards of
forwards according as the full moon next after the vernal equinox falls nearer or further from the equinox. The
rule given at the beginning of the Prayer book to find Easter is this: ‘Easter day is always the first Sunday after the
full moon happens upon a Sunday, Easter day is the Sunday after.’
The paschal controversy, which for a time divided Christendom, grew out of a diversity of custom. The
churches of Asia Minor, among whom were many Judaizing Christians, kept their paschal feast on the same day as
the Jews kept their Passover; i.e. on the 14th of Nisan, the Jewish month corresponding to our month March or
April. But the churches of the West, remember that our Lords resurresction took place on the Sunday, kept their
festival on the Sunday following the 14th of Nisan. By this means they hoped not only to commemorate the
resurrection of the day on which it actually occurred, but also to distinguish themselves more effectually from the
Jews. For a time this difference was borne with mutual forbearance and charity. And when disputes began to
arise, we find that Polycarp, the venerable bishop of Smyrna, when on a visit to Rome, took the opportunity of
conferring with Anicetas, bishop of that city, upon the question. Polycarp pleaded the practice of St. Philip and St.
John, with the latter of whom he had lived, conversed, and joined in its celebration; while Anicetas adduced the
practice of St. Peter and St. Paul. Concession came from neither side, and so the matter dropped; but the 2
bishops continued in Chirstian friendship and concord. This was about a.d. 158.
Towards the end of century, however, Victor, bishop of Rome, resolved on compelling the Eastern
churches to conform to the Western practice, and wrote and imperious letter to the prelates of Asia, commanding
them to keep the festival of Easter at the time observed by the Western churches. They very naturally resented
such an interference, and declared their resolution to keep Easter at the time they had been accustomed to do.
The dispute henceforward gathered strength, and was the source of much bitterness during the next century. The

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East was divided from the West, and all who, after the example of the Asiatics, kept Easterday on the 14th, whether
that day were Sunday or not, were styled Quatrodecimans by those who adopted the Roman custom.
One cause of the strife was the imperferction of the Jewish calendar. The ordinary year of the Jews
consisted of 12 lunar months of 291/2 days each, or of 29 and 30 days alternately; that is, of 354 days. To make up
the 11 days’ deficiency, they intercalcated a 13th month of 30 days every 3rd year. But even then they would be in
advance of the true time without outer intercalcations; so that that often kept their Passover before the vernal
equinox. But the Western Christians considered the vernal equinox the commencement of the natural year, and
objected to a mode of reckoning which might sometimes cause them to hold their paschal feast twice in 1 year and
omit it altogether the next. To obviate this, the 5th of the apostolic canons decreed that, ‘If and bishop, priest, or
deacon, celebrated the Holy feast of Easter before the vernal equinox, as the Jews do, let him be deposed.’
At the beginning of the 4th century, matters had gone to such a length, that the Emperor Constantine
thought it his duty to take steps to allay the controversy, and to insure uniformity of practice for the future. For
this purpose, he for a canon passed in the great (Ecumenical Council of Nice (a.d. 325), ‘That everywhere the great
feast of Easter should be observed upon one and the same day; and that not the day of the Jewish Passover, but,
as had been generally observed , upon the Sunday afterwards.’ And to prevent all future disputes as to the time,
the following ruales were also laid down:
1. That the 21 day of March shall be accounted the vernal equinox.’
2. That the fullmoon happening upon or next after the 21 of March, shall be taken for the full
moon of Nisan.’
3. ‘That the Lord’s –day next following that full moon be Easter day.’
4. ‘But if the full moon happen upon a Sunday, Easterda shall be the Sunday after.’
As the Egyptians at that time excelled in astronomy, the Bishop of Alexandria was appointed to give notice
of Easter day to the Pope and other patriarchs. But it was evident that this arrangement could not last long; it was
too inconvenient and liable to interruptions. The fathers of the next age began, therefore, to adopt the golden
numbers of the Metonic cycle, and to place them in the calendar against those days in each month on which the
new moons should fall during that year of the cycle. The Metonic cycle was a period of 19 years. It had been
observed by meton, and Athenian philosopher, that the moon returns to have her changes on the same month and
day of the month in the solar year after a lapse of 19 years, and so, as it were, to run in a circle. He published his
discovery at the Olympic Games, B.c. 433, and the cycle has ever since borne his name. The fathers hoped by this
cycle to be able always to know the moon’s age; and as the vernal equinox was now fixed to the 21 st of March, to
find Easter for ever. But though the new moon really happened on the same day of the year after a space of 19
years as it did before, it fell an hour earlier on the day, which, in the course of time, created a serious error in their
calculations.
The Old Easter customs which still linger among us vary considerably in form in different parts of the
kingdom. The custom of distributing the ‘pace’ or ‘pasche ege,’ which was once almost universal among
Christians, is still observed by children, and by the peasantry in Lancashire. Even in Scotland, where the great
festivals have for centuries been suppressed, the young people still get their hard boiled dyed eggs, which they roll
about, or throw, and finally eat. In Lancashire, and in Cheshire, Staffordshire, and Warwickshire, and perhaps in
other counties, the ridiculous custom of ‘lifting’ or ‘heaving’ is practised. On Easter Monday the men lift the
women, and on Easter Tuesday the women lift or heave the men. The process is performed by 2 lusty men or
women joining their hands across each other’s wrists; then, making the person to be heaved sit down on their
arms, they lift him up aloft 2 or 3 times, and often carry him several yards along a street. A grave clergyman who
happened to be passing through a town in Lancashire on an Easter Tuesday, and having to stay an hour or 2 at an

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inn, was astonished by 3 or 4 lusty women rushing into his room exclaiming they had come ‘to lift him.’ ‘To lift me!’
repeated the amazed divine; ‘what can you mean?’ ‘Why your reverence, we’ve come to lift you, cause its Easter
Tuesday.’ ‘Lift me because its Easter Tuesday? I don’t understand. Is there any such custom here?’ ‘yes, to be sure;
why, don’t you know? All us women was lifted yesterday; and us lifst the men today in turn. And in course its our
rights and duties to lift em.’ After a little further parley, the reverence traveler compromised with his fair visitors
for half a crown, and thus escaped the dreaded compliment. In Durham, on Easter Monday, the men claim the
privilege to take off the women’s shoes, and the next day the women retaliate. Anciently, both ecclesiastics and
laics used to play at ball in the churches for tansycakes of Eastertide; and, though the profane part of this custom is
happily everywhere discontinued, tansy cakes and tansy puddings are still favourite dishes at Easter in many parts.
In some parishes in the counties of Dorset and Devon, the clerk carries round to every house a few white cakes as
an Easter offering; these cakes, which are about the 8th of an inch thick, and of 2 sizes, the larger being 7 or 8
inches, the smaller about five in diameter, have a mingled bitter and sweet taste. In return for these cakes, which
are always distributed after divine service on Good Friday, the clerk receives a gratuity according to the
circumstances or generosity of the householder.[275]
The Christian festival commemorating the resurrection of Christ, synchronized with the Jewish Pesach, and
blended since the earliest days of Christianity with pagan European rites for the renewed season. In all countries
Easter falls on the Sunday after the first full moon on or following March 21. It is preceded by a period of riotous
vegetation rites and by a period of abstinence, Lent (in spain cuaresma, in Germany Lenz, in central Italy
Quaresima), and by the special rites of Holy Week.
Everywhere Easter Snday is welcomed with rejoicing, singing, candle processionals, flowers in abundance
and ringing of church bells. Any pagan customs survive, such as the lighting of new fires at dawn, among the maya
as well as in Europe, for cure, renewed life, and protection of the crops. The German Osterwasser (Easter water) is
water dipped against the stream and imbued with curative properties. Ostermarchen are told in order to produce
laughter (risus paschalis). The Easter lamb is perennially sacrificed. Children roll pasch eggs in England.
Everywhere they hunt the many colored Easter eggs, brought by the Easter rabbit. THis is not mere child’s play ,
but the vestige of a fertility rite, the eggs and the rabbit both symbolizing fertility. Furthermore, the rabbit was the
escort of the Germanic Goddess Ostara who gave the name to the festival by way of the German Ostern.
Flowers in profession ornament altars and church facades. This floral association is expressed in the
Spanish term Pascua de flores. That the sun dances as it rises on Easter morning is quite common folk belief in the
British Isles, and people rise early and go to the hilltops to see it.
The German Schmeckostern: the beatings given to each other on Easter Monday and Tuesda by men and
women in parts of German and Austria to bring them good luck, protect them from vermin, and bring them young
and health and “green.” The custom is observed,by other names, in most Slavic countries. The men beat the
women on Easter Monday, the wome beat the men on Easer Tuesday. In Croatia the beatings take place on the
way home from chrch on Good Friday. The beatings are commonly given with birch branches, especially branches
just sprouted, or sometimes with cherry, or with a willow switch. The new young life inherent in the sprouting
branch is thus bestowed upon the one beaten with it. In Bohemia vine branches are used, and the women make
presents of red Easter eggs to their beaters. These are saved for afternoon egg rolling. In some sections these
beatings are given on Holy Innocents Day December 28.[276]
Fresh green branches of trees or shrubs (birch, willow, fir, cherry, rosemary, juniper, etc., or vine, in vine
growing regions) just newly buddied or blossomed and therefore potent with new life: used by the young village
people of southern Germany and southeastern Europe to beat each other on certain feast and holy days. The rods
of life impart health and energy, renew life in the weak or ill, bestow fertility, and are used by one sex upon the

246
other. In Bohemia, for instance, birch, willow, or cherry branches are put to sprout on St. Barbara’s Day, and are
used on St. Stephen’s Day or Holy Innocents’ day by the young men of the villages to beat the girls on hands, feet,
and face. The girls are beaten with the fresh stinging branches for their own good: it keeps them fresh and fair and
young and healthy. Unhappy is the one who does not get beaten. The next day or on New Years day the girls beat
the boys with the same branches. The fool’s whip of European Carnival is probabl a direct descendant of these
rods of life.
Frazer reports (Scapegoart, London, 1913, p. 264) that in Hungary barren women are beaten with a stick
that has been used to separate copulating dogs. An early spring custom of Albanian herdsmen is to cut branches
of newl sprouting cornel and to beat their health. In Thuringia on Hol Innocents’ Day (Dec. 28) it is said that
children used to run around the streets wit green branches and strike at passersby, expecting pennies in return for
this life giving favor.[277]
720: Ah ha. The spanking practices of Europeans are now understood. There is an erotic nature to the spanking,
especially when used as role play in dominant/submission form. But who knew certain branches enforced an
abundant harvest or to protect, induce other things. At the end of the day they have a romantic nature of
understanding interwoven with eachother. Whether that be murder or a simple holiday.
The Christian liturgical calendar did not achieve its full effectiveness until the Council of Nicea established
that the Easter commemoration takes into account lunar rhythms and the spring equinox. THis made irt possible
to prop up Chirstian time with the religious time of European paganism.[278]
The Easter Bunny, for example, is a springtime reincarnation of the Wild and belongs among the host of
magical animals that haunted the medieval imagination.
While those in the Middle Ages did not recognize the rabbit that distributed gifts and sweets, they did
know other, equally marvelous figures. The white doe of white stag of the Arthurian tales haunts the transitions
that separate the 40 day periods of the year. In Chretien de Troyes’s romance Erec and Enide, the hunt of the
white stag takes place on Easter Monday, as if there was a need to recall the connection between this animal and
the moon of the equinox. In fact, the lunar body governs the appearance of fairy animals and provides the rhythm
of their annual reappearance, while these soul guiding animals serve as mediators between the human world and
the Otherworld.
In modern folklore, traditional easter eggs are supposedly carried to children by the bells on their way back
from Rome or by the easter Bunny himself. In Germanic regions, however, this role of the enchanted rabbit is
played by entirely different animals: in Westphalia it is a fox, in Thuringia a stork, in the Tyrol a white hen, in
Switzerland a cuckoo, and in Saxony a rooster. It seems that most often farmyard animals accompany these rituals
eggs. Yet it is obvious that Easter eggs are invested with a mythical value that has nothing to do with their usual
role as food. In fact, their mythic character gives greater value to their nonfood meaning.
In certain regions of Alsace, vintage eggs are handed down through generations. Further, it is believed
that the yolk of an Easter egg preserved for 100 years will transform into a precious stone and ensure the fortune
of its owner.[279]
Throughout peasant history, Bakhtin reminds us, on the holiest days, notably easter and Christmas, there
has been peasant laughter. During the easter season, laughter and jokes were permitted even in church. The
priest would tell amusing stories and jokes from the pulpit. Jokes and stories especially concerned material bodily
life. Permission to laugh was granted simultaneously with the permission to eat meat and to resume sexual
intercourse which was forbidden during lent.” I am reminded of a contemporary sicilian feminist ritual at
Pietraperzia, described in my Black Madonnas, of women interpreting good Friday as a spring festival, in which the
cross becomes the maypole. Celebrants of the easter festival at San Fratello may be remembering the dar mother

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in her image as Canaanite Astarte/Esther. Pasqua, the Italian word, refers both to Esther (whose origin is Astarte)
and to the Christian holy day, Easter.
The easter festa of jews of San Fratello acts out the meaning of the city’s name, brotherhood, in identifying
with persecuted others. Moors are recalled in the Arabic embroidery of festival costumes. Heretics are
remembered in the whip used by inquisitors to flail them. Women, heretics, and jews are recalled in the tail of the
devil, with whom the inquisition identified all three. The festival of the jews at San Fratello also suggests how
persecuted others sought protection from clerical persecution by putting on protective symbols of the Christian
church. Sal Salerno found that when the expulsion edict was proclaimed, jews from Palermo, Messina, and Catania
took refuge in small mountain towns. “In San Fratello they probably asked to be converted to Catholicism and
asked to adorn themselves with this mask during the passions of Easter week.”[280]

St. Patricks Day

Fig. 122.). St. Patrick Statue and Milagros

Before I tell you the tale of St. Patrick and the werewolves of Ireland I need you to clear your mind of St.
Patrick’s Day parties, clovers, green glitter and beer. Good, now we can begin.
According to legend, St. Patrick once punished the Welsh king Vereticus by transforming him into a wolf.
While St. Patrick was in Ireland he became so disgusted with certain tribes that continued to resist his efforts to
convert them to Christianity that he cursed them and condemned them to become werewolves.
The spell fell on the poor tribesmen and caused them to turn into werewolves every seven years. They
would stay in wolf form for seven years, then once the years passed they would turn back into humans, but only
for another seven years, then it was back to wolf all over again. It was a horrible vicious cycle. Seven years as a
wolf, seven as a human, seven as a wolf, seven as a human… until they died.
But during their seven years as a werewolf they weren’t denied the sacraments of the church. In 1191 a
man named Giraldus Cambrensis recorded the testimony of a priest that swore that he once gave a sacrament to a
werewolf.
Throughout the years, travelers to Ireland insisted that they had met entire families of werewolves and
that they have even seen some people transform into wolves. Up until the end of the eighteenth century, Ireland
was known as Wolfland.

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 This legend of St. Patrick turning unbelievers into werewolves could very well be a fabricated story used to
scare people into turning to Christianity. This kind of thing was done quite often throughout the old world. They
would tell the people that if they led sinful lives they would be turned into a vampire or werewolf or some other
monster – that’s actually how we have many of the stories we have. Think of it as telling a child if he doesn’t
behave the boogeyman will get him, same deal. But who knows, maybe St. Patrick did turn the pagans into
werewolves for not bringing Christ into their hearts.[281]
Olaus Magnus, in his Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus, Rome, 1555, has much to say of wolves in
general and devotes the last three chapters of his Eighteenth Book to werewolfery, emphasizing the hellish
ferocity of the werewolf, and discussing these transformations with examples of such metamorphosis both from
old days and in his own time. “In the Feast of Christs Nativity, in the night, at a certain place, that they are resolved
upon among themselves, there is gathered together such a huge multitude of Wolves changed from men that
dwell in divers places, which afterwards the same night doth so rage with wonderfull fiercenesse, both against
mankind and other creatures, that are not fierce by nature, that the Inhabitants of that Country suffer more hurt
from them, than ever they do from true natural Wolves. For as it is proved they set upon the houses of men that
are in the Woods with wonderful fierceness, and labour to break down the doors, whereby they may destroy both
men and other creatures that remain there. They go into Beer Cellars, and they drink out some Tuns of Beer or
Mede…wherein they differ from natural and true Wolves…[282]
One of the last Celtic kings to rule at Tara before the arrival of St. Patrick in A.D. 433 was Dathi, whose
military expedition into Alba (Britain) and later to the Continent was said to have been ordained by the Druids.
The expedition, celebrated with a magnificent Beltane feast at Tara, founded when Dathi was struck down by
lightning while storming a tower in the Rhine Valley. The area enclosed by the headwaters of the Danube and the
Rhine rivers is said to have been the original home of the wandering Celtic tribes. Dathis body was brought back to
Ireland by his followers and lovingly buried at Religh na Righ, the royal cemetery at Rath Cruachan, where a 7 foot
pillar stone still stands marking his grave among the numerous earthworks.
When St. Patrick arrived in Ireland, King Laoghaire was on the throne and it was not long before the saint
felt obliged to make a direct challenege to his rule. It was the eve of May and while waiting for the roal fire to be
lit at Tara, the assembled Druids were amazed to see smoke rising from the nearby hill of Slane. Summoned into
the king’s presence to explain this sacrilege, St. Patrick (for it was he who had lit the fire) some how managed to
get royal assent for a contest of magic during which 2 huts were set afire, one containing the magician with the
robe of the saint wrapped around him.[283]
Almost as many countries arrogate the honour of having been the natal soil of St. Patrick, as made a similar
claim with respect to Homer. Scotland, England, France, and Wales, each furnish their respective pertensions; but
whatever doubts may obscure his birthplace, all agree in stating that, as his name implies, he was of a patrician
family. He was born about the year 372, and when only 16 years of age, was carried off by pirates, who sold him
into slavery in Ireland; where his master employed him as a swineherd on the well known mountain of Sleamish, in
the county of Antrim. Here he passed 7 years, during which time he acquired a knowledge of the Irish language,
and made himself acquainted with the manners, habits, and customs of the people. Escaping from captivity, and,
after many adventures, reaching the Continent, he was successively ordained deacon, priest, and bishop; and then
once more, with the authority of Pope Celestine, he returned to Ireland to preach the Gospel to its then heathen
inhabitants.
The principal enemies that St. Patrick found to the introduction of Christianity into Ireland, were the
Druidical priests of the more ancient faith, who, as might naturally be supposed, were exceedingly adverse to any
innovation. These druids, being great magicians, would have been formidable antagonists to any one of less

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miraculous and saintly powers than Patrick. Their obstinate antagonism was so great, that, in spite of his
benevolent disposition he was compelled to cuse their fertile lands, so that they became dreary bogs; to curse
their rivers, so that they produced no fish; to curse their very kettles, so that with no amount of fire and patience
could they ever be made to boil; and, as last resort, to curse the Druids themselves, so that the earth opened and
swallowed them up.
A popular legend relates that the saint and his followers found themselves, one coldmorning, on a
mountain, without a fire to cook their breakfast, or warm their frozen limbs. Unheeding their complaints, Patrick
desired them to collect a pile of ice and snow balls; which having been done, he breathed upon it, and it
instantaneously became a pleasant fire.
The greatest of St. Patricks miracles was that of driving the venomous reptiles out of Ireland, and rendering
the Irish soil. For ever after, so obnoxious to the serpent race, that they instantaneously die on touching it. Colgan
seriously relates that St. Patrick accomplished this feat by beating a drum, which he struck with such fervour that
he knocked a hole in it, thereby endangering the success of the miracle. But an angel appearing mended the drum;
and the patched instrument was long exhibited as a holy relic.
In 1831, Mr James Cleland, an Irish gentleman, being curious to ascertain whether the climate or soil of
Ireland was naturally destructive to the serpent tribe, purchased half a dozen of the common harmless English
snake (natrix torquata), in Covent Garden market in London. Bringing them to Ireland, he turned them out in his
garden at Rath gael, in the count of Down; and in a week afterwards, one of them was killed at Milecross, about 3
miles distant. The persons into whose hands this strange monster fell, had not the slightest suspicion that it was a
snake, but, considering it a curious kind of eel, they took it to dr. J. L. Drummond, a celebrated Irish naturalist, who
at once pronounced the animal to be a reptile and not a fish. The idea of a ‘rale living sarpint’ having been killed
within a short distance of the very burial place of St. Patrick, caused an extraordinary sensation of alarm among
the country people. The most absurd rumours were freely circulated, and credited. One farseeing clergyman
preached a sermon, in which he cited this unfortunate snake as a token of the immediate commencement of the
millennium; while another saw in it a type of the approach of the cholera morbus. Old prophecies were raked up,
and all parties and sects, for once, united in believing that the snake foreshadowed ‘the beginning of the end,;
though they very widely differed as to what that end was to be. Some more practically minded person, however,
subscribed a considerable sum of money, which they offered in rewards for the destructionof any other snakes
were never very clearly accounted for; but no doubt they also fell victims to the reward. The writer, who resided
in that part of the country at the time, well remembers the wild rumours, among the more illiterate classes, on the
appearance of those snakes; and the bitter feelings of angry indignation expressed by educated persons against
the very fortunately then unknown person who had dared to bring them to Ireland.
A more natural story than the extirpation of the serpents, has afforded material for the pencil of the
painter, as well as the pen of the poet. When baptizing an Irish chieftain, the venerable saint leaned heavily on his
crozier, the steel spiked point of which he had unwittingly placed on the great toe of the convereted heathen. The
pious chief, in his ignorance of Christian rites, believing this to be an essential part of the ceremony, bore the pain
without flinching or murmur; though the blood flowed so freely from the wound, that the Iish named the place
Struthfhuil (stream of blood), now pronounced Struill, the name of a well known place near Downpatrick. And
here we are reminded of a very remarkable fact in connection with geographical appellations, that the footsteps of
St. Patrick can be traced, almost from his cradle to his grace, by the names of places called after him.
Poteen, a favourite beverage in Ireland, is also said to have derived its name from St. Patrick; he, according
to legend, being the first who instructed the Irish in the art of distillation. This, however, is, to say the least,
doubtful; if not exactly a teetotaler. We read that in 445 he commanded his disciples to abstain from drink in the

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daytime, until the bell rang for vespers in the evening. One Colman, though busily engaged in the severe labours
of the field, exhausted with heat, fatigue, and intolerable thirst, obeyed so literally the injunction of his revered
preceptor, that he refrained from indulging himself with one drop of water during a long sultry harvest day. But
human endurance has its limits: when the vesper bell at last rang for evensong, Colman dropped down dead a
martyr to thirst. Irishmen can well appreciate such a martyrdom; and the name of Colman, to this day, is
frequently cited, with the added epithet of Stadhach The Thirsty.
The shamrock the well known trefoil plant, and Irish national emblem, is almost universally worn in the hat
over all Ireland, on St. Patricks day The popular notion is, that when St Patrick was preaching the doctrine of the
Trinity to the pagan Irish, he used this plant, bearing 3 leaves upon one stem, as a symbol or illustration of the
great mystery. To supposed, some absurdly hold, that he used it as an argument, would be derogatory to the
saints high reputation for orthodoxy and good sense; but it is certainly a curious coincidence, if nothing more, that
the trefoil in Arabic is called shamrakh, and was held sacred in Iran as emblematical of the Persian Triads. Pliny,
too, in his Natural History, says that serpents are never seen upon trefoil, and it prevails against the stings of
snakes and scorpions. This, considering St. patricks connexion with snakes, is really remarkable, and we may
reasonably imagine that, previous to his arrival, the Irish had ascribed mystical virtues to the trefoil or shamrock,
and on hearing of the Trinity for the firet time, they fancied some peculiar fitness in their already sacred plant to
shadow forth the newly revealed and mysterious doctrine.
In the Galtee or Gaultie Mountains, situated between the counties of Cork and tipperary, there are 7 lakes,
in one of which called Lough Dilveen, it is said Saint Patrick, when banishing the snakes and toads from Ireland,
chained a monster serpent, telling him to remain there till Monday. The serpent every Monday morning calls out
in Irish, ‘It is a long Monday, Patrick.’ That St. Patrick chained the serpent in Lough Dilveen, and that the serpent
calls out to him every Monday morning, is firmly believed by the lower orders who live in the neighbourhood of
the Lough.[284]
720: In relation to today its pretty simple. On St. Patricks day we get drunk from poteen which makes us act like
werewolves who want to ravage. The same poteen makes women act like snakes, in which they hiss during sex.
That pretty much sums it up. St. Patricks day is one of the official liquor days. The 4 leaf clover maybe considered
the devils version of the shamrock which symbolizes the holy trinity. Etymologically it can be theorized the word
leprechaun is leper-khan(con). The Khans were of Muslim religion and considered magical. Everything all peoples
do is viewed as magical and wonderous and extremely exaggerated upon when relayed to someone else.
In Irish folklore a small, roguish elf. Originally derived from lu chorpan, little body, the word has been
corrupted by folk etymology into a form meaning “half brogue,” with the result that the fairy is usually thought of
as a shoemaker. In 15th century manuscripts, we have a delightful tale of Lubdan, king of the Lupracan, a noble and
truthfull potentate, whose strongest subject could perform the feat of cutting down a thistle at a single stroke! As
late as 1908 school children and country folk near Mullingar believed they had seen a leprechaun. Besides
practicing his trade cobbling, he is the owner of many crocks of buried treasure. If caught, he can be forced to
reveal the secret of their location, but he will vanish if one takes ones eyes off him. He tricks the one who has
caught him into looking elsewhere, and the minute human eyes are off of him, he vanishes. “your bees are
swarming and going off with themselves,”he cries, or “The cows are into the oats.” And he who looks to save his
property never sees the leprechaun again or finds the treasure. Typical is the story about the man who was not
thus tricked but got so far as to compel the leprechaun to lead him to the very bush in the field where the gold was
buried. But the man had no spade to dig, so he took off one red garter and tied it to the bus, in order to recognize
the spot again, politely liberated the leprechaun, and ran back for the spade. He was gone only 3 minutes, but
when he returned to dig, there was a red garter on every bush in the field. This is, of course, a variant of the

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marked culprit motif. In Ulster the leprechaun is sometimes identified with a kind of malicious little snub nosed
fairy called geanncanac. In the neighborhood of Cork, the leprechaun is sometimes identified with the cluracan.
[285]

• Leprechaun legends have been around in Ireland for at least 1000 years. They stem from the Celtic belief in the
Otherworld, a mythical place where magic powers can be used for good or evil.
• Leprechauns have fantastically good memories, but they tend to harbour grievances.
• Leprechauns are solitary fairies. They prefer their own company and they're very rarely encountered in groups.
• Yes, there are female leprechauns, although they seem to be quite few in number. Calling them lady
leprechauns is to overlook their lack of social graces.
• Many leprechaun legends feature a robin. This most common of birds is a great friend of the little fella, so
don't kill or trap robins (even accidentally) unless you're looking for some bad luck.
• Leprechauns are usually described as being between two and three feet tall, very old and wrinkly, with a wide
mouth, round eyes and a bulbous red nose.
• When it comes to dress, the wee fellas are a bit old fashioned and often shabby but they don't like too much
uniformity. So you might come across one with a red coat, one with a green coat and another with a brown
coat. Most wear a tall hat and hold up their trousers with a belt featuring a big buckle. Their shoes, which are
superbly groomed and adorned with a silver buckle, typically have built up heels because leprechauns are
notoriously sensitive about their diminutive stature.
• The Little People are great distillers, having been given the secret of whiskey making by the legendary Tuatha.
Some say their tendency to over indulge in the home brew is what makes them so belligerent and
unpredicatable and turns even the friendliest wee chap into an evil leprechaun.
• Although they don't have formal qualifications, leprechauns are very intelligent. As well as being great poets,
athletes, philosophers and musicians, they are also the accountants of the Otherworld. Their reputation for
miserliness is to some extent unfounded. They are, in fact, the Irish Fairies' Treasurer, and they take their
responsibility seriously. This is why they hide crocks of gold wherever they can find rainbows, and go to great
pains to stop greedy mortals finding their stash.

Little People in America

Although the majority of leprechauns still live in the Emerald Isle, some hid themselves in the scant
belongings of Irish emigrants and turned up in Australia and the USA. Those that arrived in America have been
rehabilitated over the last century or so, and the evil leprechaun has become a lot less cranky and more sociable.
It could be argued that he's become a lot more stupid in the process, having lost his sharp wit and inclination to
mendacity. Could be he also spends too much time in the pub these days. He's always been a bit keen on a drink,
that's true, but while it's frothy beer in the States, his preference on this side of the pond remains whiskey or
poteen, both of which he likes to brew up himself.

Types of leprechaun in Ireland

There are five 'clans' of leprechaun and they don't mix much. Which one you need to be on the lookout for
depends on where you are in the island.
• The Leinster leprechaun most closely fits with the popular notion of the little fellow. They're the least
flamboyant in dress, the least extrovert in character, and they're very keen on honey.

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 • The Ulster leprechaun is the shortest in stature, but it's best not to mention it. In addition to built up
heels, they usually wear pointed hats to give the illusion of greater height. They claim to be the best poets
and most accomplished hurlers.
• The Meath leprechaun's USP is his diplomacy. This is a good trait, but in the execution of his diplomatic
skills he tends to use a hundred words when ten would do. Don't be in a hurry to run into him if you've not
got time to spare.
• The Connaught leprechaun, like his brethren, is industrious, whether at work or at study. But this chap
takes it all a bit too seriously. Although they say they are the best inventors and great philosophers, they
are the most reclusive of the five so you're unlikely to get to test this claim.
• The Munster leprechaun is the wildest party animal you're ever likely to encounter. His drinking habits are
legendary. When sober he has the sweetest tongue. When he in the drink he's simply horrible.[286]

Fig. 123.).Of course, leprechaun legends and sightings aren’t just limited to Ireland’s shores (and no, we’re not
talking about the Alabama leprechaun). A small patch of carefully landscaped land sits in the middle of a road in
Portland, Oregon, but it’s not just roadside greenery to perk up a neighborhood street. It’s actually a park
dedicated to leprechauns. Local legend says that a reporter wrote a series of columns about the country’s only
leprechaun colony in 1947. The reporter, Dick Fagan, spotted one of the leprechauns digging a hole in the spot
outside his window and captured it. He used his wish to get a park of his own, but the leprechaun tricked him and
gave him the hole in the ground instead. The two foot long patch of ground became an official city park in 1976
and serves as the epicenter of the town’s St. Patrick’s Day festivities.
Fig. 124.).A facsimile of a Leprechaun
Leprechauns, or little people, and their heritage are protected on a European directive thanks to a group of
lobbyists from Carlingford, Co. Louth. The directive was part of an effort to preserve the rich bio diversity of the
area called "The Sliabh Foy Loop,” now a protected area for flora, fauna, wild animals and leprechauns.
“It is a long, detailed procedure and it has taken nearly eight years to secure the future of our heritage,
culture and folklore. We are delighted in the knowledge that our little people will be protected from extinction and
allowed to thrive on the mountains,” local man Kevin Woods said of the directive in 2011. The group of locals who
lobbied for this protection directive, and also organize the annual Leprechaun Hunt in the area, said the directive
was put through in spite of objections from the Black Faced Mountain Sheep Breeders Association. Their site says,

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“The EU have opted in favor of the rich bio diversity of the Cooley Mountains, and this area is now protected under
the European Habitats Directive."
Woods, a local man and one of the original members of the group, explains in a video, that there are only
236 leprechauns still living in Ireland on the Foy mountain at Slate Rock. He believes that this place is of the spirit
world.[287]
St Patrick's Purgatory is an ancient pilgrimage site on Station Island in Lough Derg, County Donegal, Ireland.
According to legend, the site dates from the fifth century, when Christ showed Saint Patrick a cave, sometimes
referred to as a pit or a well, on Station Island that was an entrance to Purgatory. Its importance in medieval times
is clear from the fact that it is mentioned clearly in texts from as early as 1185 and shown on maps from all over
Europe as early as the fifteenth century. It is the only Irish site designated on Martin Behaim's world map of
1492.[288]
Three legendary stories excited the minds of the people in the middle ages that are about St. Patricks
Purgatory. The 2 former were insignificant in comparison with the last. It was about the middle of the 12th centry
that a Benedictine monk, named henry of Saltrey, established the wondrous and widespread reputation of an
insignificant islet in a dreary lake, among the bearren morasses and mountains of Donegal, by giving to the world
the Legend of the Knight. This legend, extravagant in our eyes, but in perfect accordance with the ideas of that
age, was a sort of composition out of various previous notions, including one which held that the land of departed
souls lay in the west.
It represented its hero, Sir Owen, as an Irish man, who with courage and fidelity had served in the wars of
King Stephen of England. Returning to Ireland to see his parents, he was seized with sudden remorse for his many
sins; for he had lived a life of bloodshed and rapine, and had not scrupled to plunder churches, maltreat nuns, and
apply the most sacred things to his own profance use and benefit. In this penitent mood he determined to visit St.
Patricks Purgatory, with the view of washing away the guilt of so many misdemeanours.
Respecting the origin of the Purgatory, the legend states that when St. Patrick was endeavouring to
convert the Irish by telling them of the torments of the infernal regions, the people crie, ‘We cannot believe such
things, unless we see them.’ So, the saint, miraculously causing the earth to open, showed them the flaming
entrance of the place of punishment; and the unbelieving heathens were at once converted to the true faith. St.
Patrick, then placed a gate on the cave, and building an abbey near it, entrusted the key to the prior, so that he
had the privilege of admitting pilgrims. The penitent who wished to enter had to pass a probation of 15 days in
prayer and fasting; and on the 16th, having received the sacrament, e was led in solemn procession t the gate.
Having entered, the gate was locked by the prior, and not opened till the following day. If the pilgrim were found
when the gatewas re opened, he was received with great joy; if not, he was understood to have perished in the
Purgatory, and his name was never after mentioned.
The knight, having duly performed the preliminary ceremonies, entered the cave, and travelled till he
came to a spacious hall, where he was kindly received by 15 venerable men, clothed in white garments, who gave
him directions for his future guidance. Leaving the old men, and travelling onwards, he was soon attacked by
tropps of demons, whom he successfully resisted by earnest prayer. Still pushing on he passed through four
‘fields” of punishment, by fire, ice, serpents, &c. , that need not be too particularly described. He ascended a lofty
mountain, from whence he was blown by a hurricane into a horribly filthy river; and, after many adventures,
surrounded by millions of demons, and , after many adventures, surrounded by millions of demons, and wretched
souls in dreadful tortures, he succeeded in crossing a narrow bridge, and found his troubles over, the malignant
demons not daring to follow him farther. Pursuinghis journey, he soon arrived at a wall as bright as glass, and
entering a golden gate, found himself in the garden of eden among those happy souls who had expiated their sins,

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and were now waiting to be received into the celestial Paradise. Here, Owen wished to remain, but was told that
he must again return to the world, there to die and leave his corporeal fabric. As he was for ever exempt from the
punishment of Purgatory, he was shown a short and pleasant road back to the mouth of the cave; where he was
received with great joy by the prior and monks of the abbey.
The earliest authentic record of a visit to Lough Derg is in the form of letters testimonial, granted, in 1358,
by Edward III. To Ungarus of Rimini and Nicholas of Beccaria, in proof of their having faithfully performed the
pilgrimage to St Patricks Purgatory. There are some documents of a similar description in the archi episcopal
archives of Armagh; and in 1397 Richard II. Granted a safe conductpass to Raymond, Viscount Perilhos, and Knight
Interspersed with personal history and political matters. There is yet anotheraccount of a pilgrimage by one
William Staunton in 1409, preserved among the Cotoonian MSS. in the British Museum. Staunton’s story differs
slightly from that of the knight. He was fortunate enough to meet with a countryman in the Purgatory, one St. John
of Bridlington, who protected him from the demons. He also had a romantic and affecting interview with a pre
deceased sister and her lover there; and was ultimately rescued by a fair woman, who drew him out of the fiery
gulf with a rope that he had once charitably given to a beggar. [289]
In ancient Roman religion and mythology, Liber /ˈlaɪbər/ ("the free one"; Latin: Līber [ˈliːbɛr]), also known
as Liber Pater ("the free Father"), was a god of viticulture and wine, fertility and freedom. He was a patron deity of
Rome's plebeians and was part of their Aventine Triad. His festival of Liberalia (March 17) became associated with
free speech and the rights attached to coming of age. His cult and functions were increasingly associated with
Romanised forms of the Greek Dionysus/Bacchus, whose mythology he came to share.
Before his official adoption as a Roman deity, Liber was companion to two different goddesses in two
separate, archaic Italian fertility cults; Ceres, an agricultural and fertility goddess of Rome's Hellenised neighbours,
and Libera, who was Liber's female equivalent. In ancient Lavinium, he was a phallic deity. Latin liber means "free",
or the "free one": when coupled with "pater", it means "The Free Father", who personifies freedom and
champions its attendant rights, as opposed to dependent servitude. The word 'liber' is also understood in regard of
the concept libation, ritual offering of drink, which in Greek relates to 'spondé', literally related to English 'to
spend'. Roman writers of the late Republic and early Empire offer various etymological and poetic speculations
based on this trope, to explain certain features of Liber's cult.
Liber entered Rome's historical tradition soon after the overthrow of the Roman monarchy, the
establishment of the Republic and the first of many threatened or actual plebeian secessions from Rome's
patrician authority. According to Livy, the dictator A. Postumius vowed games (ludi) and a joint public temple to a
Triad of Ceres, Liber and Libera on Rome's Aventine Hill, c.496 BC In 493 the vow was fulfilled: the new Aventine
temple was dedicated and ludi scaenici (religious dramas) were held in honour of Liber, for the benefit of the
Roman people. These early ludi scaenici have been suggested as the earliest of their kind in Rome, and may
represent the earliest official festival to Liber, or an early form of his Liberalia festival. The formal, official
development of the Aventine Triad may have encouraged the assimilation of its individual deities to Greek
equivalents: Ceres to Demeter, Liber to Dionysus and Libera to Persephone or Kore.
Liber's patronage of Rome's largest, least powerful class of citizens (the plebs, or plebeian commoners)
associates him with particular forms of plebeian disobedience to the civil and religious authority claimed by
Rome's Republican patrician elite. The Aventine Triad has been described as parallel to the Capitoline Triad of
Jupiter, Mars and Quirinus on the Capitoline Hill, within the city's sacred boundary (pomerium): and as its "copy
and antithesis". The Aventine Triad was apparently installed at the behest of the Sibylline Books but Liber's
position within it seems equivocal from the outset. He was a god of the grape and of wine; his early ludi scaenici
virtually defined their genre thereafter as satirical, subversive theatre in a lawful religious context. Some aspects of

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his cults remained potentially un Roman and offered a focus for civil disobedience. Liber asserted plebeian rights
to ecstatic release, self expression and free speech; he was, after all, Liber Pater, the Free Father – a divine
personification of liberty, father of plebeian wisdoms and plebeian augury.
Liber, Bacchus and Dionysus
Liber's associations with wine, inebriation, uninhibited freedom and the subversion of the powerful made
him a close equivalent to the Greek god Dionysus, who was Romanised as Bacchus. In Graeco Roman culture,
Dionysus was euhemerised as a historical figure, a heroic saviour, world traveller and founder of cities; and
conqueror of India, whence he had returned in the first ever triumph, drawn in a golden chariot by tigers,
accompanied by a retinue of drunken satyrs and maenads. In some cults, and probably in the popular imagination,
Liber was gradually assimilated to Bacchus and came to share his Romanised "Dionysian" iconography and myths.
Pliny calls him "the first to establish the practice of buying and selling; he also invented the diadem, the emblem of
royalty, and the triumphal procession." Roman mosaics and sarcophagi attest to various representations of this
exotic triumphal procession. In Roman and Greek literary sources from the late Republic and Imperial era, several
notable triumphs feature similar, distinctively "Bacchic" processional elements, recalling the supposedly historic
"Triumph of Liber".
Liber and the Bacchanalia of 186 BC
Very little is known of Liber's official and unofficial cults during the early to middle Republican era. Their
Dionysiac or Bacchic elements seem to have been regarded as tolerably ancient, home grown and manageable by
Roman authorities until 186 BC, shortly after the end of the Second Punic War. Livy, writing 200 years after the
event, gives a highly theatrical account of the Bacchanalia's introduction by a foreign soothsayer, a "Greek of mean
condition... a low operator of sacrifices". The cult spreads in secret, "like a plague". The lower classes, plebeians,
women, the young, morally weak and effeminate males ("men most like women") are particularly susceptible: all
such persons have leuitas animi (fickle or uneducated minds) but even Rome's elite are not immune. The
Bacchanalia's priestesses urge their deluded flock to break all social and sexual boundaries, even to visit ritual
murder on those who oppose them or betray their secrets: but a loyal servant reveals all to a shocked senate,
whose quick thinking, wise actions and piety save Rome from the divine wrath and disaster it would otherwise
have suffered. Livy's dramatis personae, stylistic flourishes and tropes probably draw on Roman satyr plays rather
than the Bacchanalia themselves.
The Bacchanalia cults may have offered challenge to Rome's traditional, official values and morality but
they were practiced in Roman Italy as Dionysiac cults for several decades before their alleged disclosure, and were
probably no more secretive than any other mystery cult. Nevertheless, their presence at the Aventine provoked an
investigation. The consequent legislation against them – the Senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus of 186 BC – was
framed as if in response to a dire and unexpected national and religious emergency, and its execution was
unprecedented in thoroughness, breadth and ferocity. Modern scholarship interprets this reaction as the senate's
assertion of its own civil and religious authority throughout the Italian peninsula, following the recent Punic War
and subsequent social and political instability. The cult was officially represented as the workings of a secret, illicit
state within the Roman state, a conspiracy of priestesses and misfits, capable of anything. Bacchus himself was not
the problem; like any deity, he had a right to cult. Rather than risk his divine offense, the Bacchanalia were not
banned outright. They were made to submit to official regulation, under threat of ferocious penalties: some 6,000
persons are thought to have been put to death. The reformed Bacchic cults bore little resemblance to the
crowded, ecstatic and uninhibited Bacchanalia: every cult meeting was restricted to five initiates and each could be
held only with a praetor's consent. Similar attrition may have been imposed on Liber's cults; attempts to sever him
from perceived or actual associations with the Bacchanalia seems clear from the official transference of the

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Liberalia ludi of 17 March to Ceres' Cerealia of 12–19 April. Once the ferocity of official clampdown eased off, the
Liberalia games were officially restored, though probably in modified form. Illicit Bacchanals persisted covertly for
many years, particularly in Southern Italy, their likely place of origin.
Festivals, cults and priesthoods
Liber was closely, often interchangeably identified with Bacchus, Dionysus and their mythology but was
not entirely subsumed by them; in the late Republican era, Cicero could insist on the "non identity of Liber and
Dionysus" and describe Liber and Libera as children of Ceres. Liber, like his Aventine companions, carried various
aspects of his older cults into official Roman religion. He protected various aspects of agriculture and fertility,
including the vine and the "soft seed" of its grapes, wine and wine vessels, and male fertility and virility.[16] As his
divine power was incarnate in the vine, grape and wine, he was offered the first, sacred pressing of the grape
harvest, known as sacrima.
The wine produced under Liber's patronage was his gift to humankind, and therefore fit for profane (non
religious) use: it could be mixed with old wine for the purposes of fermentation, and otherwise adulterated and
diluted according to taste and circumstance. For religious purposes, it was ritually "impure" (vinum spurcum).
Roman religious law required that the libations offered to the gods in their official cults should be vinum inferum, a
strong wine of pure vintage, also known as temetum. It was made from the best of the crop, selected and pressed
under the patronage of Rome's sovereign deity Jupiter and ritually purified by his flamen (senior priest). Liber's
role in viniculture and wine making was thus both complementary and subservient to Jupiter's.
Liber also personified male procreative power, which was ejaculated as the "soft seed" of human and
animal semen. His temples held the image of a phallus; in Lavinium, this was the principal focus for his month long
festival, when according to St. Augustine, the "dishonourable member" was placed "on a little trolley" and taken in
procession around the local crossroad shrines, then to the local forum for its crowning by an honourable matron.
The rites ensured the growth of seeds and repelled any malicious enchantment (fascinatus) from fields.
Liber's festivals are timed to the springtime awakening and renewal of fertility in the agricultural cycle. In
Rome, his annual Liberalia public festival was held on March 17. A portable shrine was carried through Rome's
neighbourhoods (vici); Liber's aged, ivy crowned priestesses offered honey cakes for sale, and offered sacrifice on
behalf of those who bought them – the discovery of honey was credited to Liber Bacchus. Embedded within
Liberalia, more or less at a ritualistic level, were the various freedoms and rights attached to Roman ideas of virility
as a divine and natural force. Young men celebrated their coming of age; they cut off and dedicated their first
beards to their household Lares and if citizens, wore their first toga virilis, the "manly" toga – which Ovid, perhaps
by way of poetic etymology, calls a toga libera (Liber's toga or "toga of freedom"). These new citizens registered
their citizenship at the forum and were then free to vote, to leave their father's domus (household), choose a
marriage partner and, thanks to Liber's endowment of virility, father their own children. Ovid also emphasises the
less formal freedoms and rights of Liberalia. From his later place of exile, where he was sent for an unnamed
offense against Augustus having to do with free speech, Ovid lamented the lost companionship of his fellow poets,
who apparently saw the Liberalia as an opportunity for uninhibited talking.
Imperial era
Augustus successfully courted the plebs, supported their patron deities and began the restoration of the
Aventine Triad's temple; it was re dedicated by his successor, Tiberius. Liber is found in some of the threefold,
complementary deity groupings of Imperial cult; a saviour figure, like Hercules and the Emperor himself.
Septimius Severus inaugurated his reign and dynasty with games to honour Liber/Shadrapa and Hercules/Melqart,
the Romanised founding hero deities of his native town, Lepcis Magna (North Africa); then he built them a massive

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temple and arch in Rome. Later still, Liber Pater is of one of many deities served by the erudite, deeply religious
senator Vettius Agorius Praetextatus (c. AD 315 – 384).
A Bacchic community shrine dedicated to Liber Pater was established in Cosa (in modern Tuscany),
probably during the 4th century AD. It remained in use "apparently for decades after the edicts of Theodosius in
391 and 392 AD outlawing paganism". Its abandonment, or perhaps its destruction "by zealous Christians", was so
abrupt that much of its cult paraphernalia survived virtually intact beneath the building's later collapse. Around
the end of the 5th century, in Orosius's Seven Books of History Against the Pagans, Liber Pater's mythic conquest
of India is taken as an historical event, which left a harmless, naturally peaceful nation "dripping with blood, full of
corpses, and polluted with [Liber's] lusts."[290]
Saint Patrick is clearly associated with what is known as the hole of Purgatory that is, the belief according
to which it is possible to enter into and travel in the Otherworld, which became Christianized as Purgatory. The
hole on the Isle of Derg through which, it is said, Purgatory an be reached is not an imaginary site. This abyss was
reorked into a vaulted construction, probably during prehistoric times, and in the very remote past served as a
chamber of visions. Perhaps it was the home for certain rites and mysteries similar to those practiced in the cave
of Trophonius and transported to Ireland at the beginning of the Christian era. Certainly the place calls to mind the
esoteric rites specific to old shamanic customs that had been reintroduced into the Celtic religion. During the
Middle Ages, at the time of the reign of Henry II Plantagenet (1154 89), monks built a monastery on the Isle of
Regis and organized a kind of pilgrimage descent into the hole of Saint Patrick, placing under the saint’s authority
the rites of voyaging to the Otherworld, which had become Purgatory.
Indeed Purgatory has all the appearances of being a Christian reformulation of the Celtic Otherworld,
which is increasingly confused with the world of the dead, though it was originally the dwelling of gods and magical
beings. As for Saint Patrick, his commemoration during the Pascal period and his association with a mythical
Otherworld brings to mind an obvious comparison to Christ, who went down into hell after his death to free the
souls of the just. The infernal voyage is suggestive of many others in countless mythologies that tell of a crossing
to death (catabasis) followed almost immediately by a return to the human world. The god or demigod
psychopops that accomplish fairly perilous journeys often act in obedience to cosmic injunctions. Thus their
voyage to the Beyond is most often inscribed inside a sacred time and space that the calendrical rites periodically
maintain and remember.[291]
720: I had to be long winded in this area. You will need everything you just read here about Liber for other info
later on. The holiday we all knowingly celebrate, while we unknowingly take part in ritualistic activity that is
supposed to be relative to St. Patrick, may have other reasonings then what we think we know. As we all know the
college jocks come out for Spring break around this time and this is the part that merges with the coming age
aspect of Liber that has nothing to do with St. Patrick. For St. Patrick to be the gate keeper for purgatory is
profound when considering the liquor consumption. St. Patrick is proably one of the most celebrated and widely
known/accepted saints. One of the reasons for this may be because of his repetitive pagan like stories which are
more focused on the usage of magic and battling pagans. In American culture the symbology of the trefoil or
clover is not just a representation of St Patrick and Ireland but it also represents the Celtic basketball team with
the Leprechaun. These folkloric symbols are considered pagan. Pagan like thinking structures can never be
divided from how humans operate. The church understands this law, has accepted it and uses it for its own gain
whether that be financial or souls. Therefore the churchs true nature is to impose and implement the mentality of
safety. The occult side of things relies on nature which is wild and unpredictable, therefore unknown and
dangerous. But, as has been proven you don’t know what may occur over time, in essence were all in the
unknown whether you like it or not. The only thing that brings confidence to “knowing” is unbroken repetition.

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 Chapter 10
The Non Believers
The Heresy & The Heretics
From the 12th century onwards both civil and canon law became gradually more severe in dealing with
heresy. The authorities tightened their control over the courts, aided by the revival of Roman law with its
centralized and systematic approach. Under Roman law, men and women were part of the corporation of the
state and bound to conform to its principles. In the late Roman Empire, the codes of Theodosius and of Justinian
had declared heresy lese majeste against God and hence at least as worthy of death as lese majeste against the
emperor. The revival of such Roman concepts encouraged the imposition of much harsher penalties. Under the
influence, German law codes of the 13th and 14th centuries commonly decreed death both for sorcerers and for
relapsed heretics. As the laws tightened, they encouraged active searches for witches. Before the 13th century,
individual personal accusation had been the only way of bringing a sorcerer to trial. But the bishops had initiated
inquisitions formal investigations of their dioceses for heresy by the late 12th century, and under the influence of
Roman law the secular courts began to search out malefactors actively. When the authorities began actively
seeking for culprits rather than passively waiting for accusations, the witch craze had started.[292]
To a very big extent the Christian Church adopted the Roman law of torture in regard to treason, applying
it to heresy, which they construed to be “treason against God.” It also adopted the principle of confiscation of all
property owned by those guilty of heresy; a policy peculiarly dangerous to society as a whole in view of the
Church’s perpetual need of funds and the opportunities afforded by such a measure for securing such funds.
The ecclesiastical authorities condemned every faith outside Christianity as demonology: they averred, in a
crescendo of denunciation, that the worship of pagan and heathen deities angered the true Christian Trinitarian
Godhead; that whereever a heretic reared up his ugly head there was danger to the whole neighbourhood through
God’s anger being directed towards the inhabitants of this particular spot. Lecky says: “It is not surprising that the
populace should have been firmly convinced that every great catastrophe that occurred was due to the presence
of enemies of the gods.” Nor is it to be wondered at, that when once the public discovered a heretic in their midst
they looked upon him as we today should look upon a leper; that in their mortal terror they clamoured for his
immediate extermination.[293]
The various sects, all of debased Manichaean origin, Paulicians, Bogomiles, Kathari, Paterini, Vaudois,
Albigenses, Tartarins, Beghards, Pauvres de Lyon, or what not, were clandestinely devoted to Satanism, adepts in
the most lewde and abominable rites glorifying the principles of anarchy and evil, fanatics whose active
propaganda soon fanned to flame the dying embers of sorcery and revivified every foul superstition which the
Church had wellnigh stamped out, but which yet lingered in remote districts amongst the fearful and ignorant
peasantry.[294]
720: As the scholar stated it is very true that during the times, any mention of anything not stated by or agreed by
the church was denounced as heresy. If said doctrine or philosophy was respresented by a group, then the group
must be denounced or converted, if not they will perish. We must understand that the first form of consequence

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God gave Adam and Eve was Anathemization/Excomunication which is what you receive in todays world when not
in agreeance with the “social norms”. You will be questioned and then excommunicated.

The Heretical Groups

The Poverty Movements: The poverty movements grew out of the essence of Christian doctrine: renunciation of
the material world the idea that made the great break with the classical age. It maintained that God was positive
and life on earth negative, that the world was incurably bad and holiness achieved only through renunciation of
earthly pleasures, goods, and honors. To gain victory over the flesh was the purpose of fasting and celibacy, which
denied the pleasures of this world for the sake of reward in the next. Money was evil, beauty vain, and both were
transitory. Ambition was pride, desire for gain was avarice. Desire of the flesh was lust, desire for honor, even for
knowledge or beauty, was vainglory. Insofar as these diverted man from seeking the life of the spirit, they were
sinful. The Christian ideal was ascetic: the denial of sensual man. The result was that, under the sway of the
Church, life became a continual struggle against the senses and a continual engagement in sin, accounting for the
persistent need for absolution. [295]
Heretical Groups: Leveling charges against various dissenting groups or heretical sects both of holding meetings at
which babies were ritually slaughtered and of conducting orgies at which every form of intercourse, including
incest, together with the worshiping of odd divinities in the form of animals, was almost a standard procedure in
the history of religions. Cannibalism or sexual intercourse between close relatives, which are usually considered
against human nature and as such forbidden in almost every society, were the natural imputation against persons
who saw themselves as outside the normal customs or rules. Moreover, dissenting factions were labeled
"conspiratorial organizations" and often faced charges of conducting ritual murder and cannibalistic feasts. In
some cases it is possible to establish with certainty that these charges were no more than a stereotype, as in the
case of such activities imputed to the early Christians. Besides allegations of cannibalism and sexual promiscuity,
radical groups were sometimes accused also of sacrilegious acts, such as spitting and trampling on the crucifix or
adoring Satan in corporeal form in some obscene fashion. Sometimes the nocturnal orgy was imagined as presided
over and supervised by a demon.[296]
In the 12th century, particularly, several heretical sects argued that all flesh and all sexual experience were
evil. This could lead in several different directions. One was antinomian (rejection of established laws): if sex was
a creation of the devil, marriage could not sanctify it. You might as well commit fornication, adultery, sodomy,
incest, whatever you wished, because it was no worse than marital sex. Orthodox writers often accused heretics
of adopting the antinomian point of view, but the only evidence suggesting that they were actually doing so comes
from hostile sources.
The other direction in which this sort of dualist heresy (soul created by God, flesh created by the devil)
could go is toward a rejection of the works of the flesh, including sex. Gerared of Cambrai wrote in the early 11th
century that heretics taught that “married people would in no way be counted among the faithful.” Obviously
Gerard did not wish to label as heretical anyone who rejected sexual activity, since clerics, monks, and nuns were
required to remain chaste. Gerard argued that “since there is a distinction of orders between men of the world
and men of the church, a distinction should be maintained between their behavior.” The condemnation of lay
sexual activity, not sexual activity in general, was characteristic of heretics.
Ralph of Coggeshall tells a story that in the 1170s Gervase of TIlbury accused a young woman in Rheims of
heresy. His evidence was that when he had propositioned her, she had refused to have sex with him, “because if I
lose my virginity and my flesh once becomes corrupt, without a doubt I should be subject to eternal damnation

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with no remedy.” Obviously, in such a case the cleric was using the threat of a heresy accusation to coerce sex, but
the important part here is that he was believed and the woman burned along with others whom she implicated.
Wishing to cling to virginity and insisting that any sexual activity would prevent ones salvation, especially without
the backing of a religious order. [297]
During the twelfth century Western Europe, in particular Italy, France, and Germany, suffered from an
extraordinary outburst of dualism, the adherents of which foul doctrines propagated their dark creed with tireless
zeal until the country began to swarm with Catharists, Albigenses, Paterini, Publicani, Bulgari, Tisserands, Bougres,
Paulicians, and a thousand other subversive sectaries. The ultimate principle of these beliefs, differ as they might
in detail, was Satanism.[298]
Similarly, it was under torture that medieval heretics in Italy revealed in revolting detail an imporbable
abomination called “barilotto,” consisting of the roasting of a new born child and the drinking of its ashes from a
sacramental cup at secret conventicles, when nameless and promiscuous lust was ritually practised.[299]
Buggery: The original buggers were heretics, not homosexuals. The Manichaean heresy of the third century had
spread disruptively in the East but quietly in the West, and had become well established in Bulgaria, from which it
spread in a slightly different form to Provence, Germany, northern France, and Italy. To the Church,
Manichaeanism was the most dangerous heresy, and it became easy to speak of Bulgars and heretics as if they
were by definition the same; in this way, Bulgari or Boulgres, corrupted into Bugari and Bougres, became part of
the language in western Europe. In the district around Albi in southern France, the Bulgarian/Manichaean heresy
culminated in Catharism, otherwise known as the Albigensian heresy and believed by the Church to be spiritually
and socially disastrous. All that most people knew about the Albigenses was that they regarded propagation of the
species as wrong, forbade sex altogether to the highest ranks (the Perfecti), but simply forbade the lower ranks to
conceive children. The heretics, the bougres, were thus sexual deviants from the Christian line, and sexual
deviation allied with a ban on conception could only mean homosexuality and/or heterosexual anal intercourse.
(No one seems to have thought of coitus interruptus, possibly because it was common, if unconfessed, among
orthodox Christians.) Heterosexual anal intercourse was, in fact, a standard if reprehensible contraceptive method
in France in the medieval and post medieval period, as it had been in Classical Greece; Brantome says that several
husbands of his acquaintance used their wives ”more by the rear than the front, and only made use of the front in
order to have children.”
Spanish laws against sodomy or buggery (the words became interchangeable) were both ruthless and
ruthlessly enforced, in Spain itself and on the unfortunate inhabitants of the New World. It may have been a
reaction to the Arab occupation, when bardajes (catamites, or passive homosexual partners) were a familiar sight
and it was generally believed that no pilgrimage to mecca was complete unless the pilgrim whiled away the
journey by having intercourse with his camel boys (and his camels), but the stringency with which the laws were
administered seems to have had some effect on the Spanish people.[300]
At Cambrai, a sect called the “Men of Intelligence” was condemned in 1411 by the famous bishop of
Bambrai, Pierre D’Ailly. The movement may have gone back to the teachings of Sister Bloemardine who preached
the freedom of the spirit in the Low Countries in the 1330s; in any event it had close connections with the Beghard
movement and with the Brethren of the Free Spirit, for the Men of Intelligence preached a doctrine of internal
pneumatic illumination and justification. The 2 leaders, Giles Cantor, an illiterate layman of about 60, and William
of Hilderniss, a Carmelite, confessed that they believed that in the 3rd age, the age of the Spirit, all men, including
Jews and pagans, would be saved, and with them the demons and the Devil himself. Their group was defined as a
“sect,” and it met in “conventicles.” The Holy Spirit dwelt within them and justified their every action. Often they
went naked to show that they were as innocent as Adam in paradise before the fall. They practiced free love at the

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urgings of the Spirit, holding the sex act to be a religious act of a value equal to that of prayer. William recanted
and was suspended from his priestly functions and sentenced to 3 years in the bishop’s prison.[301]
720: All of these philosophies may be philosophies that have been extracted from ancient mythology systems of
different European tribal groups. Yes Europeans had tribes, if your living off the earth entirely and you have
dances and other cultural elements that you relate to your survival and existence then you fit the definition. As, I
was stating these groups and their heresy evolved into the several different sects of Christianity that we have here
in America today. One direct example would be the Quakers and their history. Over time there have been many
different cults based on different logics designed off of the bibles theology which stems back to Greece. The
groups you are reading about now are more like the Great great grandchildren of the ones coming from Greece.
This means that the practices and evangelism dwindled over time. The main goal of the church during these times
was to destroy any evidence of their ruthless great great grandfathers .This evidence is embodied in the Jewish
religion which predates Christianity. These thought patterns and cults would rear their ugly heads every now and
again and were sought out and destroyed by the church. There will be no one before me, there will be no option of
outward thought, there will be no threat and no competition.
The Gypsies: Gyp sy (jip’se), 1. A member of a nomadic, Caucasoid people of generally swarthy complexion, who
migrated originally from India, settling in various parts of Asia, Europe, and, most recently, North America. 2.
Romany; the language of the Gypsies. 3. A person who resembles or lives like a Gypsy. 4. See gypsy gapstan. 5. See
gypsy winch. 6. Gyp (def. 4). 7. Gypsyhead 8. Of or pertaining to the Gypsies. [back formation of gipcyan, aph. Var.
of Egyptian, from a belief that Gypsies came originally from Egypt].[302]
Romany (rom’e ne, ro’me ), 1. A Gypsy. 2. Gypsies collectively.3. the Indic language of the Gypsies, its
various form differing greatly because of local influences. 4. Pertaining to Gypsies, their language, or their customs.
Also Romany, {< Gypsy Romain, fem. And pl. of Romano (adj.), deriv. of Rom Rom][303]
The Spanish call the Gypsies gitanos, a shortened form of Egipcianos. When the dark skinned wanderers
arrived in Europe during the late 14th century, it was popularly supposed that Egypt was their homeland.
The Gypsies of Sacro Monte are unique in that their tribe settled Andalusia centuries ago, breaking the
roving tradition. The art of flamenco was not originated by the gitanos but rather preserved by them from
Moorish themes and 17th century music and dance of the countryside. No one could deny that the Gypsies have
developed, embellished, and perfected the style.
But the tribe in Granada and their music strengthen Charles Godfrey Lelands theory that Gypsises are not
originators but rather custodians of magical lore. Lelands book Gypsys Sorcery and Fortune Telling is a marvelous
potpourri of western folk magic collected by Gypsies from every corner of Europe and the British Isles. Their oral
tradition has managed to keep alive skill in divination, herbal knowledge, and an almost mystic ability in training
animals.
Gypsy attitudes reflect an old wisdom of mystical life and arcane practices. “We fall back upon Nature,” a
Gypsy told author Vernon S. Morwood, almost a century ago. “We are contented with the light of the sun, the
moon and the stars; we love the woods, the trees, the fields, and the flowers and to listen to Natures own music in
the songs of the birds, in the murmuring stream and in the breeze . . . Nature is our altar and even in the green
lanes, on the mountainside, in the forest recess, or anywhere else we can raise our shrines of devotion.”
Some historians claim to have traced Gypsies back to the Jats or Yats, a pastoral race that lived in the
foothills of the Himalayas in northern India until some of them were invited by the King of Persia to relocate in his
country. Eventually they became lazy and the king expelled them from Persia, thus starting their wanderings.
Other historians have suggested that Gypsies were a mixture of Arabs and Jews who escaped from the slavery of
pyramid building in Egypt and headed eastward through Arabia into northern Hindustan, and thence throughout

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the world. The Gypsies themselves are ignorant of their origin but do call themselves the Rom, their language
Romany. About 40 percent of the words they speak are said to be traceable to Sanskrit.[304]
The church has tried to absorb black madonnas, but heretical popular beliefs around the dark mother
elude clerical clutch. Marie Boucher has pointed out that the black Madonna of the sanctuary and pilgrimage of
Saintes Maries de la mer is called santa Sara by the church, but gypsies call her Sara Kali. Outwardly deferring to
the church, gypsies keep their own beliefs in the dark mother in an oral and secret tradtion. “The name give by the
Gypsies to Sara, ‘la Kali.’ In both romani and hindi means ‘the Black woman’ and ‘the Gypsy woman.” Gypsies are
believed to have originated in India, to have migratd to Persia, Armenia, the Levant, Anatolia, the Balkans,
Romania, Hungary, and Macedonia before arriving in western Europe. Others went to Egypt, crossed north Africa
and the straits of Gibraltar to reach Spain, where many gypsies still live in caves or tents. Like prehistoric and
contemporary Africans, hindus, and other earth bonded peoples, gypsies consider everything alive to be sacred.
Journeys of gypsies from Asia to Africa to Europe suggest the continuing blending of peoples and images of
the dark mother from prehistory to the present. Peoples of India immerse Kali in the holy river Ganges; gypsies
immerse Sara Kali in the Mediterranean sea. Mer, French word for the sea, Marie Boucher points out, is almost
identical to the French word for mother, mere. The pilgrimage site of the black Madonna of Saintes Maries de la
Mer is located in a region of early African migration paths, where, millennia later, canaanites brought images of
Astarte, Isis, and Cybele and established an entrepot, in this region of France where Christians built many
sanctuaries of black madonnas.
Gypsy culture helps us understand veneration of black madonnas and other black divinities by people
considered other by dominant cultures. Gypsies put on (like one puts on a protective cloak) the religion of the
dominant culture wherever they happen to be, but keeptheir deep beliefs to themselves. In external affiliation,
gypsies may be catholic, orthodox catholic, hindu, muslim, whatever, but their actual beliefs are kept in a secret
oral tradition glimpsed in rituals surrounding the black Madonna a black woman who seems tobe earth, all the
waters of the earth, all creatures, and themselves. A few years ago, Wally and I were participant observers in the
pilgrimage to saintes Maries de la Mer. Priests sand to santa Sara, male gypsies on horseback “guarded” the black
mother, and thunder and lightning split the sky as a passionate crowd of pilgrims took Sara Kali into the sea. The
next day, a more subdued church procession honored Sara Kalis 2 white half sisters.[305]
720: I’ve always heard about the Gypsy people, never met one. They don’t really have a strong stance in America,
maybe in earlier times. Ever since their reemergence on TV with “My Gypsy family” and other shows, they’ve been
floating around here and there, usually solo. The Gypsies are the metaphysical piece of the transformation of the
sciences of Egypt and other locations like Rome to be filtered into the Caucasian race. This is evident by the name
Gypsy/Romany, socially identified as mystical and also thieves. Last but not least their complexion and appearance
is identified as swarthy but racially identified as of caucus stock. The Gypsies will forever be mystical and will
always be spread out for maintanence of the ancient secrets and also the bridge of knowledgeto their people that
they represent.
The Adamites: In 1421, a group of heretics called Adamites were exterminated in Bohemia by John Zizka. Although
no relation to the 2nd century Adamites who condemned marriage, advocated free love as a means of liberating
the flesh, and went naked in order to symbolize their equivalence to Adam in his antelapsarian innocence, they
were given the name of the earlier heretics because of the similarity of their practices. The Adamites heresy was
introduced into Bohemia by Beghards emigrating from the west, probably because of religious persecution like
that at Cambrai, and the basis of their teaching was pneumatic antinomianism. They taught that nakedness was
essential to purity, for this was the only way to restore antelapsarian innocence. They preached free love, and
groups of men and women lived tighter in sexual promiscuity. Zizka’s crusade against them was in retaliation for

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alleged attacks they had made upon the neighboring peasants, killing those who would not join them, but it is not
clear whether this atrocity was an invention of their enemies used to justify their extinction, or, if not, from what
kind of doctrine it springs. It was not commonly alleged, curiously enough, against either medieval heretics or
witches that they used force to attempt the conversion of their enemies.[306]
Witchcraft was, indeed, so closely identified with heresy that during the 13th and 14th centuries in Germany
this crime was tried by the Papal inquisitors, of whom the zealous Conrad of Marburg is one of the earliest and
most renowned. At the same time a Dominican, Conrad Dorso or Tors, with a colleague John, made a visitation of
several disturbed districts, and purged them of the more notorious criminals. After the publication of the
Clementines in 1312 new efforts were made to suppress various anarchical and nihilistic bodies, bent on disrupting
human society, such as the Beghards and Bogomiles, but the good work seems to have been organized and carried
on by the episcopal courts rather than by papal Inquisitors. The secular arm dealt with the few cases of Witchcraft
when heresy was only a secondary or accidental charge, and fire was the penalty which had been juridically
appointed for this offence by the secular codes known as the “Sachsenspiegel” (1225), and the “Schwabenspiegel”
(1275). It was not in truth until 1367 that Blessed Urban V (Guillaume de Grimoard) stabilized the Inquisition
throughout Germany by the appointment of 2 Dominican delegates. There was certainly need of organized
repression, for the scandals of the Adamites had become very gross, a shameless communism being openly taught
and naked debauchery elevated to a cult and a religion. It is curious to note that these practices still survive , since
in the Daily Express of Tuesday, 9 June, 1925, under the headings “The Society of Eden Fined,” “Nude Sect Seeks a
New Paradise,” the correspondent from Geneva is quoted as follows:
“A queer sect, which calls itself the ‘Society of Eden,’ has been founded at Rapperswil, near Zurich. The
members believe in the simple life of Adam and Eve.
“The sect consists of a score of persons of both sexes and of various nationalities, among them being a
countess and a retired general. They declare that they are tired of the conventions of modern life with its useless
ceremonies. Their only garment is a shirt, worn to the knees, but even this garment is discarded during prayer
meetings, which take place in a forest twice a week.
“The inhabitants, shocked to see nude men and women walking and singing hymns among the trees near
the road, informed the police who arrested the band. They were made to put on their shirts, and were taken to
the police station, where their names and addresses ‘The Earth’ were registered.
The simple lifers appeared before the tribunal on a charge of outrage against public morals, and the Public
Prosecutor demanded imprisonment and a heavy fine. The magistrates, however, took a more lenient view, and
fined them 2 each, warning them that if they continued to play at Adam and Eve in public’ they would be sent to
prison. The Society of Eden is now looking for another forest, in another canton.”[307]
Ernst Werner has shown conclusively that the Bohemian Adamites of the 14th and 15th centuries did indeed
follow immoral practices.[308]
720: Sounds like the same thing as a Sabbat to me. Dancing and running around naked in the woods seems to
occur in every facet of lifefor the European. If these people were tired of the everyday conventions back then, I
wonder what they would say about what were living in now. The nudity and immoral sexual practices being
religiously based is a sad excuse for just doing what you like unless it adds intensity. Remember at all times we
must refrain from becoming animal. But we do everything in the woods? Ok. The revolutionary groups and other
sects of people still live in the woods today, right here in America. As a matter of fact the majority of Caucasian
population in this country is in the rural areas, they do not live in the city by majority rule. They have remained an
earthbounded people while overtime having made all other peoples fully disconnected from nature and the earth.
Then have the nerve to call the devil the nature god.

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The Cathars: In 1051 a number of Cathari were hanged at Goslar by order of and in the presence of the Emperor
Henry III. Early in the 12th century, S. Norbert, Bishop of Magdeburg (d. 6 June, 1134), was combating the foul
heresies and anarachy which Tanchelin had shamelessly propagated and practised; in 1114 a number of heretics
who had been provisionally placed in prison by the Bishop of Strasburg were, during that prelate’s absence,
forcibly seized upon by the crowd who feared clerical lenience, dragged out of the town, and burned alive; a
similar event happened at Cologne in 1143. In 1184, Lucius III and Frederick Barbarossa held a conference at
Verona, the result of which was the publication on 4 November of the famous Bull Ad abolendam, anathematizing
the Cathari, Paterini, the Poor men of Lyons, Arnaldists, and other wretches. Rules were laid down for the
examination of suspects, the visitation of infected areas, and the ample cooperation of civil authority. The
Emperor Henry VI. Less than half a century after Frederick II extended the penalty of death at the stake for
obstinate heresy into the Empire, introducing this measure into the Swachenspiegel and Schwabenspiegel of
Germany. On 20 November, 1220, a first constitution was published for Lombardy; in March, 1224, this was
reiterated and reinforced, capital punishment being prescribed; and the amended law was finally promulgated
throughout the Empire in 1238. This constitution has been ascribed to the influence of Albert, Archbishop of
Magdeburg, who has horrified by the spread of the most abominable ideas and revolutionary theories, which
seriously threatened the peace and prosperity of his people. Some writers have blamed Frederick for his sanction
of the extreme penalty. This is foolish and short sighted to a degree. He was merely giving legal recognition to an
actual practice, and the time for tolerance has passed.[309]
The church in the 12th and 13th centuries may also have downplayed the idea of marital sex as sinful
because of the attack from the Cathars. The Cathar religion, labeled a heresy (also known as the Albigensian
heresy) by the church, was dualist, holding that the soul was a creation of God but the body was evil.
Reproduction, therefore, was evil as well, and sex was too because it promoted reproduction. Cathars argued that
sex within marriage was no less sinful than sex outside it, and that in instituting marriage the Catholic church had
made itself into a pimp. Indeed, marital sex could be worse than extramarital sex.[310]
Guillaume Belibaste, a Cathar “perfect” (holy man), justified marriage by saying that since the sin was the
same whether with a wife or a mistress, “it is better for a man to attach himself to a definite woman than to fly
from one to another like a bee among the flowers.”He added a practical consideration: not only did a promiscuous
man engender bastards, but his mistresses among them would despoil him and turn him into a pauper. “But when
a man is attached to one woman, she helps him maintain a good ostal.” Sexual morals in Montaillou were relaxed.
Apart from Pierre Clergue, a dozen of whose love affairs are mentioned in the record, including one with his
brother’s wife and another with the widow of the castellan, five or six of the fifty couples in the village were openly
“living in sin.” Catharism at least provided an excuse; echoing Guillame Belibaste, but in a different sense, Pierrer
Clergue declared that it was no sin to sleep with a married woman: “One woman’s just like another. The sin is the
same, whether she is married or not. Which is as much as to say that there is no sin about it at all.” Grazide Lizier,
an illegitimate cousin of the Clergues who became the mistress of the priest, justified her conduct by an innocent
rationalization: “With Piere Clergue I liked it. And so it could not displease God. It was not a sin.” Later, when she
tired of the affair, Grazide refused the priest. In the absence of desire, sex became a sin.
The castellan’s widow de Planissoles, at the beginning of her affair with Pierre Clergue, feared a possible
pregnancy, but Pierre reassured her: he had a “certain herb” that would prevent conception by keeping his semen
from curdling or solidifying to produce a fetus. Beatrice testified that Pierre wrapped the herb in a piece of linen
and hung it around her neck at the end of a long cord that it hung down “as far as the opening of my belly.” He
refused to leave the herb with Beatrice for fear she might use it with another man. Thanks to the talisman or not,
Beatrice did not conceive. Many others did. Montaillou’s numerous bastards were consigned to the lower levels of

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society, the females often as household servants, the males in equally menial employment. Both, however,
manage to marry into peasant families.
The typical ostal provided little privacy of illicit sex, but lovers managed. Pierre Clergue seduced Grazide
“in the barn in which we kept the straw” and after that made love to her in her mother’s house, usually during the
daytime, with the mother’s compliance. When he married her off to Pierre Lizier, who seems to have been elderly,
her husband allowed the relationship to continue, only warning Grazide not to “go having other men.” They did
not make love when her husband was at home, however, only “when he was out.” Pierre made love with Beatrice
de Planissoles in the cellar of her house with a maid on guard at the door, and once perversely in the church. Later
an aging Beatrice slept with a young priest Barthelemy Amilhac, in her own house, but always when her daughters
and the servant were away. A medieval tableau: Beatrice de Planissoles delousing her lover in bed while Pierre
philosophized about Catharism and love. Divorce was unknown, but married couples occasionally separated.[311]
The Cathar religion consoled grieving parents with the belief that the soul might be reincarnated in a later
child, perhaps one of their own. Pierre Austatz, the bailiff of Ornolac, comforted a woman who had lost 4 sons by
telling her that she would get them back again, “for you are still young. You will be pregnant again. The soul of one
of your dead children will enter into the new fetus.” Another woman began to “weep and lament” when she found
her little son, who slept in her bed, dead beside her. Pierre told her, “Do not weep. God will give the soul of your
dead son to the next child you conceive, male or female. Or else his soul will find a good home somewhere else.”
One Cathar couple, Raymond and Sybille Pierre of the village of Arques, whose infant daughter Jacotte fell
seriously ill, decided to have her receive the consolamentum usually reserved for persons who had reached the
age of understanding. Once it had been administered, the father was content: “If Jacotte dies, she will be an angel
of God.” But the mother had different feelings. The perfect had instructed her not to give the baby milk or meat,
forbidden to the Cathar elect. But Sybille “could not bear it any longer. I couldn’t let my daughter die before my
very eyes. So I put her to the breast.” Raymond was furious with her and for a while “stopped loving the child, and
he also stopped loving me for a long while, until later, when he admitted that he had been wrong.” Raymond’s
admission coincided with the renunciation of Catharism by all the inhabitants of Arques. The child survived for a
year and then died.[312]
The Cathar philosophy was dualistic; the universe was thought to contain 2 opposing principles of good
and evil. They denied the supremacy of Christ, rejected the authority, sacraments, and priests of the Roman
Catholic Church, and maintained that the god of the Old Testament was actually a demon. They thought of
themselves as akin to the early Christians before the dominance of the Roman church. The Cathars were ascetics
and renounced the material world. They denied the eating of flesh meat and the drinking of spirits and frowned
on sex. They trained themselves to endure torture. They withstood half a century of indescribable massacres and
atrocities. Paintings of the period often depict the burning of the books of the Cathars; the nonheretical volumes
rising unsinged from the pyre. It is said that the last of the Cathars at Monsegar hid their books and a treasure of
gold in a secret cave. Despite and brutal suppression, the Cathar heresy would surface again and again.[313]
Many essential Catharist doctrines encouraged the development of witchcraft. The spirit of Evil (whether
a creature, as the mitigated dualists taught, or coeval with God, as the mitigated dualists taught, or coeval with
God, as the absolute dualists maintained) created the material world for the purpose of entrapping spirit in matter.
He imprisoned the human soul in a cage of flesh. The creator of the world, the God of the Old Testament, is the
lord of matter, the prince of this world, and the Devil. All the personages of the Old Testament, and John the
Baptist in the New, are demons. Christ was a pure spirit sent down by the good God into this world in order to
teach man how to escape from the matter that confines him. By the practice of Catharism, man might follow the
teachings of Christ and so liberate himself; but the Catholic Church was established by the Devil in order to delude

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people. Of all sins, the worst was procreation, since the conception of a child imprisoned a soul in flesh. Since
Christ was pure spirit, he did not suffer on the cross, and the cross could not be venerated; since the Eucharist and
baptism employ material substance, they too were condemned.[314]
The Catharists taught that the God of this world is evil, he is the Devil. The true good God is the lord of
spirit and is hidden from our souls, encased as they are in matter. Moreover, if one accepted the identification of
the Devil with the God of the Old Testament, but had been brought up as a Christian to venerate that God, it
would actually be consistent to worship the Devil. This statement of Catharist beliefs written about 1208-1213,
some of the heretics say:
That the malign god exists without beginning or end, and rules as many and as extensive lands, heavens,
people, and creatures as the good God. The present world, they say, will never pass away or be depopulated. God
himself, they say, has two wives, Collam and Colibam, and from them, he engendered sons and daughters, as do
humans. On the basis of this belief, some of them hold there is no sin in man and woman kissing and embracing
each other, or even lying together in intercourse, nor can one sin in doing so for payment…(They) await the
general resurrection which they shall experience, so they say, in the land of the living, with all their inheritance
which they shall recover by force of arms. For they say that until then they shall possess that land of the malign
spirit and shall make use of the clothing of the sheep, and shall eat the good things of the earth, and shall not
depart thence until all Israel is saved.
All the associations that the orthodox opponents of heresy had made between the older heresies and
witchcraft were now made with the Catharists, particularly desecration of cross and sacraments, cannibalism,
secret conventicles at night, formal renunciation of Christ, and sexual orgies. St. Augustine (The Nature of Good,
XLVIII, 47) argued that the Manichaeans ate their babies in order to free their spirits from the flesh. Ladner calls
eros, a restless striving now more than ever concentrated upon the desire for material pleasures, whether sexual
or monetary.
A priest in the diocese of Aquileia during the pontificate of Alexander III (1159 1181) was suspended for 2
years for calling up a demon.
The other crimes with which they were commonly charged, namely kissing cats and frogs (the first hint of
the osculum infame, later a standard witch crime), calling upon the Devil, and fornicating in an orgy with the lights
turned out, aroused David’s doubts. These charges, he noted, are usually made against the Catharists, and are not
properly assigned to any other sect.
Some of the pagan Roman accusations of immorality among the primitive Christians may have been valid,
not for ordinary Christians, but for Christian gnostics.[315]
Kurze argues that even a topos a cliché may contain a “kernel of historical individuality.” All myths are in
one sense or another true; the question is why these particular myths were so widespread.
About 1180 Joachim of Flora, describing heretics he called Patarini, implies that they had orgies, and this
judgement on the “Patarenes” was confirmed by Walter Map, writing about 1182. The sectaries, Map claimed, put
out the lights and after an obscene rite proceeded to indiscriminate intercourse, each person seizing the one next
to him. Alan of Lille makes the connection between dualism and immorality explicit. The dualists say, he reported,
that a person must use every means at his disposal to cleanse himself of everything earthly or diabolical clinging to
him. In order to rid themselves of concern for the body, they engage in random sexual intercourse. Thus, as Koch
points out, they abused the body in order to show their contempt for it, and the Catharist dislike of marriage was
the result, not only of their horror of imprisoning souls in bodies, but also of the respect that marriage accords the
body.

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 In the 1150’s and 1160’s, heretics in Germany were practicing rites of exceptional strangeness. At dawn, at
noon, and in the evening, these heretics offered solemn sacrifices to the Devil, whom they allegedly called
Belphegor (a pagan god of love and fertility appearing in the Old Testament). In his honor they held revels in which
the lights were extinguished and everyone committed incest. On Christmas Eve, while others were celebrating the
birth of Christ, they performed rites that mocked the solemnity of the Nativity. The priest of their cult, in mockery
of the Christian kiss of peace, touched the altar with his bare backside. The oblations are brought out befouled by
human sperm. The chronicler has himself seen in Regensburg an episcopal chapel that had been profaned by this
blasphemous cult. Heisig argues that this is a gnostic cult of Basilidean origin, and that the heretics must have
identified their sperm with the Giver of Life, i.e., the Holy Spirit, who was identified by some early Christians with
the logos spermatikos of the Neoplatonists. It is unlikely that the sect was really gnostic, for there is no evidence
anywhere else in medieval Europe of such practices. Perhaps Gerhoh was embellishing with his own pedantic
knowledge of Augustine the ideas of a group infected with Catharist libertinism.
Next to libertinism, the most common witch trait attributed to Catharists was their tendency to adore the
Devil. Ralph the Ardent says that because the “Manichaeans” of the Agenais believe that the Devil was the
architect of the material world, they secretly adore him as the creator of their bodies. One of the more curious
tales of medieval heresy is reported at Reims in 1176 1180. There a handsome young clergyman propositioned a
peasant girl, and when he was refused on the grounds that she believe it a sin to lose her virginal purity, she was
charged with being a Catharist heretic. She was alleged to be a member of a group of heretics in the city who
believed that a fallen angel name Luzabel was the creator of the world and had power over all things in it. They
met in subterranean caverns, offered sacrifices to Lucifer, and engaged in sacrilegious practices. The story also
includes one of the 1st specific links of heresy to flight: the chaste girl, who was, incidentally, finally burned as a
heretic, confessed that she had been led astray by a certain old woman, who was brought into court and accused.
It proved impossible to bring the crone to her just punishment, however, for as she was seized in order to make
her ready for the stake, she produced a ball of thread from her bosom, and, holding onto one end, threw the ball
out the window, crying out “Catch,” in a loud voice. Immediately she was lifted up by the thread and flew out the
window never to be seen again. Doubtless, as Ralph of Coggeshall argues, this was accomplished through the
intervention of demons.
That the Patarines, or Publicans, as they were sometimes called, were identified with the Catharists and
witches is seen in a phrase in the edit of Otto IV in 1210 published in L.A. Muratori, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores, 25
vols. The origin of this use of the word Patarine is uncertain: it may derive from the 11th century Patarines of
Florence, reformers who were charged by their enemies with heresy, or from the Patarenoi, as the Bogomils of the
Illyrian coast were called.
The idea of sperm communion derives from St. Augustine. The Manichean elect “consume a sort of
eucharist sprinkled with human seed in order that the divine substance may be freed even from that, just as it is
from other foods of which they partake.” (St. Augustine had described their belief that in eating foods, they
liberated their spirit from the enclosing matter). Later, Augustine describes the unappetizing custom of sprinkling
flour beneath a couple in intercourse so that a batter can be made of their seed.[316]
Just as the Catharists had encouraged witchcraft by magnifying the awesome power of the Devil, the
antinomians, by arguing that all action was virtuous and that Satan was God, advanced the cause of rebellion,
libertinism, and Satanism But so close to classical witchcraft did the Luciferans, the Adamites, and some of the Free
Spirit heretics come that they not only influenced witchcraft but were in a sense witches themselves.[317]
The heretics, Gregory told his bishops, have secret meetings. When a postulant wishes to become a
member of their congregation, he is led into the midst of the meeting, whereupon the Devil appears in the form of

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a toad, goose, or duck, as a black cat with erect tail which descends a statue backwards to meet his worshipers, or
as a thin pale mane with black, shining eyes. The postulant kisses the apparition either on the mouth or on the
anus. When he has done, the master of the sect, and then the other initiates, also give the obscene kiss. After
songs and a short liturgy, the lights are extinguished in order that a bisexual orgy may more comfortably occur.
When everyone has been satisfied, the lights are relit, and thereupon a man emerges from a corner. From the
waist upwards he shines like the sun; below the waist he is covered with hair. The master hands him part of the
new initiate’s clothing and then retires.
Among the doctrines of these heretics is that they must go to communion every Easter, keep the host in
their mouths until they return home, and then spit it out into the privy. God has unjustly cast Lucifer down into
hell, they maintain. Lucifer is the true creator, and one day he will cast the usurper God out of heaven and return
to his pristine glory, leading all his followers with him to perfect happiness. Consequently his worshipers render all
obedience to him and totally renounce the false God of the Christians.
Similar to the tradition of Vox in Rama is a confession by a heretic named Lepzet.* The initiate to the sect,
he reports, must formally renounce the sacraments of the Church. A pale faced man in black, of terrifying
appearance, appears, and the postulant kisses him. Then a huge frog, as big as a pot, with a gaping eye,
materializes, and this also he kissed. He is then considered initiated, and he returns to the house of the mast of the
sect. When the sectaries wish to practice their religion, they go secretly into a cave beneath the master’s cellar.
There, their bishop (the master?) bares his buttocks, into which he inserts a silver spoon with which he offers an
oblation. Then the congregation kiss the master’s backside. After this, they all stand or sit around a pillar, up which
a huge cat climbs until he reaches the top, where a lamp has been placed. There the animal clings, lifting up his tail
so that everyone may kiss his anus. Then the cat puts out the light and each person carnally embraces the one next
to him, “masculi in masculos et feminae in feminas.”
These heretics, who are named “Cathari” in the manuscript , believed that the God of heaven is the evil
god who unjustly cast Lucifer out of heaven. They called Lucifer their father and said that he was the crrator of all
visible things, including human bodies (scarcely an orthodox Catharist point of view). At the end of the world,
Lucifer would regain his power with the help of the Antichrist, who would be engendered by a carnal union of the
sun and the moon.
Lepzet confessed publicly that for 5 years he had worn a hair shirt in mourning for Lucifer’s exile. He
receive communion 3 times a year, hiding the host in his mouth and taking it home and burning it. He had
personally killed 30 people in accordance with the teaching of the sect that murder is a sacrifice pleasing to their
God, Lucifer. He and his friends also accepted as virtues other deeds that Christians call sins. They condemned
marriage as fornication but approved incest. If a man wished to sleep with his mother, he must pay her 18d.
according to the rules of the sect; 6d. for having conceived him, 6d. for bearing him, and 6d. for nursing him. A
man might sleep with his daughter for 9d., but the best bargain was a sister, who cost only 6d. Sodomy was
perfectly acceptable. In addition to these tenets, Lepzet’s group held some beliefs that were much closer to
orthodox Catharism, including the abstention from meat, mild, or other products associated with reproduction,
the conferring of grace by the imposition of hands, and the use of endure if they wished to become martyrs.[318]
A manuscript of 1280 (like one of about 1325) shows pictures of maskers dressed as stags, donkeys, hares,
or bulls. At Mont Aime in 1239 there was a trial of Catharists in which one of the accused said that she was carried
through the air to Milan on Good Friday in order to wait upon the Catharists at a banquet. She could go without
fear of detection because she had left a demon in her shape in bed with her husband. Imprecise reports of
witchcraft come from Pistoia in 1250. At Toulouse in 1275 Angele de la Barthe, A 56 yr old woman of moderate
wealth, was tried by the Inquisition. She was accused of having intercourse every night over a period of years with

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an incubus. Of this unholy union was born a child who was half wolf and half snake: for 2 years he feasted on small
children and then disappeared. It is doubtful that such peculiar silliness was suggested to Angele by the Inquisition;
far more likely, she was mad. In any event, the pitiless institution delivered her to the secular arm to be
burnt.[319]
Catholic theologians imagined that, during the secret meetings of Cathars, the Devil would incarnate
himself in the form of a large black cat. His devotees would demonstrate their submission to him by an obscene
kiss (osculum infame) on his anus. Thus, said Alanus de Insulis in the twelfth century, in a libel that became
commonplace, Cathari are so called from their worship of the cattus, or cat. In later times, the Devil often
incarnated himself as a goat or a goat like hybrid. [320]

Fig. 125.). DA Fe Presided Over By Saint Dominic Of Guzmán (1475);

Pedro Berruguete (around 1450 1504) Now in the Museo del Prado, Madrid. Detail Cathars being burned.
Catharism was a strongly dualist religion, in that it strongly emphasized the power of the Devil in the
world. The Catharists taught that the Spirit of Evil, the Devil, created the material world for the purpose of
entrapping spirit in matter. He imprisoned the human soul in a cage of flesh. Since the God of the Old Testament
created the material world, he is the Spirit of Evil. The true God, the God of goodness and light, is hidden and
remote from this world. All the personages of the Old Testament are demon followers of the Spirit of Evil and
darkness who rules the world. Chirst was a pure spirit sent down by the good, hidden God in order to teach
humanity how to escape from the matter that confined them. Since matter is evil, Christ was pure spirit, his body
an illusion; he was not truly a man. Being pure spirit, he did not truly suffer on the cross, and the cross is to be
despised as a symbol of a lie. The worst sin is procreation, since conception imprisons another individual spirit in
the flesh. The Catholic Church was established by the Devil in order to delude people, but an individual may free
himself from the bondage of matter by following the teachings of Catharism.
The Catharist emphasis upon the Devil influenced orthodox theology, so that the Devil came to play a
muchy larger role in late medieval thought than he had earlier. Fear of the Devil’s powers was one of the chief
ingredients of the witch craze. But the Catharist Devil had a curious influence of another kind as well. The
Catharists emphasized the power of the Devil, not to serve him, but to fight him. Yet their insistence upon his
power as Lord of this World contained the seed of a curious misinterpretation. If the Devil really has powers nearly

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equal to the Lord’s, and if the true God of light is distant and hidden, and if the Devil presides over wealth, fame,
sex, and other earthly delights, some might prefer to worship the deity that gave them access to such pleasures.
This kind of thinking, twisted from a Catharist as well as from a Catholic point of view, may have emerged from a
zealous but faulty grasp of Catharist doctrine. Evidence that this occurred comes from 14th century Italy, where
heretics believed that the Devil created the material world. Since the Devil was creator of the world, he was more
powerful than God, and should be worshipped in his place.’[321]
According to Runciman, the only Occultist child of what he calls ‘Christian Dualism’, i.e. Catharism, is
probably to be found in the symbolism of the Tarot, which appeared in northern Italy, Marseilles and Lyons in the
14th century, after the repression of the Cathars and Templars. There is, however one other arcane tradition that
has recently come tolight, which is relevant to our story, that of Holy Blood, and the Holy Grail. Not all Cathars
perished after the fall, in 1244, of Montsegur, under what they called Mount Tabor, after the Gnostic mountain of
the Holy Spirit. Le Roy Ladurie has shown that, up to 80 years later, they were still living their religion in an
extensive area of the eastern Pyrenees. Apart from Montaillou, the greatest concentration of Cathar families was
to be found between Arques, source of one of the 2 major Parisian Black Virgins, Notre Dame de Paix, and Limoux,
home of the black Notre Dame de Marceille. A mile or so from Arques stands the village of Rennes le Chateau,
former Visigothis capital of the region, where the most curious cult of Mary Magdalene has its centre. The church
there, not, presumably, the Razes hd been acquired by the Counts of Toulouse, at a time when Catharism was
beginning to sweep through Europe like wildfire. It was to Rennes, as we have noted, that Sigebert IV came with
Merovee Levi on 17 January 681 to seek refuge at the court of his Visigothic relations. He thus perpetuated the
Merovingian blood line, which, according to Baigent et al. stemmed from the union of Jesus Christ and Mary
Magdalene.[322]
Cathars and troubadours, no less than Templars, exercise a powerful romantic attraction, and it is
important not to idealize them. Cathar husbands at Montaillou were just as likely to beat their wives as any other
peasants. There is a vein of misogyny that runs through the poetry of the troubadours from first to last,
counterbalancing the extravagant service of praise accorded to the Lady. Nevertheless, Catharism and courtly
love, which grew together as part of the same phenomenon, acknowledged, in theory and practice, women;s
freedom to take a lover. This world of incarnation was punishment enough, and the just God would not inflict
further pains on those who followed the promptings of nature. To be passion’s slave, however, might well entail
further incarnations, and to have children would certainly prolong the time of waiting until the final purification at
the end of the world. The parfaits and parfaits, who trod the path of enlightenment, avoided identification with
the world of matter in all its forms, but, for the simple hearers, sexual peccadilloes were not considered any worse
than other deviations from that path. Indeed cathars agreed with Plato and St Bernard that salvation began with
love of bodies. Troubadours even went so far as to suggest that one must tend towards heaven through the love
of women. Although both marriage and fornication were qualified as ‘adultery’, extra marital union, undertaken
freely, was preferable to the conjugal bond. It might even symbolize the return of the soul to its spirit after death.
Nelli states categorically that Cathars and troubadours were perfectly in agreement that true love from the soul
purified from the false love associated with marriage. The troubadour who wrote Flamenca’ between 1250 and
1260 juxtaposes the ‘Mass of Love’ and the sacramental office, and made his hero serve God for the love of his
lady. We are not so far in spirit from the sexual rites of Sion Vaudemont 6 centuries later of from the licentious
love feasts of the Gnositcs 900 years before.
Once women are free to bestow their favours and affections where they will, the whole structure of
patriarchal society starts to crumble. In the long spiraling progress of the history of ideas this seems to be the
point that we have once again reached. Now it is an idea whose time has come and no crusades have so far been

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launched by Church and State to quell it. If the Black Virgins really do carry a charge from the goddesses, perhaps,
now that they have been ‘found’ yet again, they are whispering in our ears like the female serpent of Eden, ‘You
won’t really die.’[323]
As in other peasant Christian cultures, cathars honored the Madonna, locally embodied in the Virgin Mary
of Montaillou, while they held heretical beliefs, doubting, for example, that the Madonna was immaculate. Cathar
continuum with pagan beliefs is evident in the ubiquity among cathars of the name Sybille. Agents of the
inquisition defined the meaning of Sybille as “Bad mother, devil!” Peasants called heretics “goodmen,” and
respected them because “they walk in justice and truth.” “Saracens,” as muslims were called, lived in carthar
regions. So did Franciscans, who believed in the goodness of the earth and all its creatures. The Franciscan ideal
of voluntary povertymerged with cathar beliefs in an ideal community “where great and small live together and
rub shoulders freely.” Cathars, like peoples of north Africa, west Asia, and spain, shared a belief in fate, a belief
compatible with beliefs of Saracen shepherds who lived in their midst, as well as with beliefs of moors of Africa
and Spain. The cathar belief in fate was also shared with Italians who believe in la forza del destino (the force of
destiny). Cathars were also friendly with jews in this period when the church was inciting hatred against them.
The cathar peasant pierre said, “God and the blessed Virgin are nothing but the visible world around us;
nothing but what we see and hear.” (Pierre’s wording is heretical, suggesting that god and the virgin are equal
divine figures in a sacred, not fallen, world). Echoing the civilization of the dark mother of Africa, cathars believed
that “souls of animals were just as good as those of men, since all souls were merely blood.”
Sometimes cathar beliefs were expressed in earthy bodily terms that outraged church persecutors: “God
was made fucking and shitting.” In heretical cathar belief, priests rode everyone; “They sleep with women. They
ride horses, mules and she mules. They are up to no good.” A good heart, in cathar belief, was what is important,
reminding me that the main journal of the student resistance of Italy in the 1990s was named cuore (heart). In
cathar belief, it is not the act, but the intention, that counts “A lady who sleeps with a true lover if purified of all
sins…the joy of love makes the act innocent, for it proceeds from a pure heart.” It is evident how athar belief
melded in the Languedoc with that of trouboudours who sought pure love, considering authentic love
incompatible with the institution of marriage.[324]
The Flagellants: Then in 1259, the great plague which swept the district brought things to a head. Raniero Fasani,
known as the hermit of Umbria, preached the doctrines of self appeasement, self sacrafice, atonement and
martyrdomas means of placating God and securing divine interference in the affairs of man. He went further. He
gathered together a number of enthusiastic followers. Under the name of “Disciplinata di Gesu Cristo,” this
fanatical band marched through northern Italy, preaching their gospel and adopting self flagellation as part of their
rubric. With their bodies bared to the waist, carrying whips, sticks, twigs, and every manner of crude flagellating
instrument, marching in procession, they scourged themselves and one another until, if the accounts handed down
to posterity do not exaggerate, the blood ran down their bodies. As they marched, they called for recruits. And
not surprisingly, to anyone acquainted with the psychology of mass emotion, they got them.[325]
Self flagellation was intended to express remorse and expiate the sins of all. As a form of penance to
induce God to forgive sin, it long antedated the plague years. The flagellants saw themselves as redeemers who,
by re enacting the scourging of Christ upon their own bodies and making the blood flow, would atone for human
wickedness and earn another chance for mankind.
Organized groups of 200 to 1000 marched from city to city, stripped to the waist, scourging themselves
with leather whips tipped with iron spikes until they bled. While they cried aloud to Christ and the Virgin for pity,
and called upon God to “Spare us!”, the watching townspeople sobbed and groaned in sympathy. These bands put
on regular performances three times a day, twice in public in the church square and a third in privacy. Organized

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under a lay Master for a stated period, usually 331/2 days to represent Christ’s years on earth, the participants
were required to pledge self support at 4 pence a day or other fixed rate and to swear obedience to the Master.
They were forbidden to bathe, shave, change their clothes, sleep in beds, talk or have intercourse with women
without the Master’s permission. Evidently this was not withheld, since the flagellants were later charged with
orgies in which whipping was combined with sex. Women accompanied the groups in a separate section, bringing
up the rear. If a woman or priest entered the circle of the ceremony, the act of penance was considered void and
had to begin over again. The movement was essentially anti clerical, for in challenge to the priesthood, the
flagellants were taking upon themselves the role of interceders with God for all humanity.
The inhabitants of many towns greeted the flagellants with reverence and ringing of church bells, lodged
them in their houses, brought children to be healed and, in at least on case, to be resurrected. They dipped cloths
in the flagellats’ blood, which they pressed to their eyes and preserved as relics. Many, including knights and
ladies, clerics, nuns, and children, joined the bands. Soon the flagellants were marching behind magnificent
banners of velvet and cloth of gold embroidered for them by women enthusiasts.
Growing in arrogance, they became overt in antagonism to the Church. The masters assumed the right to
hear confession and grant absolution or impose penance, which not only denied the priests their fee for these
services but challenged ecclesiastical authority at its core. Priests who intervened against them were stoned and
the populace was incited to join in the stoning. Opponents were denounced as scorpions and Anti Christs.
Organized in some cases by apostate priests or fanatic dissidents, the flagellants took possession of churches,
disrupted services, ridiculed the Eucharist, looted altars, and claimed the power to cast out evil spirits and raise the
dead. The movement that began as an attempt through self inflicted pain to save the world from destruction,
caught the infection of power hunger and aimed at taking over the church. They began to be feared as a source of
revolutionary ferment and a threat to the propertied class, lay as well as ecclesiastical.
By this time Church and state were ready to take the risk of suppressing the flagellants. Magistrates
ordered town gates closed against them; Clement VI in a Bull of October 1349 called for their dispersal and arrest;
the University of Paris denied their claim of Divine inspiration. Philip VI promptly forbade public flagellation on
pain of death; local rulers pursued the “masters of error,” seizing, hanging, and beheading. The flagellants
disbanded and fled, “vanishing as suddenly as they had come,” wrote Henry of Hereford, “like night phantoms or
mocking ghosts. Here and there the bands lingered, not entirely suppressed until 1357.[326]
The flagellants, one of the most macabre developments of a nightmarish time, provided a kind of
professional scapegoat service. Phillipus Dietz explains their motives and reasoning: ‘…if the body is to be
restrained from lasciviousness and evil desires and trained to chastity and moderation, scourges, whips, discipline
and cilica [hair shirts or similar garments], and such like means and painful instruments, should be ready at hand…”
Many people would have accepted the truth of this, but baulked at the actual application of scourges, whips, and
painful instruments to their own persons. The flagellants offered them vicarious asceticism, travelling from town
to town in a body, and putting on an open air service during which the members of the fraternity flogged
themselves until the blood ran. Henry of Herford describes the scourges: ‘’Each scourge was a kind of stick from
which three tails with large knots hung down. Right through the knots iron spikes as sharp as needles were thrust
which penetrated about the length of a grain of wheat or a little more beyond the knots. With such scourges they
beat themselves on their naked bodies so that they became swollen and blue, the blood ran down to the ground
and bespattered the walls of the churches in which they scourged themselves. Occasionally they drove the spikes
so deep into the flesh that they could only by pulled out by a second wrench.’
The rules of the “order” forbade the flagellants to bathe, to wash their heads, or to change their blood
soaked clothes, without special permission from the master of the group, so they must have presented a repellent

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picture. For the onlookers, however, they produced the mixture of horror and fascination that any thorough going
zealot can call upon: these filthy creatures torturing themselves, often to death, were at least trying to do
something positive about the plague, when all that the local priest could offer was prayers and penances. The
deaths were occasion for extra self punishment by the others. More lethal was the way in which they carried the
plague from town to town as they went on their black pilgrimages.[327]
In 1347 the Black death swept Europe like a whirlwind. Everywhere was dismay, depression, and all the
familiar results that follow a major catastrophe. The Flagellants once more appeared on the scene, and with
renewed vigour preached their tenets of atonement and martyrdom. Throughout continental Europe the
movement flourished and spread. There were many different organizations, all motivated by the same spirit of
self sacrifice, humility and goodwill to ones fellow men. Men and women, too, of all classes and creeds joined the
processions. Criminals even became fanatical flagellators. [328]
720: Ive never heard of any ritualistic practices amongst any other people that was aimed at sacrificing themselves
for the sins of man kind. This is definitely stating to theworld that there is a love that they want to give which is
there soul for the entirety of the human beings of the planet. There are many cases as you have read through out
the 3 volume series that states these individuals would march from town to town whipping themselves. There was
a time period where these individuals were so popular and gained so much notoriety, not only did nobles and
other dignitaries join them but they were paid to perform the act as entertainment. As was stated public orgies
have been incited from these spectacles in the middle of the market. Blood was of an attraction level during these
times. Whether that was the blood of Jesus or blood baths that cured leprosy.
The Flagellants are still alive and well today. They are all over Europe but they are also in the Phillipines. I
guess if you think you are punishing yourself for other humans , then I guess you are. Theres nothing “official”
stating that, this is actually occurring. So there must be other reasons for the activity. From what I understand
about human activity worldwide, Id have to state that there are deeper reasonings for the behavior. I will also
state that “whipping” has such a long history with man that it would be apart of our nature now for some people
to have the inclination to desire said activity amongst both genders. Whipping with straps, wood or other
materials has always been the communication device between master and slave for aeons. Im pretty sure if one
was to explore this avenue amongst many cultures you will find vast reasonings and many similarities.
The beghards, or Brethren of the Free Spirit, who claimed to be in a state of grace without benefit of priest or
sacrament, spread not only doctrinal but civil disorder. One of the sects of voluntary poverty that perennially rose
against the establishment, they had flourished for over a century in Germany, the Low Countries, and northern
France, sometimes fading or driven underground by persecution but re stimulated in the 14th century by the
worldliness of Avignon and the mendicant orders. Because the Free Spirits believed God to be in themselves, not
in the Church, and considered themselves in a state of perfection without sin, they felt free to do all things
commonly prohibited to ordinary men. Sex and property headed the list. They practiced free love and adultery
and were accused of indulging in group sex in their communal residences. They encouraged nudity to
demonstrate absence of sin and shame. As “holy beggars,” the Brethren claimed the right to use and take
whatever they pleased, whether a market womans chickens or a meal in a tavern without paying. This included
the right, because God’s immanence, to kill anyone who forcibly attempted to interfere.
If the Brethrens habits came to be less pure than their precepts, the impulse was nevertheless religious.
They were in search of of personal salvation, not social justice. Medieval heresies were concerned with God, not
man. Poverty was embraced not only in imitation of Christ Apostles but in deliberate contrast to the avarice that
corrupted men of property. To be without property was to be without sin. Dissent was not a denial of religion but

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an excess of piety in search of a purer Christianity. It became heresy by definition of the Church, which recognized
in the mystics’ renunciation of property the same threat as in Wyclifs disendowment.
In monk like robes deliberately ragged, the Brethern of the Free spirit clutterd towns like sparrows,
preaching, begging, interrupting church services, scorning monks and priests. Drawn from clerks, students,
dissenting clergy, and from the propertied class, especially women, they were articulate and usually literate.
Women, out of their frustrations and search for ecstasy, were prominent among the mystics. In the Beguines they
had a sect of their own, a lay order that followed its own religious rule of good works and, when nunneries had no
room, provided a place for unmarried women and widows, or, as a bishop wrote in criticism of the Beguines, a
retreat from the “coercion of marital bonds.” Members joined the Beguines by taking an oath of dedication to
God before a parish priest or other cleric, but the movement was never quite sanctioned by the Church. At street
meetings Beguines read the Bible translated into French.
While the Brethren of The Free Spirit admitted both sexes, its two major gospels were written or
formulated by women, one a shadowy figure known only as Schwester Katrei, the other named Marguerite Porete,
who wrote The Mirror of Free souls and was excommunicated and burned along with her book in 1310. Following
her, the daughter of a rich merchant of Brussels known as Bloemardine attracted fervent disciples by her
preaching. In 1372 the movement was condemned by the Inquisition, its books were burned in Paris on the Place
de Greve, and a woman leader of the French group, Jeanne Dabenton, was burned at the stake together with the
corpse ofa male associate ywho had died in prison. Like the heresy of the Spiriutal Franciscans, the sect of the Free
Spirit persisted and spread in spite of the Inquisition. [329]
The Fraticellis: Ritualistic orgies can be affirmed for a large number of Christian groups in the Middle Ages, which
showed a polemical—and sometimes even schismatic, by the rejection of some dogmas—attitude toward the
Catholic Church and sought a radical restoration of its conduct, which should have been more in conformance with
Christ's example, for example, by totally abolishing richness and luxury. Among these the Waldensians (who
originated at the end of the twelfth century) first and the Fraticelli (who developed from radical Franciscan
spiritualism) can be also counted. In spite of their condemnation in 1184, the Waldensians spread throughout
Europe, and it is probably against them that the attacks of the inquisitor Conrad of Marburg in Germany were
directed. Also the papal bull Vox in Rama, issued in 1233 by Gregory IX, which for the first time gave official
character to the trivial charges of nocturnal orgiastic and demonic covens, had the same sect in mind. Even though
the archbishop of Mainz, in disagreement with Conrad, minimized the phenomenon (reducing the orgies to mere
transgressions by individuals), the stereotype survived in the following centuries and periodically caused a
repetition of the prosecutions, until the Waldensians were finally rehabilitated in 1509 and given back their
confiscated properties.
A trial in 1466 was the end of the Fraticelli as an organized sect, albeit their renown as devil worshipers and
cannibals lasted later. This sect, whose adherents were not indeed numerous and did not possess a unified
organization, had originated from a radical wing of the thirteenth century Franciscans, some of whom left the
order and then the church (they were the so called Spirituals, inspired also by the apocalyptic and prophetic
writings by the Calabrian abbot Joachim of Fiore). They professed the opinion that Christ and the apostles lived in
total poverty and therefore considered the Roman church as the whore of Babylon, a pattern that recurs
elsewhere in millennial groups. The trial of 1466 was the final act of a series of minor proceedings that started at
the beginning of the century. Many sources, such as Bernardino of Siena and the historian Flavio Biondo, attest the
practice of a ritual infanticide (the practice is called barilotto, an Italian word that alludes to the little barrel of wine
with the ashes of the dead child), followed by a promiscuous orgy.[330]

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 The insistence upon the witches’ heretical nature often caused witches and heretics to be put on trial
together, as in Carcassonne where from 1387 to 1400 more than 200 persons were condemned and 67 burnt for
crimes of magic, or for being Waldensians, Beguines, or Albigensians. At Toulouse in 1412 sorcerers and so called
Beguines were tried together and sentenced to unusually light punishments life imprisonment, pilgrimages, or
fines whereas others were condemned to death for “sorcery and sodomy.” Thecrime of sodomy may have been
introduced against the witches here by analogy to to the trial of the Templars or with reference to the supposed
homosexuality of the Catharists. Homosexuality was not a deviation ordinarily alleged against the witches. In 1423
several sorcerers suspected of heresy were condemned to death or life imprisonment at Carcassonne.
A treatise of the early 15th century, the Errores Valdensium, claims of the Waldensians that they kissed the
posterior parts of a demon in cat form and that they flew to their meetings in a twinkling of an eye on a staff
rubbed with magical salve. The problem of why the apostolic minded Waldensians should have become associated
with diabolism has long interested historians. Apparently the identification of witches and Waldensians was first
made in Alpine regions, where heretics had been accustomed to retreat from orthodox persecution, and were the
Waldensians were numerous enough to cause the orthodox inhabitants to refer to all heretics by that name, just
as earlier the Germans had come to refer to all heretics as Cathari, from which the German Keter (“heretic”)
derives. The confusion was so pronounced that often, as at a trial of “Waldensians” at Fribourg in 1399, it is
difficult to say whether the accused were really Waldensians, other heretics, or witches. Again like the Catharists,
the Waldensians were supposedly sexually depraved, and by the beginning of the 15th century a sex fiend was
often termed a Vaudois. From the Alps the identification spread through southern and then northern France,
though it was seldom sed beyond French speaking lands. The term was finally adopted formally in a bull issued
March 23, 1440, by Pope Eugenius IV. It was justified by theologians on the grounds that the Waldensians, though
originally devoted to poverty and asceticism, had gradually become commited to witchcraft, and the distinction
between Waudenses (witch Waldensians) and Waldenses (old fashioned Waldensians) was soon lost. The
identification was so firmly fixed that vauderie came to be a synonym for the sabbat, and aller en vauderie meant
“to go to the sabbat.”[331]

Fig. 126.). The Waldensians are a pre Protestant Christian movement founded by Peter Waldo c. 1173.

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The Waldensians: A treatise of the early 15th century, the Errores Valdensium, claims of the Waldensians that they
kissed the posterior parts of a demon in cat form and that they flew to their meetings in a twinkling of an eye on a
staff rubbed with magical salve.* The problem of why the apostolic minded Waldensiands should have become
associated with diabolism has long interested historians. Apparently the identification of witches and waldensians
were numerous enough to cause the orthodox inhabitants to refer to all heretics by that name, just as earlier the
Germans had come to refer to all heretics as Cathari, from which the German Ketzer (“heretic’0 derives. The
confusion was so pronounced that often, as a trial of “Waldensians’ at Fribourg in 1399, it is difficult to say
whether the accused were really Waldensians, other heretics, or witches. Again like the Catharists, the
Waldensianswere supposedly sexually depraved, and by the beginning of the 15th century a sex fiend was often
termed Vaudois. From the Alps the identification spread through southern and then northern France, though it
was seldom used beyond French speaking lands. The term was finally adopted formally in a bull issued on March
23, 1440, by Pope Eugenius IV. It was justified by theologians on the grounds that the Waldensians, though
originally devoted to poverty and asceticism, had gradually become committed to witchcraft, and the distinction
between Waudenses (witch Waldensians) and Waldenses (old fashioned Waldensians) was soon lost. The
identification was so firmly fixed that vauderie came to be a synonym for the sabbat, and aller en vauderie meant
“to go to the sabbat.”
Witches were also still identified with Catharists. Te term Gazarii (from Cathari) was applied to the witches
in Savoy in the 1420’s and 1430’s by the Inquisition, and the usage gained wide currency thereafter. Hansen and
Runeberg have overemphasized the importance of the mountains in the formation of witchcraft in both the official
and the public mind.
At Pinarolo and Turin in Lombardy, Antonio da Savigliano, a Dominican Inquisitor, conducted in 1387 1388
a series of trials extraordinarily significant for the way in which Waldensianism, Catharism, and witchcraft became
inseparably blended. An initial group of heretics, apparently all of modest social status, were tried, tortured, and
thereby induced too implicate others until most of the town was involved. Though their doctrines were a
mélange, they were explicitly identified as a sect or society of Waldensians and linked with the heretics of
Dauphine who were described as “the Poor of Lyon.” Their doctrines do in fact bear some similarities to
Waldensianism. They believed that their sect was of such moral excellence that no one could be saved without
belonging to it. The Catholic Church and its sacraments were usless, being an invention of priests to obtain money;
and any member of their sect could consecrate the Eucharist himself. Pilgrimages, the veneration of the cross,
almsgiving, and hagioduly were all superstitions of the Catholic Church, which had been corrupt from the time of
Constantine. The heretics had their own pope in Apulia. All oaths are mortal sin.[332]
It must be admitted that in some instances charges of witchcraft clearly were based on misinterpreted
rituals of one sort or another. The secret assemblies of heretics lent themselves to misrepresentation, and
inquisitors seem to have taken advantage of the opportunity. In some cases, communities prosecuted for
witchcraft were probably groups of Waldensian heretics pure and simple. The charges of witchcraft were
sometimes grafted on to standard doctrinal charges made against Waldensians. In other cases the supposed
witches were described as simulating orthodox piety to evade detection a common feature of Waldensians
throughout Europe.[333]
Among the Wallachians, however, there is a kind of murony that corresponds to the belief in kynanthropy,
which is one of the forms of the same superstition. This is described as ‘a real living man, who has the peculiarity of
roaming by night as a dog over heaths, pastures, and even villages, killing with his touch horses, cows, sheep,
swine, goats, and other animals in his passage, and appropriating to himself their vital forces, by means of which
he has the appearance of being in continual health and vigour’.[334]

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Piedmont Easter
In January 1655, the Duke of Savoy commanded the Waldensians to attend Mass or remove to the upper
valleys of their homeland, giving them twenty days in which to sell their lands. Being in the midst of winter, the
order, of course, was intended to persuade the Vaudois to choose the former; however, the bulk of the populace
instead chose the latter, abandoning their homes and lands in the lower valleys and removing to the upper valleys.
It was written that these targets of persecution, including old men, women, little children and the sick "waded
through the icy waters, climbed the frozen peaks, and at length reached the homes of their impoverished brethren
of the upper Valleys, where they were warmly received."
By mid April, when it became clear that the Duke's efforts to force the Vaudois to conform to Catholicism
had failed, he tried another approach. Under the guise of false reports of Vaudois uprisings, the Duke sent troops
into the upper valleys to quell the local populace. He required that the local populace quarter the troops in their
homes, which the local populace complied with. But the quartering order was a ruse to allow the troops easy
access to the populace. On 24 April 1655, at 4 a.m., the signal was given for a general massacre.

Fig. 127.). Print illustrating the 1655 massacre in La Torre, from Samuel Moreland's History of the Evangelical
Churches of the Valleys of Piemont, published in London in 1658
Fig. 128.). Illustrations depicting Waldensians as witches in Le champion des dames, by Martin Le France, 1451
The Duke's forces did not simply slaughter the inhabitants. They are reported to have unleashed an
unprovoked campaign of looting, rape, torture, and murder. According to one report by a Peter Liegé:
Little children were torn from the arms of their mothers, clasped by their tiny feet, and their heads dashed
against the rocks; or were held between two soldiers and their quivering limbs torn up by main force. Their
mangled bodies were then thrown on the highways or fields, to be devoured by beasts. The sick and the aged were
burned alive in their dwellings. Some had their hands and arms and legs lopped off, and fire applied to the severed
parts to staunch the bleeding and prolong their suffering. Some were flayed alive, some were roasted alive, some
disemboweled; or tied to trees in their own orchards, and their hearts cut out. Some were horribly mutilated, and
of others the brains were boiled and eaten by these cannibals. Some were fastened down into the furrows of their
own fields, and ploughed into the soil as men plough manure into it. Others were buried alive. Fathers were
marched to death with the heads of their sons suspended round their necks. Parents were compelled to look on
while their children were first outraged [raped], then massacred, before being themselves permitted to die.

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 This massacre became known as the Piedmont Easter. An estimate of some 1,700 Waldensians were
slaughtered; the massacre was so brutal it aroused indignation throughout Europe. Protestant rulers in northern
Europe offered sanctuary to the remaining Waldensians. Oliver Cromwell, then ruler in England, began petitioning
on behalf of the Waldensians; writing letters, raising contributions, calling a general fast in England and
threatening to send military forces to the rescue. The massacre prompted John Milton's famous poem on the
Waldenses, "On the Late Massacre in Piedmont". Swiss and Dutch Calvinists set up an "underground railroad" to
bring many of the survivors north to Switzerland and even as far as the Dutch Republic, where the councillors of
the city of Amsterdam chartered three ships to take some 167 Waldensians to their City Colony in the New World
(Delaware) on Christmas Day 1656. Those that stayed behind in France and the Piedmont formed a guerilla
resistance movement led by a farmer, Joshua Janavel, which lasted into the 1660s.[335]
The Khlysts: Even more puzzling are the accounts reported about the Russian orthodox sect of the so called
"people of God," or Khlysts, and it is difficult to distinguish the real significance of this mystical and totally
irrational religious approach, since the concealment of their rites was almost total and the majority of our
information derives from hostile sources (missionaries or police). The name Khlysts, as the members were called
by detractors, derives either from a distortion of "Christ," because the adherents thought that Christ could become
incarnate in every one of them, or (and this seems the most probable interpretation) from the Russian word for
"whip," with an allusion to ritual practices of self flagellation. It seems possible to affirm that this sect was an
emanation of the various Russian schismatic movements that began their diffusion during the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries and that taught that Christian faith had been destroyed by an Antichrist, after a long period
of splendor and decadence, and should be founded again. Where as Danil Filippovič, a peasant from the Volga
region and alleged founder of the sect, seems to be nothing more than a shadowy and legendary figure, the first
important representative was Ivan Timofeevič Suslov. In the eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries the sect
spread out and reached also the high society in Saint Petersburg.
Both an emotional revelation and a multiplicity of the divine incarnations lay at the ground of the Khlyst
spirituality. In order to allow the death of the old person and the mystical resurrection in Christ, which also meant
the presence of a divine spark in the intimate self and possession by the Holy Spirit, fasting, chastity, prayer and
self flagellation were necessary. The culmination of their rites consisted in a nocturnal ceremony, which began
with a fanatical dervish like dance, after a dispersion of holy water: men and women concentrically rotated in
opposite directions, until they became exhausted and proffered prophecies. Accounts of self flagellation and a
concluding orgy—after the ritual election of a woman, who was then adored as the Virgin Mary—are also
reported; these practices, a sort of hybrid between the cult of the ancient Mother Goddess and the Christian
veneration of Mary, were justified by asserting that the satisfaction of carnal desires is the straightest way to
redemption and that humans can be saved only passing through a hyperbolic degree of depravation and sin.
Sexual intercourse, however, was restrained to this singular rite, while usually a strict chastity was observed. The
same kind of frantic, insistent attitude toward asceticism and purity led some members to refuse such
transgressive behavior and to commit self castration at the end of a frantic dance (like their pagan antecedents,
the Galli, priests of Cybele who emasculated themselves). The new monastic order was founded in the second half
of the eighteenth century by Kondratij Selivanov, who asserted in 1765 at the same time that he was the
embodiment of God and of Tsar Peter III. The members took the name Skoptzi (literally "whitened"), alluding to
their condition: they also proclaimed the intrinsic oneness of God and man and aimed at restoring the chiliastic
reign of God on earth. The Khlysts enjoyed a special renown also because, according to many, the famous monk
and political intriguer Rasputin (born c.1864–d. 1916) was a member of the sect, even though not all his

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biographers credit this information. It is true, however, that he exercised a sort of magnetic fascination over
women, and he is reported to having seduced many, despite his strong ascetic outlook.[336]
The Convulsionnaires &Secourists: The appearance of the Convulsionnaires in France, whose inhabitants, from
the greater mobility of their blood, have in general been the less liable to fanaticism, is in this respect, instructive
and worthy of attention. In the year 1727 there died, in the capital of that country, the Deacon Paris, a zealous
oppose of the Ultramontanists, division having arisen in the French church on account of the bull: Unigenitus.”
People made frequent visits to his tomb in the cemetery of St. Medard, and 4 years afterward (in September,
1731), a rumor was spread, that miracles took place there. Patients were seized with convulsions and tetanic
spasms, rolled upon the ground like persons possessed, were thrown into violent contortions of their heads and
limbs and suffered the greatest oppression, accompanied by quickness and irregularity of pulse. This novel
occurrence excited the greatest sensation all over Paris, and an immense concourse of people resorted daily to the
above named cemetery, in order to see so wonderful a spectacle, which the Ultramontanists immediately
interpreted as a work of Satan, while their opponents ascribed it to a divine influence. The disorder soon
increased, until it produced, in nervous women, clairvoyance (Schlafwachen, a phenomenon till then unknown;)
for one female especially attraced attention, who blindfold, and, as it was believed, by means of the sense of smell,
read every writing that was placed before her, and distinguished the charactes of unknown persons. The very
earth then from the grave of the Deacon was soon thought to possess miraculous power. It was sent to numerous
sick persons at a distance, whereby they were said to have been cured, and thus this nervous disorder spread far
beyond the limits it was computed that there were more than 800 decided Convulsionnaires, who would hardly
have increased so much in numbers, had not Louis XV. Directed that the cemetery should be closed.
The disorder itself assumed various forms, and augmented, by its attacks, the general excitement. Many
persons, besides suffering from the convulsions, became the subjects of violent pain, which required the assistance
of their brethren of the faith. On this account they, as well as those who afforded them aid, were called by the
common title of Secourists. The modes of relief adopted were remarkably in accordance with those which were
administered to the St. Johns dancers and the Tarantati, and they were in general very rough; for the sufferers
were beaten and goaded in various parts of the body with stones, hammers, swords, clubs, etc., of which
treatment the defenders of this extraordinary sect relate the most astonishing examples, in proof that sever pain is
imeratively demanded by nature in this disorder as an effectual counter irritant.
The Secourist used wooden clubs in the same manner as paviours use their mallets, and it is stated that
some Convulsionnaires have borne daily from 6 to 8,000 blows, thus inflicted, without danger.* One Secourist
administered to a young woman, who was suffering under spasm blows of the stomach, the most violent blows on
that part, not to mention other similar cases, which occurred everywhere in great numbers. Sometimes the
patients bounded from the ground impelled by the convulsions, like fish when out of water; and this was so
frequently imitated at a later period, that the women and girls, when they expected such violent contortions, not
wishing to appead indecent, put on gowns, made like sacks, closed at the feet. If they received any bruises by
falling down, they were healed with earth from the grave of the uncanonized saint. They usually, however showed
great agility in this respect, and it is scarcely necessary to remark that the female sex especially was distinguished
by all kinds of leaping and almost inconceivable contortions of body. Some spun round on their feet with
incredible rapiditiy, as is related of the dervishes; others ran their heads against walls, or curved their bodies like
rope dancers, so that their heels touched their shoulders.
All this degenerated at length into decided insanity. A certain Convulsionnaire, at Vernon, who had
formerly led rather a loose course of life employed herself in confessing the other sex; in other places women of
this sect were seen imposing exercised of penance on priests, during which these were compelled to kneel before

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them. Others played with childrens rattles, or drew about small carts, and gave to these childish acts symbolical
significations.* One Convulsionnaire even made believe to shave her chin, and gave religious instruction at the
same time, in order to imitate Paris, the worker of miracles, who during this operation, and while at table, was in
the habit of preaching. Some had a board placed across their bodies, upon which a whole row of men stodd; and
as, in this unnatural state of mind, a kind of pleasure is dervived from excruciating pain, some too were seen who
caused their bosoms to be pinched with tongs, while others, with gowns closed at the feet, stood upon their
heads, and remained in that position longer than would have been possible had they been in health. Pinault, the
advocate, who belonged to this sect, barked like a dog some hours everyday, and even this found imitation among
the believers.
(*Arouet, the father of Voltaire, visited in Nantes, a celebrated Convulsionnaire, Gabrielle Mollet, whom he found
occupied in pulling the bells of a childs coral, to designate the rejection of the unbelievers. Sometimes she jumped
into the water and barked like a dog. She died in 1748.)
The revolution, finally, shook the structure of the pernicious mysticism.l It was not, however, destroyed;
for even during the period of the greatest excitement, the secret meetings were still kept up; prophetic books, by
Convulsionnaires of various denominations, have appeared even in the most recent times, and only a few years
ago in (1828) this once celebrated sect still existed, although without the convulsions and the extraordinarily rude
aid of the brethren of the faith, which, amidst the boasted pre eminence of French intellectual advancement,
remind us most forcibly of the dark ages of the St. Johns dancers.[337]
There are some denominations of English Methodists which surpass, if possible, the French Convulsionnaires;
and we may here mention, in particular, the jumpers, among whom it is still more difficult, than in the example
given above, to draw the line between religious ecstasy and a perfect disorder of the nerves; sympathy, however,
operates perhaps more perniciously on them than on other fanatical assemblies. The sect of Jumpers was founded
in the year 1760, in the county of Cornwall, by 2 fanatics, who were, even at that time, able to collect together a
considerable party. Their general doctrine is that of the Methodists, and claims out consideration here, only in so
far as it enjoins them, during their devotional exercises, to fall into convulsions, which they are able to effect in the
strangest manner imaginable.
By the use of certain unmeaning words, they work themselves up into a state of religious frenzy, in which
they seem to have scarcely any control over their senses. They then begin to jump with strange gestures,
repeating this exercise with all their might, until they are exhausted, so that it not unfrequently happens that
women, who, like the Maenades, practice these religious exercises, are carried away from the midst of them in a
state of syncope, while the remaining members of the congregations, for miles together, on their way home,
terrify those whom they meet by the sight of such demoniacal ravings. There are never more than a few ecstatics,
who by their example excite the rest to jump, and these are followed by the greatest part of the meeting, so that
these assemblages of the Jumpers resemble, for hours together, the wildest orgies, rather than congregations men
for Christian edification.
In the United States of North America, communities of Methodists have existed for the last 60 years. The
reports of credible witnesses of their assemblages for divine service in the open air (camp meetings), to which
many thousands flock from great distances, surpass, indeed, all belief; for not only do they there repeat all the
insane acts of the French Convulsionnaires and of the English Jumpers, but the disorder of their minds and of their
nerves attains, at these meetings, a still greater height. Women have been seen to miscarry while suffering under
the state of ecstatsy and violent spasms into which they are thrown, and other have publicly stripped themselves
and jumped into the rivers. They have swooned away by hundreds, worn out with ravings and fits; and of the
Barkers, who appeared among the Convulsionnaires only here and there, in single cases of complete aberration of

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intellect, whole bands are seen running on all fours, and growling as if they wish to indicate, even by their outward
form, the shocking degradation of their human nature. At these camp meetings the children are witnesses of this
made infatuation, and as their weak nerves are, with the greatest facility, affected by sympathy, they, together
with their parents, fall into violent fits, though they know nothing of their import, and many of them retain for life
some severe nervous disorder, which, having arisen from fright and excessive excitement, will not afterward yield
to any medical treatment.
But enough of these extravagances, which, even in our own days, embitter the lives of so many thousands,
and exhibit to the world, in the 19th century, the same terrific form of mental disturbance as the St. Vituss dance
once did to the benighted nations of the middle ages.[338]
The Albigenses: In the 13th century, heresies began to spring up all over Europe like mushrooms in a dung heap.
The most prominent of these sects were the Albigenses in the south of France, who attempted to return to what
they considered to be purity of early Christian doctrines. Innocent III ordered a crusade against them. How to tell
the heretics from the devout presented a considerable difficulty but, according to popular legend, the problem
was solved by Arnaud, the papal legate, who told the crusaders, “Kill everyone God will recognize his own.”
Although the crusaders did their best to follow instructions, this sort of wholesale butchery was plainly impractical,
and so St. Dominic, the founder of the Dominican Order and an expert theologian, was sent to France to examine
prisoners and determine their religious beliefs.
From a strictly theological point of view, Dominic was not unreasonable. He first made sure that the
individual being question was really a heretic many of Albigenses were really protesting more against the
corruption of the local clergy against the basic doctrines of the Church. But if the prisoner was definitely denying
basic Catholic doctrines, Dominic would spend days if necessary arguing obscure theological points in an effort to
convert the sinner. If the person remained obdurate well, as Dominic himself said, ‘When kind words fail, blows
may avail.” Dominic argued that one heretic would corrupt others. Such a man could not, therefore be allowed to
adhere to his false doctrines any more than a man inflicted with the plague could be allowed to infect others.
Torture, until the heretic recanted or died, was the only solution. St. Dominic is often said to have been the first
Inquisitor, although the organization was not officially founded until later. Although some historians deny that
Dominic ever actually ordered the use of torture, he certainly did nothing to prevent it.
The Albigenses were soon virtually exterminated, 200 being burned at Monstegur in one day. But other
sects continued to appear, and so in 1233 a perpetual board of inquiry was established to investigate cases of
suspected heresy. As heresy was considered the most terrible of all crimes, this board was permitted to use torture
as a standard procedure to discover the truth, a custom that was gradually adopted by the secular courts as well.
This church court became known as The Inquisition and was put under the supervision of the Dominicans, or the
“Hounds of God” as they came to be called.[339]
The impression left, and it is one which was not altogether uncommon some 70 years ago, is that the
Albigensian was a stern old Protestant father, Bible and sword in hand, who defended his hearth and home against
the lawless brigands spurred on to attack him by priestly machinations. Nothing, of course, could be further from
the truth. The Albigensian was a Satanist, a worshipper of the powers of evil, and he would have found short shrift
indeed, fire and the stake, in Puritan England under Cromwell, or in Calvinistic Scotland had his practices been
even dimly guessed at by the Kirk. As Dr. Arendzen well says: “Albigensianism was not really a heresy against
Christianity and the Catholic Church, it was a revolt against nature, a pestilential perversion of human
instinct.”[340]
On the 22 August, 1320, John XXII addressed a Bull from Avignon upon the subject of Witchcraft to the
Dominican Cardinal of S. Sabina, William de Laudun, Bishop of Carcassone and Toulouse, to which was added in

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1326 the Constitution Super illius specula. Four years later on the 4th of November, 1330, the same Pope issued a
Bull Sano nouiter intellect to Bernard de Farges, Archbishop of Narbonne, and his suffragans. The whole of that
district had been honeycombed by the sect of the Albigenses of whom Innocent III justly remarked: “They are
worse than the Saracens.” Strictly speaking, Albigensianism was not even a Christian heresy, but an extra Christian
religion deeply involved with Oriental magic and blasphemous parodies of Holy Mass; in a word, Satanism. When
the adherents of this cult had gained sufficient power in a district they did not hesitate to spread their doctrines by
fire and sword. The holy Cistercian s. Peter of Castelnau, whom they martyred in 1208, and S. Camelia, put to
death by the same ruffians, are both honoured in the Proper of Carcassone. Other similar cases might be cited.
The dregs of the heresy were finally driven underground, but they reappear in the form of Witchcraft and the black
art.[341]
The Albigenses were soon virtually exterminated, 200 being burned at Montsegur in one day. But other
sects continued to appear, and so in 1233 a perpetual board of inquiry was established to investigate cases of
suspected heresy. As heresy was considered the most terrible of all crimes, this board was permitted to use
torture as a standard procedure to discover the truth, a custom that was gradually adopted by the secular courts
as well. This Church court became known as The Inquisition and was put under the supervision of the Dominicans,
of the “Hounds of God’ as they came to be called.[342]
The Luciferians: In 1227, Gregory IX ordered Conrad to investigate a sect in Germany known as the Luciferians.
This group considered that everything worldly was evil and as God could not have created evil, it followed that the
devil must have made the world. Conrad departed on his mission but received word en route that Elizabeth had
died as a result of her life of exaggerated asceticism. Conrad suffered a complete collapse at the news. He was
unable to continue with his crusade and could do nothing but send letters to the Pope imploring him to have
Elizabeth made a saint.
Another Inquisitor, Conrad Tors, had to be sent to investigate the Luciferians. Tors adopted as his motto,
“It is fitting to burn a hundred innocent in order to destroy one heretic among them.” When accounts of Tors’
exploits reached Conrad, he was galvanized into activity. He displaced Tors and assumed command of the
investigation.
Almost at once, Conrad had a great stroke of luck. A 20yr old girl who’d had a quarrel with her family told
Conrad that they were Luciferians. Under torture, the family confessed and then, under the threat of additional
tortures, implicated others. The accused were instantly arrested and tortured until they named still others and
soon half the population of Germany was accusing the other half.
These confessions made under the most hideous tortures sound, not surprisingly, like the ravings of a
lunatic. One woman described a Luciferan ceremony by saying that she was first forced to kiss a toad, which then
turned into a duck “the size of an oven.” A black cat jumped out of the inside of a statue crying, “What does this
teach?” A voice replied, “The highest peace.” Then the lights went out.
Conrad sent these confessions to Gregory, who exclaimed in horror, “Such people should be wiped from
the earth, sparing neither age nor sex.”
Conrad tried to comply, while at the same time mourning for the tragic death of Elizabeth. In Strasburg
alone he burned 80 men, women, and children. In his fury he spared no one not even nobles or prominent church
dignitaries. At last the Archbishops of Cologne, Treves and Mayence appealed to the Pope, writing:
Whoever falls into his hands has only the choice between a ready confession and a denial,
whereupon he is speedily burned. Every false witness is accepted but no defense granted. Many
devout Catholics have suffered themselves to be burned rather than confess to vicious crimes of
which they were innocent. The weak ones lie about themselves and others. Brothers acc use

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 brothers, wives their husbands, servants their masters. Many give money to the clergy for advice
on how to protect themselves and everything is in confusion.
Then Conrad went too far. He accused Henry, count of Sayn, of heresy. Henry was one of the most
powerful nobles in Germany, and, supported by both the king and the German bishops, he demanded a public
trial. The trial was held at Mainz in 1233. Conrad produced witnesses who had sworn to seeing Henry at Luciferian
ceremonies, but when guaranteed protection from the Inquisitors tortures, the witnesses recanted, admitting that
they had accused Henry only to save themselves. The court ruled in favor of Henry. Conrad went mad with rage.
He swore to have the entire court condemned as heretics and set off for Rome to appeal directly to the Pope. On
the way, he was murdered by the nobles whom he had denounced. He died without knowing that 2 years later the
Pope would answer his constant desperate pleas and canonize poor little Saint Elizabeth. One of Conrads favorite
methods for determining guilt. Before being branded, the accused was asked to pray that the iron would not sear
his flesh. If the iron burned him, it was considered proof of hi s guilt. So many heretics were discovered by such
methods that in 1369 the famous Paris Bastille had to be reconstructed to hold them. The builder, Hugh Aubriot,
was himself the first prisoner to be inured in the fortress. [343]
"Early in the [13th] century rumours circulated of the hideous Satanic rites practised by a sect in Germany
called Luciferans, and in 1227 the Pope sent Conrad of Marburg to root out the heresy and reform the Church in
Germany. Conrad was a sadistic fanatic who had been spiritual director of St. Elizabeth of Thuringia and had
delighted in beating and humiliating her. He descended on the Luciferians in the fierce conviction that he was
called to do battle with Satan himself. The confessions he extracted were apparently made without torture, but
under the threat of death if the victim did not confess. If these confessions were accurate, the Luciferans were full
blown Satanists. They worshipped the Devil as creator and ruler of this world, complained that he had been
unjustly and treacherously banished from heaven, and believed that he would overthrow the God of the Christians
and return to heaven, when they would enjoy eternal happiness with him. They revelled in whatever displeased
the Christian God and hated whatever pleased him. At Easter they would go to Mass, keep the consecrated hosts
in their mouths and spit them out into a cesspool to show their contempt for Christ.
"When a man was initiated as a Luciferan he was taken to one of their meetings and made to kiss a toad
on its backside or mouth. Or sometimes the thing he kissed looked like a duck or a goose and was the size of an
oven. Then there came to him a man with black eyes who was pale, emaciated and icy cold. Possibly, he
represented the Devil or lord of death. The initiate kissed him and lost his Catholic faith in that instant. Then
everyone sat down to a feast and a large black cat appeared, emerging from a statue which was always present.
The initiate, the leader of the group and any other members who were worthy of the honour, kissed the cat's
backside. The leader said, 'What does this teach?' A member answered, 'the highest peace', and another added,
'And that we must obey.' The candles were put out and there was indiscriminate heterosexual and homosexual
orgy. Afterwards the candles were relit and the figure of a man appeared from a dark corner. The upper part of
his body shone like the sun, but from the hips down he was black like the cat. The leader cut off a piece of the
initiate's clothing and gave it to the shining man, saying, 'Master, I give this to you which has been given to me.'
The shining man answered, 'You have served me well, you will serve me more and better. I leave to your care
what you have given to me.' Then he disappeared.
"This account of an initiation carries a certain conviction and it could have been stage managed without
too much difficulty. There are traces, in modern times, of a tradition among witches that Lucifer, 'the light bearer',
was the sun, an identification which could easily be made when the Devil was regarded as the ruler of life on earth.
The shining man may perhaps have been intended to represent the Devil as both the sun of day time the shining
upper half of the figure and the sun of night, the black lower parts standing for the black sun, passing under the

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earth through the regions of darkness before the next sunrise. The black sun can be imagined as the leader of the
stars, which follow his course towards the western horizon and disappear beyond it the stars fallen from heaven.
"The obscene kiss on the backside of an animal or person representing Satan became a stock charge in
allegations of devil worship, but where it originally came from is not known. It was evidently a symbol of utter
submission and perhaps also of the reversal of conventional values."[344]
The Luciferians, a sect of the 14th century, who were closely connected with the sect of the Brethren of the
Free Mind and had many adherents among the mendicant orders, actually affirmed that God had obtained
possession of heaven by usurpation, force, and injustice. When at church, the faithful prayed, “Our Father which
art in heaven,” these heretics added when among themselves,: If He is in heaven it is only by force and injustice.”
The chief article of their Faith was that the unjust government of God over the world would some day be replaced
by the rule of Lucifer, whom they worshipped with hymns and prayers.
In the companies in France which were recruited from the dregs of all nations, Spaniards, Englishmen, and
Germans, were many runaway ecclesiasts, of whom the arch priest Arnaud de cervole was the most notorious.
[345]
At the beginning of the 14th century the old elements of folklore and heresy were still shaping witchcraft.
In Austria a group of heretics were accused of worshipping Lucifer and believing that he would one day be restored
to heaven while St. Michael was cast into hell. On meeting, the heretics hailed one another with the words, ‘May
the injured Lucifer greet you’. They were supposed to have underground orgies, and one young woman was said
to argue that she was a virgin above ground though sexually experienced under the earth. These Luciferians also
preached doctrines similar to those of the Catharists and Waldensians. The Waldensians (Vaudois in French) were
actually reform minded heretics, but so closely did the orthodox perceive the connection between witches and
Waldensians that the witches were often called Vaudois, and aller en vauderie came to mean ‘to go to the witches’
meeting’. The most common term for the meeting continued to be ‘synagogue’, though ‘sabbat’, equally insulting
to Jews, became common in the next century.[346]
On 11 Odctober, 1231, Pope Gregory directed a bull to Conrad, who was thereby relieved of some more
duties in order that he might devote his attention to the inroads of the Luciferians, and abominable sect, whose
covens, as it was alleged, actually saw the Demon under a human form and worshipped him with foul ceremonies
at their midnight assemblies. They were, in fact, Satanists who devoted themselves to the most monstrous
profanations and stopped at nothing to spread their devilish doctrines. Small wonder that Conrad proceeded
against them with exemplary severity, and delivered the guilty to legal punishment, the stake. Plots, however,
were incontinently laid against him and snares multiplied, until on 30 July, 1233, both he and his companion, a holy
Franciscan named Gerhard Lutzelholb, were assassinated as they returned to Marburg. He is fittingly buried in the
exquisite Gothic faneof S. Elizabeth, not far from the shrine of his spiritual daughter “die liebe Frau,” where the old
stone steps are worn hollow by the knees pilgrims.
The Satanists seldom failed to perform their bad work with untiring energy, sowing evil and anarchy on
every side, as was only too clearly evident from the revolt of the Setedingers, who had long been secretly
corrupted by sorcerers ande heretics. The Stedingers (a word meaning those living about the shore) were a tribe
of Frisian peasants who in past years proved wellnigh the despair of missionaires on account of their bitter
resistance to both Christianity and culture and their obstinate perserverance in cruel pagan superstistions and
darkness. Even in the 13th century their profession of faith seem s to have been at best lukewarm, and we are
hardely surprised to learn that ignorance and rudeness made them an easy prey to the emissaries of the
pestilential sects who now began to ravage and infest Europe. The Satanists taught the Stedingers anarchy, and in
1204 they broke out into open rebellion against the Archbishop of Bremen, Hartwich II, an enlightened and

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generous prelate. His successor Gerhard II (1219 57) was a man of sterner mould, and unable to endure their
insolence and violence he sent a levy of troops against them. His army, however, was defeated in 1229,
whereupon the Stedingers elated with their victory overran the whole country side, burning and plundering on
every side. In particular were churches and monasteries the objects of their attack; the flame and smoke of
reverend sanctuaries and hallowed houses of prayer mounted to heaven in ceaseless clouds amid the roar of
crashing roofs and falling walls; neither age nor sex was spared; priest and nun were put to the sword amid cruel
scenes of fearful blasphemy and the desecration of a 1000 altars. A synod held at Bremen, 17 march, 1230, in
addition to these acts fo violence and outrage, accuses the rebels of the most hideous profanities and the open
practice of sorcery, wherefor they were sternly excommunicated, a discipline which but served to spur the
Stedingers on to fresh atrocities, whilst Gregory IX commissioned the Bishop of Lubeck aided by certain zealous
Dominicans to use his best endeavours to quell the revolt by an appealto reason and sanity. A little later, however,
the Pontiff learned the full extent of the evil, and the remorselessness of the ruffians with whom authority had to
deal ere law and order might be restored. Frederick II placed the Stedingers under the ban of the Empire. Anarchy
was growing apace. The strong castle of Slutterberg , near Delmenhorst, had been razed to the ground by a fearful
horde3 of marauders, and Count Burckhardt of Oldenburg, its lord, was slain whilst bravely fighting in defence of
his property. Vast multitudes of lubber kerns, ferocious levelers, savage desperadoes and brigands, the vilest
rascality, swarmed like locusts over the land. With them went a train of sorcerers and sibyls, who prophesied their
ultimate triumph throughout the world , and spurred them on to every deed of violence and licentiousness.
The Archbishop of Bremen was greatly alarmed, and applied to Pope Gregory for counsel and aid. The
successor of Peter, who had also learned the details of the catastrophe for it was little less from other trustworthy
sources, no longer stayed his hand. A crusade against the Stedingers was preached in all that part of Germany.
The sypreme Pontiff wrote instantly to all the Bishops and leaders of the faithful an exhortation to arm, to root out
from the land those abominable witches and wizards. “The Stedingers,” said his Holiness, “seduced by the Devil,
have abjured all the laws of God and man, slandered the Church, insulted the holy Sacraments, consulted witches
to raise evil spirites, shed blood like water, taken the lives of priests, and concocted an infernal scheme to
propagate the worship of the Devil, whom they adore under the name of Asmodi. The Devil appears to them in
different shapes, sometimes as a goose or a duck, and at others in the figure of a pale black eyed youth, with a
melancholy aspect, whose embrace fills their hearts with eternal hatred against the holy Church of Christ. This
devil presides as their Sabbats, when they all kiss him and dance around him. He then envelopes them in total
darkness, and they all, male and female, give themselves up to the grossest and most disgusting debauchery.”[347]
The most important and, of course, supremely authoritative series of documents dealing with the conduct
of witchtrials in Italy and elsewhere are the Papal Bulls. In 1233 Pope Gregory IX (Ugolino, Count of Segni)
addressed to the famous Conrad of Marburg bidding him proceed against the Luciferians, who addressed homage
and prayers to the demon, but it may fairly be said the first Bull which directly reviews the situation was issued 13
December, 1258, by Pope Alexander IV (Rinaldo Conti). Addressing the Franciscan inquisitors this prudent and
holy pontiff ruled that they must carefully refrain from any intervention in charges of sorcery unless there be some
clear presumption of heretical belief and practice, “manifeste haeresim saperent.” But it is obvious that the two
thing were now so intermingled that one could hardly exist without the other.[348]
720: Ive heard of the Luciferians far before I wrote these books. I never ran into them until this study. All of
these groups have similarities. As is also mentioned that these groups knew of eachother and shared philosophies.
The majority of the activity mentioned has its roots in Greece. Todys scholars view osculum infame accusations as
defaming/satirical propaganda used as psychological warfare to gain support from the populace by warring parties.
I personally believe the Luciferians were real as it is evident the philosophies and other groups were and still are.

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 Chapter 11
The Minority Report
Jewish & Muslim Hatred
720: This section maybe one of the major highlights of the entire series. I state this because in todays world we
are dealing with racism everyday. Racism was interwoven in the American law system against all peoples even
Italians, Irish, Quakers, Scottish and many others. This mentality is exhibited to us today with our recent president
and current president. The massive amount of shootings that occurred during Obamas presidency and in actuality
have always been a problem with America can claim a percentage of the influence to this series. Vol. 2 is based on
finding the root definitions of the color black and how the color black has been embedded in the Caucasian psyche
from a mass amount of different experiences. These experiences synchronize with color relation to human
phenotype. Which gives a basis on why Caucasians approach people of a different complexion from theirs with
aggression and violence. Their unconscious mind tells them that the color black and beings which include animals
that are of a different hue then theirs bring death. Since all things must die as we will as well. It is better to fall in
love with death as they were forced to with the experiences of the plague.

The separation line from the Jews finds its reasonings with them being blamed for killing Jesus. This is
one reason. Another reason is to divide the ways of old from who they present themselves to be today. Judaism
predates Christianity and Catholicism. Supposedly they were kicked out of Babylon by Nimrod for tricky dealings
with finances and always being rich. Throughout the Middle Ages the Jews were shunned, hunted and hated by
everybody except Poland and other locations depending on time period and circumstance. During my studies
Poland has been mentioned several times as being a safe haven for Jews. In these times the Jews were always one
way or another connected directly to the king. Sometimes as a bank of some sort or financial advisers of the kings
monarchy. Either way it goes Jews have always been blamed for mysticism and riches. They still hold this stigma
today. The Anti Defamation League is a direct result of the abuse these people have face for literally thousands of
years. This same abuse could have in turn enforced the mentality of overt security which in turn enforced them to
understand money, greater than all peoples. Who knows? It is very clear that they’ve faced many massacres
historically. In our modern minds we only know about World War 2 and the concentration camps which embody
all the massacres of the old world.
The Jews and Muslims specifically the Moors have a similar history in Medieval times. There are details
which can support an argue on this point but overall when a Jew was excommunicated so was a Muslim. Jews
were treated worst that Muslims. In reality during these times everybody was fighting eachother, kidnapping
eachother, selling eachother into slavery, having slaves of eachother, having sex with eachother, eating with
eachother and sometimes even practicing eachothers holiday rites while remaing their own religion respectfully.
Basically, it was madness going on at any given second. One small agenda or lie could send whole families,
communities or kingdoms into war overnight. Muslims are still given problems as Jews also get constant ridicule
today. The Moors are socially not heard of today and are trying to make a comeback. I define the Moors in Old

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European times as the mystical/warrior faction of Islam. They pop up here and there, which indirectly proves that
they were obliterated with some fiery reasoning. That reasoning may be lost in their books that were burned.
In Christian Spain, a Jew or Muslim man who had sex with a Christian woman could be subject to death
penalty. There was great concern over this possibility of inter religious or inter ethnic sexual relations. One might
expect that, since prostitutes were already corrupt, it did not matter if they slept with non Christians. However,
perhaps because of prostitutes function as markers of community, judicial authorities were very concerned about
Jews or Muslims having sex with Christian prostitutes, and the prostitutes themselves sometimes refused to have
sex with circumcised men and reported them to the authorities. Christian authorities were not so concerned
about Christian men having sexual contact with non Christian women; indeed, they encouraged the prostitution of
mudejar women ( Muslims living within Christian Spain). Jews in Christian Spain debated whether it would be
better to have Jewish prostitutes to prevent men from wasting their seed on gentile (presumably Muslim) women.
[349]
Relations between minorities and majority suffered as well. The history of minorities can easily be made
to parallel the cataclysms of the 14th century. Jews, for example, were expelled from England in 1290; from France
in 1306, 1322 (or 1327), and 1394. They were massacered in Germany in 1298, 1336 1338, and 1348; in France in
1320 and 1321. Lepers were attacked, imprisioned, or burned in France in 1321; witches were pursued more or
less everywhere after 1348. For mninorities, the 14th was among the most violent of centuries.[350]
In all 3 communities, Christian, Muslim, and Jewish, violence was a normal way of pursuing goals within
(conflictive) relationships. [351]
Further, the recognition that violence against Jews and Muslims touched upon Crown interests structured
the arguments of contemporaries about such events. We have already seen examples of the types of arguments
Jews used in order to mobilize royal vengeance and protection. Christians, too, might borrow these strategies,
even in situations seemingly unrelated to religious issues. In 1327, the location of the official weighing station for
grain in the city of Xativa was under dispute, with rival interest groups coming to blows in their support for
particular locations. In the thick of this debate Pere Fuster, a native to the city, wrote to the royal councilor Vidal
de Vilanova hoping to enlist Vidals intercession in favor of his preferred location. First, Pere warned that if Vidal
did not intercede, the violence would escalate so that 2 or 300 men might easily die in a day. He then turned to
more subtle arguments. Moving the weights to the “canto de sancta Maria” would be prejudicial to the king’s
interests, because:
Jews and Muslims have much to do all day long at the scales…and the scales would be close to the
cemetery, and the clergy do not cease all day long…to go with crosses about the tombs to carry out the divine
offices which a Christian deserves, and the ordinance of the Church is such that if Jews or Muslims do not…bend
their knees in front of the cleric who passes with the cross, the students and clerics who are escorting the cross
beat them harshly with sticks.
In this case, arguments about religious violence, here only anticipated, served to lobby the Crown in a
conflict over “urban development.” Finally, the same legal structures which allowed Jews (and sometimes
Muslims) to argue that they were exempt from private violence also made them especially vulnerable to state, or
official, violence. The claim that Jews were “royal serfs” could induce royal officials to treat the kings property as
their own, the king indeed had to forbid royal officials to extort ransoms from Jewish travelers. More often,
however, it meant that peoplein conflict with Jews would tap into the judicial monopoly on violence against Jews
by taking judicial action.[352]
One way to demonstrate the costs of the “irrationalist” approach is to pursue its (admittedly equally
overstated) polar opposite, an “intentionalist” interpretation. How would it affect our understanding of the events

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of 1320 and 1321 if we assumed that the killers had motives, that their actions had meaning, and that this meaning
is decipherable from context? Such is the strategy of this chapter, as it argues that violence against minorities,
however motivated by irrational hatred of them as it may have been, only gained meaning and usefulness for
contemporaries in the context of much broader social conflicts, ideologies, and discourses.
Let us begin where the shepherds began, with a vision:
In Spain, a young boy, 17 years of age, said that a dove had appeared to him one afternoon and had
alternately alighted on his shoulder and on his head; that then the Holy Ghost, as they call it, had begun to visit
him. When he tried to take the dove in his hand, an exceedingly beautiful maiden appeared to him and said, “I
now make you a shepherd on the earth. You shall go forth to fight with the Moors. And here is the sign of what
you have seen with your eyes. When the lad took a look at himself, they say he found the account of this event
written on his arm. At the same time, another man came forward who announced that the lad had sicovered the
sign of the cross inscribed on his should. People said, however, that he had only dreamt all this while sleep near a
fountain.
But, however it may have happened, the meek dove turned into a venomous scorpion for me, and the
dream became a true and disastrous reality; when the nobles of the land heard the news, they all became excited,
treated the boy like a saint, and conferred solemn honors upon him. When the masses saw this, a large rabble
attached itself to the lad and followed his call to conquer the Kingdom of Granada. But woe is me; although the
people were only against the Moors, heaven had secretly decreed that a cruel blow be struck against the Jews.
And when the Devil, our Enemy, gave an Israelite a chance to scoff at this miracle, the people were filled with
bitter hatred against me.
With Samuel Usque, the 16th century Jewish chronicler and author of these words, we shall set aside the
question of whether or not the vision actually occurred: if it did not, yet it could have done. So we may believe that
the Shepherds’ Crusade of 1320 began with a young boy’s vision, a vision steeped in the symbolism of Crusade
against Islam. The geographic origins of the Crusade are more obscure. Although Usque, Kohen, and Ibn Verga,
writing some 2 centuries after the fact, placed the initial vision somewhere in Spain, archival documentation
stresses that the crusaders came from France.
Fortunately, contemporary French chroniclers were very interested in the shepherds. According to Jean de
Saint Victor, they began to assemble in early 1320, ande the Chronique parisienne adds that this occurred in May,
in Normandy. All the chroniclers agree that the multitutdes of “shepherds” were poor, many adolescents, who
had a rudimentary organization if any, and who subsisted largely on alms from the Christian faithful. But the
movement had other adherents as well: papal and Aragonese documentation calls attention to the presence of
women, married couples, clerics, and minor nobles. By early May, after storming various prisons, some 10,000
shepherds (or so the chronicles claim) had reached Paris, where they called upon the king to lead them on
Crusade, asserting that the necessity for this had been revealed to them by an angel. The king refused to meet
them. After storming the prison of the Chatelet, seat of the prevote of Paris and a symbol of royal authority, they
left Paris and marched south into Aquataine, perhaps intending to reach Mediterranean ports such as Aigues
Mortes whence they could embark for the Holy Land.
As the shepherds moved south they attacked royal castles, royal and seigneurial officials and clerics, an
activity that prompted a good deal of papal concern. Bernarnd Gui stated that “they struck terror and dread of
their name in the communities of the towns and castles, and in the rectors and leaders of them and among the
princes and prelates and rich persons.’ Then too’ there was afterwards found through some of them that they had
arranged to rise up against clergy and monks having riches and to seize their goods.”

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 The shepherds came to focus most spectacularly on the Jews, converting or killing Jews at Saintes, Verdun
on the Garonne, and in the dioceses and cities of Cahors, Toulouse, and Albi (the massacre in Toulouse occurred on
June 12). Massacres are also recorded at Castelsarrasin, Grenade, Lezat, Auch, Rabastens, Montguyard, and
Gaillac. In many of these places townsfolk and municipal officials may have been sympathetic to the pastoureax,
even complicit in their astocities. Thus Pope John XXII wrote to the archbishop of Toulouse, ordering him to
convince by any means at his disposal the “populares” of that city to withdraw their support from the shepherds.
The archbishop hesitated to take a position because he feared that he and his church would be attacked if he did
so. The pope also wrote to Guyard Gui, seneschal of Toulouse, urging him to resist the pastoreaux. Guyard must
have taken the orders to heart, because some 6 months later he was absolved by the pope for his execution of a
cleric of Montguyard who had killed 4 Jews (3 men and 1 woman), stolen their goods, and publicly proclaimed that
others should join him in this divinely sanctioned activity. At about harvesttime of 1320, but in any event after
June 29, the royal official Aymery de Cros, seneschal of Carcassonne, defeated and dispersed a large group of
pastoureaux. Other groups passed into Gascony, Navarre, and Aragon.
These are the events of the Shepherds’ Crusade in France at their most schematic. There exists a more
detailed, moving, and personal account made by the mobs in Toulouse. Baruchs narrative is unique in describing
the violence from the targets point of view. It should be noted, too, that a good part of Baruch’s account is
dedicated to explaining how, when confronted by the mob, he attempted to invoke his relationships to local clerics
and royal officials, and why those invocations proved powerless: how, in short, these cataclysmic events
transformed his normal relations with Christians. The pages that follow, however, will be concerned less with
establishing what happened than with 2 broader, perhaps unanswerable, questions: Why did the shepherds attack
the Jew? What meaning did such attacks have for contemporaries?
The answers to these questions have always been treated as obvious. “The movement of 1320 May,
therefore, be seen in the tradition of emotional and irrational action by the inarticulate…masses,’ writes Malcolm
Barber. But “the peasants were human and their feelings could be exploited by those who knew how.” The
shepherds’ choice of victims was a consequence of the hypocrisy of the royal court’s religious discourse centered
on the idea of Crusade. What the court manipulated as a fiscal device, the credulous and superstitious masses,
“with their limited experience of the wider world,” accepted literally. They attacked Jews because Jews “were the
only non Christians within reach.” Other historians have given more general explanations. For example, when
accounting for the anti Jewish violence as an outlet for psychological tensions generated by the creation of a
monetary economy.
This would have been clear, albeit paradoxically, in one of the most dramatic acts of the monarchy in the
young century: the explusion of the Jews from France in 1306. Immediately after expelling the Jews, the king had
claimed the debts owed to them by Christians as his own and began collection efforts. These efforts represented
one of the largest mobilizations of royal officialdom to date, “an enormously dramatic and dreadful statement of
the administrative capability of the Capetian monarchy,” and one leaving no doubt that in a very real sense Jews
acted in the king’s name.
By 1317 Philip V. Louis X’s successor, was ordering royal officials apparently went so far as to make the
king the heir of the Jews. According to them, though not to the king, the Jews were mainmortable, so that their
property reverted to the king when they died. In the light of such actions by royal officials, no debtor could have
failed to believe that the Jews were representatives of state fiscality, protected by the crown as such.[353]
In about 1350, a chronicler writing in Montpellier tried to claim an obvious continuity between the events
of 1320 and 1321 by stating that the Shepherds’ Crusade of 1320 was followed by the “Cowherds’ Crusade’ of
1321. This pastoral was in fact a complete fabrication. The protagonists of 1321 were drawn from a much more

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urban cast of characters than those of 1320, though they may have been inspired by their rustic cousins in their
choice of victims, since the pastoreaux had already begun to attack leprosaria. In July of 1320 the lieutenant of the
prev of Sauveterre de Guyenne had public record of the fact that he had forbidden the torching of the leprosarium
of Sauveterre, an action that was blamed on the pastoreaux. The chronicle of Raymond Bernard de La Mote,
bishop of Bazask, stated that some pastoureaux who were later hanged for their crimes had found some barrels
full of rotting bread whpillaging the leprosarium of a certain town (perhaps Mas d’ Agenias). The lepers, it was
said, had planned to use the bread in the preparation of some poisons with which to contaminate the wells. A
striking charge, and an uncommon one this early in the 14th century. [354]
The prohibition on intermarriage was often reiterated in the early Middle Ages, though most frequently in
conciliar, not secular, legislation. These pronouncements suggest that intermarriage was a continuing problem,
and one not always addressed by secular authorities. By the turn of the millennium, however, such flexibility
seems a thing of the distant past, and with all intermarriage effectively suppressed, attention shifted from
marriage to fornication and adultery (the 2 terms were used nearly interchangeably in the Middle Ages). Between
the 11th and the 14th centuries, canon lawyers elaborated an extensive literature on the impermissibility, not just
marriage, but of any sexual contact between Christian and non Christian, despite the fact that such contact outside
of marriage was nowhere specifically forbidden in any of the major decretal collections. Their reasoning was
straightforward. If Christians and non Christans were explicitly banned from bathing or dining together, and from
other forms of social intimacy, then surely the church fathers has also intended to ban the most intimate of social
relations: sexual intercourse. Not all lawyers agreed with this reasoning. Oldradus de Ponte, defending a Jew
accused of intercourse with a Christian woman in early 14th century Avignon, argued that no ecclesiastical law
demanded that the Jew be punished. But the fate of Oldradus’s client demonstrates how unconvincing the
argument was. Pandonus was castrated, his amputated flesh displayed publicly before the royal palace as a stark
symbol of transgression.
Not surprisingly, given this practical reality, Iberian secular law in the High Middle Ages ignored the issue of
intermarriage and focused its concerns on the act of sexual intercourse itself. The prohibition enunciated in the
Costums of Tortosa is representative:
If Jewish or Muslim males are found lying with a Christian woman, the Jew or Muslim should be drawn and
quartered and the Christian woman should be burned, in such a manner that they shoud die. And this accusation
can be brought by any inhabitant of the town, without the penalty of “talio” or any other [penalty].
The law in cases where Christian men had intercourse with non Christian women was only slightly
different. In the Furs of Valencia, for example, Christian males and Jewish women caught together were to be
burned. Those caught with Muslim women were to be whipped naked through the streets together with their
partner in crime.
That these laws provoked judicial violence is evident from the archival record, a record that predates even
the redaction of any of the law codes cited above. In 1022 the lands of a Jew of Barcelona named Isaac’s life
seems to have been spared in exchange for his acceptance of baptism. By the 13th and 14th centuries, references
to the punishment of Muslim and Jewish males on such charges are a bureaucratic commonplace. The passion of a
Muslim convicted of intercourse with a Christian woman in 1388, for example, is him convicted of intercourse with
a Christian woman in 1388, is recorded only in a note made by an official of the justice of Valencia that he paid a
carter some 34 sous for the wood used to burn the prisoner. This dry bureaucratization should not obscure the
nature of the Muslims fate. His consumption by the flames was meant as a vividly horrifying public example to
others, even if its annotation was lost in a pile of routine receipt.

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 The desire to prevent sexual contact between Christian and infidel led to the creation of other
complementay boundaries as well, though these carried a lesser charge of violence. By the 13th century, fear of
such intercourse came to justify the most extensive attempts at segregation undertaken by the medieval church.
At the 4th Lateran Council in 1215, it was decided that since the physicial similarities among Christian, Jew, and
Muslim led to sexual intercourse between Christians and non Christians, Jews and Muslims would henceforth be
required to dress differently from Christians. This attempt to differentiate clearly between Christian and non
Christian, to draw visible boundaries between the 2 groups, would create an explosion of new rules and legislation
stipulating how Muslims and Jews (and sometimes Christians) could attire themselves: the Jewish cape and wheel
of colored cloth and the muslim haircut and dress. We should not forget , however, that these emblems of
difference were enacted and justified as visual representations of a sexual boundary not to be transgressed. [355]
The Market: In other cases, minorities might occupy particular niches within an industry. Muslim leatherworkers
in Valencia, for example, specialized in shoemaking and depended on Christian tanners for their supplies of cured
leather. Conversely, Christian tanners depended on Muslim shoemakers as a market for their goods. Within the
cloth trade, a Jew might provide a Christian silk weaver with raw materials, and the weaver might sell his goods to
a Jewish tailor whose clothes would dress a Christian burgher: a system of specialization and interdependence that
attenuated competition. Jews do seem to have controlled trades like dice making, perhaps because the trade was
considered sorded by Christian moralists.[356]
It is difficult for modern consumers to imagine the barriers to free exchange that existed in the corporatist
and therefore deeply driven markets of the Middle Ages. In the medieval Crown, rights to sell, purchase, or
produce a given commodity might depend upon ones town of residence, guild affiliations, tax status, liege lord,
religion, the time of year, week, or day, or any combination of these factors and this is by no means an exhaustive
list. These were barriers that invited manipulation, conflict, and violence. Some of this complexity is clearly
evident in the market for meat, which can serve as an introductory example.
It is not surprising, given the place of dietary restriction in all 3 religious traditions, that the sale of food
should provide a point of conflict between groups. In the case of Muslims and Jews, dietary laws separated their
communities from others. Christians, though not in principle barred from partaking “of everything that God
created,” achieved in practice a similar separation by reiterating in countless ecclesiastical councils prohibitions on
dining with Muslims and Jews, or eating food prepared by them. As St. Vincent Ferrer put it in his emphatic way,
“Don’t buy their victuals…because we have no greater enemies….if they send you bread, throw it to the dogs; if
they send live meat, accept it, but not dead; because Holy Scripture says against these sins: ‘Do you not know that
a little leaven corrupts the whole dough?”
The most intense conflicts related to food arose over the exchange of meat between Jew and Christian. It
is not entirely clear why this is so. Some scholars have blamed such tensions on the belief that the Jews were
‘untouchable,” a source of pollution; others on the association of meat markets with blood, a liquid of rich
signification in the Middle Ages. Two other, perhaps more convincing, explanations arise. The first is an economic
consequence of ritual practice. Without some commercial outlet for meat that proved unkosher after slaughter
(usually because of tubercular lesions in the lungs), Jewish meat consumption would become prohibitively
expensive. The sale of such meat to Christians and Muslims at a reduced price provided a solution to this
deilemma, but it also irritated Christian butchers who saw their municipally regulated prices being undercut.
Furthermore, some Christians saw such sales as demeaning to their faith. It was not fitting, according to the
divines, that a Christian should eat meat rejected by a Jew, an argument that reached its apogee in the bull issued
by Benedict XIII in 1415 threatening with excommunication anyone who accepted foodstuffs from a Jew, “os
refutatas quas tryffa vocant” (or the meats rejected by them which they called trefah).

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 Municipal councils were only too willing to borrow this religious argument for a different reason. Meat
markets may well have been the most regulated aspect of medieval life. The seigneur had rights over the butcher
table itself, but the price of the meat, as well as its importation, the pasturage of the flocks as they awaited
slaughter, even the salaries of the guards who watched the flocks all were regulated by municipal ordinance.
Taxes on meat, whether on herds in transit, on the pasturage that fed them, or collected at the point of sale by the
butcher, might be imposed by the Crown, local lords, the Jewish or Muslim aljama, or the town council. In this
complex process of moving meat across geographic and jurisdictional space from the countryside to urban
markets. Jewish butchers depended on and cooperated with Christians. But with their autonomous butcher
tables, tax structures , and royal privileges, the Jews often found themselves at odds with Christian butchers and
municipal officials, and it was at these jurisidictional fault lines that anti jewish rhetoric and violence often arose.
It is not obvious that these issues should strain Muslim Jewish relations as much as Christian Jewish ones.
After all, Christian Polemicists against Muslims often faulted them for “Judaizing” in dietary matters because they
observed similar rules in the slaughtering of animals. But again fiscal issues pulled the minority communities apart.
Because both Muslims and Jews formed part of the “royal reassure,” the Crown sometimes treated its rights over
them jointly.
Monopolies could be assigned on ovens, meat markets, and even jails to be used by members of both
religions, “Joint meat markets were almost always under Jewish control, probably because jewish aljamas had
more wealth with which to purchase the privilege, and perhaps because jewish rules for ritual slaughter satisfied
most Muslim requirements, while the reverse was not true. In such a situation , Muslims became something of a
captive market for ritually slaughtered Jewish meat that proved unkosher, subsidizing Jewish meat prices and
paying taxes via Jewish collectors. The case of Tortosa provides a good example of the conflicts that could arise
from this.[357]

The Jews
In 1260, however, the Jewish community was granted permission to construct “the largest and most
beautiful synagogue in Spain,” which today (as the Church of Sta. Maria la Blanca!) is a national monument.
It was about this time in Toledo (during the 13th century) that the mystical form of thought known as the
Cabala came to be studied and practiced. Its origins were attributed to a 2nd century rabbi named Simeon bar
Yochai, said to have escaped persecution from the Romans by hiding in a cave. Actually the real author of the
most important cabalistic work, The Zohar, was the 13th century writer Moses de Leon, who incorporated
numerous earlier teachings.
The name Cabala, with its variant spellings, is derived from the Hebrew qabbalah, meaning “the received
lore,” and according to the occultist S.L. MacdGregor Mathers, “refers to the custom of handing down the esoteric
knowledge by oral transmission and is nearly allied to ‘tradition.’”
Oral tradition though it may have been originally, the Cabala came to be written down as an exceedingly
complex, multileveled form of thought involving among other things numerology, astrology, magic, squares, and
cosmic images. “Natural magic depends largely on man himself,” says the Jewish Encyclopedia, “for according to
the Cabalah, all men are endowed with insight and magical powers which they may develop.”[358]
They were much concerned with the problems raised by high magic. This was the century of the Jewish
cabala, the century when grimoires (manuals of magic) were being published, when works of astrology and
alchemy with their philosophical justifications were being translated from Arabic and Greek. But few of the
scholastics showed any concern with classical witchcraft. Vincent of Beauvais, Alexander Neckham, Bartholomew
of England, Michael Scot, Albertus Magnus, all these and most others the only major exception being Williams of

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Auvergne had virtually nothing to say about it; and what they did say was much in the tradition of earlier Middle
Ages.[359]
Social tension in the Middle Ages, expressed in terms of transcendental Christian myth, produced crazes of
fear that were directed against outcasts from Christian society. Jews were accused of praying to the Devil, doing
him homage, practicing sexual orgies, cannibalism, and murder, and using in their rites loathsome materials like
blood and semen. Lepers were accused (along with Jews and occasionally witches) of spreading poison from
hilltops or dropping it into wells.
The full bill of witchcraft was seldom leveled against the Jews, and even some superficially similar charges
were at heart quite different: the Jews were absurdly believed to stab the Eucharist in order to do hurt to Christ,
not a charge found in the witch trials; on the other hand, Jews, unlike witches, were not supposed to eat their
sacrificial victims or render them into magical ointment. Even at the height of the medieval witch craze, simple
sorcerers, heretics, Jews, lepers, political pariah, and other outcasts, though occasionally touched with the brush of
witchcraft, were for the most part dealt with quite differently. Why were witches singled out for a more total and
hysterical hatred than any of the other outcasts of Christian society? Perhaps because, unlike Jews, lepers, or out
of favor politicians, they were not physically identifiable, so that the number upon whom guilt and fear could be
projected was almost unlimited.[360]
That the Jews were unholy was a belief so ingrained by the Church that the most devout persons were the
harshest in their antipathy, none more so that St. Louis. If the Jews were unholy, then killing and looting them was
holy work. Lepers too were targets of the Pastoureaux on the theory that they had joined the Jews in a horrible
compact to poison the wells, and their persecution was made official by a royal ordinance of 1321.[361]
The accusation of well poisoning was as old as the plague of Athens, when it had been applied to the
Spartans, and as recent as the epidemics of 1320 21, when it had been applied to the lepers. At that time the
lepers were believed to have acted at the instigation of the Jews and the Moslem King of Granada, in a great
conspiracy of outcasts to destroy Christians. Hundreds were rounded up and burned throughout France in 1322
and the Jews heavily punished by an official fine and unofficial attacks. When the plague came, the charge was
instantly revived against the Jew.
The antagonism had ancient roots. The Jew had become the object of popular animosity because the early
Church, as an offshoot of Judaism striving to replace the parent, had to make him so. His rejection of Christ as
Saviour and his dogged refusal to accept the new law of the gospel in place of the Mosaic law made the Jew a
perpetual insult to the newly established Church, a danger who must be kept distinct and apart from the Christian
community. This was the purpose of the edicts depriving Jews of their civil rights issued by the early Church
Councils in the 4th century as soon as Christianity became the state religion.
The theory, emotions, and justifications of anti semitism were laid at that time in the canon law codified by
the Councils; in the tirades of St. John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Antioch, who denounced the Jews as Christ killers;
in the judgment of St. Augustine, who declared the Jews to be “outcasts” for ailing to accept redemption by Christ.
The Jews dispersion was regarded as their punishment for unbelief.
The question whether Jews had certain human rights, under the general proposition that God created the
world for all men including infidels, was given different answers by different thinkers. Officially the Church
conceded some rights: that Jews should not be condemned without trial, their synagogues and cemeteries should
not be profaned, their property not be robbed with impunity. In practice this meant little because as, as non
citizens of the universal Christian state, Jews were not allowed to bring charges against Christians, nor was Jewish
testimony allowed to prevail over that of Christians. Their legal status was that of serfs of the king, though
without reciprocal obligations on the part of the overlord. The doctrine that Jews were doomed to perpetual

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servitude as Christ killers was announced by Pope Innocent III in 1205 and led Thomas Aquinas to conclude with
relentless logic that ‘since Jews are the slaves of the Church, she can dispose of their possessions,’ legally
politically, and physically, they were totally vulnerable.
Jews were believed to kidnap and torture Christian children, whose blood they drank for a variety of
sinister purposes ranging from sadism and sorcery to the need, as unnatural beings, for Christian blood to give
them a human appearance.
To mark their separation, Innocent III in 1215 decreed the wearing of a badge, usually in the form of a
wheel or circular patch of yellow felt, said to represent a piece of money. Sometimes green or red and white, it
was worn by both sexes beginning between the ages of seven and fourteen. In its struggle against all heresy and
dissent, the 13th century Church imposed the same badge on Moslems, on convicted heretics, and, by some quirk
in doctrine, on prostitutes. A hat with a point rather like a horn, said to represent the Devil, was later added
further to distinguish the Jews.
In Basle on January 9, 1349, the whole community of several hundred Jews was burned in a wooden house
especially constructed for the purpose on an island in the Rhine, and a decree was passed that no Jew should be
allowed to settle in Basle for 200 years. In Strasbourg the Town Council, which opposed persecution, was deposed
by vote of the guilds and another was elected, prepared to comply with the popular will. In February 1349, before
the plague had yet reached the city, the Jews of Strasbourg, numbering 2,000, were taken to the burial ground,
where all except those who accepted conversion were burned at rows of stakes erected to receive them. [362]
Because of interstate deaths, property without heirs, and disputed title to land and houses, a fury of
litigation arose, made chaotic by the shortage of notaries. Sometimes squatters, sometimes the Church, took over
emptied property. Fraud and extortion practiced upon orphans by their appointed guardians became a scandal. In
Orvieto brawls kept breaking out; bands of homeless and starving brigands roamed the countryside and pillaged
up to the very gates of the city. People were arrested for carrying arms and for acts of vandalism, especially on
vineyards. The commune had to enact new regulations against “certain rascals, sons of iniquity” who robbed and
burned the premises of shopkeepers and craftsmen, and also against increased prostitution. On March 12, 1350,
the commune reminded citizens of the severe penalty in store for sexual relations between Christian and Jew: The
woman involved would be beheaded or burned alive.[363]
The long civil wars between Pedro the Cruel and his half brother Enrique had trailed the ineluctable wake
of pillage, oppression, and taxes. Social anatagonism found the vent against the Jews, who so regularly in history
become a microcosm of the worlds larger ills. In Spain their role had been more prominent and prosperous than
elsewhere. Pedro the Cruel had employed them extensively as advisors and agents, besides keeping a Jewish
mistress, and his preference was made a theme of Enriques’s accusations until Enrique emerged the victor. Then
he too used the Jews’ Financial services.
Popular hatred was inflamed by agitators who raised fears of the Jews’ increasing influence and demanded
cancellation of debts owed to Christ killers. Given a religious motive, economic fear can rise to fury. A fanatic
Archdeacon, Ferran Martinez, preached a version of Hitlers solution. In 1391 murder, seizure of property, and
forcible conversion of the Jews began, and this taste of violence soon turned into general insurrection against the
clergy and propertied class, culminating in 4 days of terror of Barcelona. Protection of the Jews was denounced by
the populace as treason to Christendom. Gradually, the rulers regained the upper hand, but aggression against the
Jews had been too overt and physically damaging to be repaired. They were rendered vulnerable, and Spain
susceptible, to the final expulsion 100 years later.[364]
Yet the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 ordered Jews to wear a distinguishing badge on their clothing
explicitly for the purpose of avoiding miscegenation: the fear was of Jewish men having sex with Christian women.

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Everywhere Jews were forbidden to frequent Christian prostitutes, and in Spain, where this sort of activity was
most likely, it was forbidden most severely. Local town laws provided, for example, that if a Jewish or Muslim man
had sex with a Christian woman, the man should be drawn and quartered and the woman burned at the stake.
[365]
In the year 1279, not fewer than two hundred and eighty Jews were hanged for clipping coin, a crime
which has brought many to the gallows.[366]
Jews were not only hanged from a special beam, but a cap lined with hot pitch was also placed on their
heads before they swung. It was customary to hang a dog alongside such criminals. One Jewish felon had been
condemned to hang by the feet till he was dead, but was graciously spared this punishment and strung up in a
Christian fashion.[367]
Many people believed Jews were really similar to the pigs they refused to eat. Artists portrayed Jews with
sows as hybrid creatures, and people told tales of Jews revealing their “pig like” true nature. Claudine Fabre Vassas
has detailed the complex webs of folklore, art, and myth that have linked Christian, Jews, and pigs, a tradition that
ends up equating Jews with pigs in reduction to a bestial level that marked Jews as perpetually “other” and
inferior. For merely one example, Christians equated castrated pigs with circumcised Jews as revealing a bestial
mark on both.*
Jews were also identified with owls, a bird that was consistently negative in the bestiaries, representing
sinners and other evils. In art, owls are often shown harassed by small birds, with the explanation that owls are like
Jews who are hated by Christians. Artists also often portrayed the feathered horns of owls as similar to both
horned devils and Jews, who were either reported to have hidden horns or wore horned hats.** As Christians
admired these works of art, their metaphoric significance reinforced the conception of Jews as closer to animals
than Christians.
Just as line blurring metaphors had caused Christians to put animals on trial as humans, there were
instances in which Jews were put on trial as animals. In some places, Jews were executed by being hung upside
down, a punishment reserved for homicidal animals, especially pigs. This was a particularly painful form of
hanging, because people survived several days hung upside down, instead of having their neck broken quickly in a
normal hanging. The Jews of Majorca petitioned the king of Aragon in 1315 to offer them a more humane form of
execution. The king rejected the petition, preserving the upside down hanging of beasts, but did allow for a stone
to be attached to the criminal’s neck to speed death. Even more shocking in its direct legal association of Jews
with beasts were charges of bestiality against Christians having sex with Jews. As one jurist (the Belgian Joos da
Damhoudere) remarked, he included intercourse with Turks, Saracens, or Jews as bestiality, “inasmuch as such
person in the eye of the law and our holy faith differ in no wise from beasts …” He also cites the case of a Parisian
man who was executed for having relations with his Jewish mistress, since coition with a Jewess is precisely the
same as if a man should copulate with a dog.”[368]
It is rather odd that Christian law givers should have adopted a Jewish code against sexual intercourse with
beasts and then enlarged it so as to include the Jews themselves. The question was gravely discussed by jurists,
whether cohabitation of a Christian with a Jewess or vice versa constitutes sodomy. Damhouder (Prax. Rer. Crim.
C., 96, n. 48) is of the opinion that it does, and Nicolaus Boer (Decis., 136, n. 5) cites the case of a certain Johannes
Alardus or Jean Alard, who kept a Jewess in his house in Paris and had several children by her; he was convicted of
sodomy on account of this relation and burned, together with his paramour, “since coition with a jewess is
precisely the same as if a man should copulate with a dog’ (Dopl., Theat., II. P. 157). Damhouder, in the work just
cited, includes Turks and Saracens in the same category, “inasmuch as such persons in the eye of the law and our
holy faith differ in no wise from beasts.”[369]

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 One Sabbath the sorrowful procession of the victims destined to death moved, surrounded by the raging
rabble, towards the Jewish cemetery, where a huge common grave was prepared for them on the flaming pile. On
thier was to execution the inhuman crown had even torn their clothes from their backs, and in their greed gloated
over the quantity of money found sewn in them. But few Jews, who had consented to be baptized, several women
conspicuous by their beauty, and many children, who were received in the Christian community, escaped the
tragic fate of their co religionists.
A resolution of the municipal council decreed that for the course of a whole century no Jews should be
allowed to settle at Strasbourg. All pledges and bonds the council ordered to be returned to the debtors and all
money found to be distributed among the artisans. Many, however, refused to accept such filthy blood money,
but on the advice of their confessors made it over to the monasteries; they were horrified at the scenes of
murderous greed over which the enraged populace seemed to have forgotten the plague.
It was believed to be a good work if churches were repaired with bricks and stones taken from the burnt
houses and destroyed graves of the Jews and new belfries erected. At Muehlhausen all the Jews were
slaughtered, at Nordhausen at least a part of them. The Landgrave Frederick of Thuringia Meisen, an ardent
enemy of the Jews, was so annoyed that in the latter town not all had been exterminated that in May he
addressed an urgent exhortation to the municipal council of Nordhausen to burn all Jews Immediately “for the
praise and honour of God and the benefit of Christianity.” At Basle, the town council was impelled, by the
threatening attitude of the guilds, who with unfurled banners marched to the Town Hall, to burn the Jews and
prohibit their setteling in the town for 200 years. The diabolical scheme was then conceived of Imprisoning all
Jews in a wooden shed on an island in the Rhine, outside the town, and then setting the shed on fire. As the
chronicler reports these atrocities were perpetrated exclusively on the tempestuous urging of the populace and
without legal sanction. Schaffhausen formed a laudable exception and protected the local Jews. The inhabitants
of Mayence made such fires for the burning of their Jews to the number of 12,000 that the lead in the window
panes and the bells of St. Quirius church were melted. A part of the Jews of Speyer were massacred by a raving
crowd and their bodies, placed in empty wine barrels, allowed to drift down the Rhine. Despair, however, inspired
the majority with the heroic courage to escape from the hands of the fiendish rabble by setting fire to their own
houses and perishing in the flames. It is related of a Jew of Constance, who had been baptized to save himself,
that he repented having renounced the faith of his forefathers and set fire to his house, burning himself and all the
inmates of the house, together with his precious stones and valuables. While the fire was raging he shouted
through the window to the crowd below that they would not live as Christians, but rather die as pious Jews. At
Esslingen the whole Jewish congregation were burnt in their synagogue, which they themselves had set on fire;
and in other towns mothers were seen to throw their children on the burning pile rather than to permit of their
being baptized, and then fling themselves in to the flames after them. On July 24, 1349, the Jews were burnt at
Frankfort. Here again, as at Oppenheim, many escaped from the hands of their executioners by burning
themselves. At Nuremberg all the Jews were murdered, and at Eger the gloomy “Murder Alley” still bears
testimony to the massacre of the Jews in 1350. In the Thuringian towns Gotha, Eisenach, Dennerstaedt,
Kreuzburg, Arnstadt, Ilmen, Nebra, Wiehe, Herbsleben, Thomasbruecken, Frankenhausen, and Weissensee the
Jews were slaughtered to the last man. The council of the town of Erfurt was anxious to save the Jews, and would
have stayed the hands of the burghers; but in spite of this more than a 100 were slaughtered, the rest, about 3000,
set fire to their houses and burnt themselves together with their families.[370]
Throughout the Middle Ages Jewish legend played no insignificant part in the history of Witchcraft, and,
especially in Spain, until the 19th century at least, there were prosecutions, not so much for the observance of
Hebrew ceremonies as is often suggested and supposed, but for the practice of the dark and hideous traditions of

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Hebrew magic. Closely connected with these ancient sorceries are those ritual murders, of which a learned
Premonstratensian Canon of Wilthin, Adrian Kembter, writing in 1745, was able to enumerate no less than 2 and
50, the latest of these having taken place in 1650, when at cadan in Bohemia, Matthias, a lad of 4 years old, was
killed by certain rabbis with 7 wounds. In many cases the evidence is quite conclusive that the body, and especially
the blood of the victim, was used for magical purposes. In 1261 at Forcheim in Bavaria the blood of a murdered
boy was used to sprinkle certain thresholds and doors. In 1285 at Munich a witch was convicted of selling Christian
children to the Jews, who carefully preserved the blood in curious vessels for secret rites. In 1494 at Tyrnau 12
vampires were executed for having opened the veins of a boy whom they had snared, and having drunk his warm
blood thence whilst he was yet alive. A deed of peculiar horror was discovered at Szydlow in 1597 when the victim
was put to death in exquisite tortures, the blood and several members of the body being partaken of by the
murderers. In almost every case the blood was carefully collected, there can be no doubt for magical purposes,
the underlying idea being the precept of the mosaic law: For the life of all flesh is in the blood thereof.[371]

Fig. 129.). A Jew is hung in White Stone / Swabia in 1553 along with two dogs on the feet. The woodcut comes
from the Swiss chronicle of Johann Stumpf
Fig. 130.). Jews taking the Blood from Christian Children, for their Mystic Rites. From a Pen and Ink Drawing,
illuminated in the Book of the Cabala of Abrham the Jew (Library of the Asenal, Paris).
Though there were some great lords who were allowed by the king to have Jewish vassals, the great
majority of Jews depended directly on the king. This resulted in a close relationship between Crown and jews.
Jews paid the king taxes, taxes that came to represent an important fraction of the funds available to him. Jews
also served the royal court as administrators, physicians, ambassadors, translators, as well as in a variety of other
capacities. In exchange, they were closely subject to the jurisdiction of royal officials and depended on royal
authority for protection. In some ways this close relationship to the monarchy resulted in increased acculturation,
since participation in royal service involved a number of Jews in Christian social and political structures. But it also
isolated the Jews, since it forced them to depend almost entirely on the king, who was but one among several
competing powers in the Crwon. The costs of this dependence were most obvious when royal power was at a low
ebb. In 1283, for example when a Union rose up against King Peter III “the Great,’ it attacked royal; administration
by demanding that the king was forced to grant in perpetuity.
Muslims were in a very different position. In theory, the king claimed ultimate jurisdiction over all muslims
in his realms. Like the Jews, Muslims were “the royal treasure”; that is, they had a special relationship of
dependence to the Crown and this relationship brought them special rights. But in fact, the great majority of

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Mudejars were direct vassals of lay and ecclesiastical lords rather than of the king. By the 14th century, the kind
directly controlled most urban Muslim communities, as well as Muslim tenants on royal lands, but he rarely
interfered in the affairs of the many Muslims working seigneurial lands. This meant that in addition to the king, all
the landowning oligarchies of the Crown also had an interest in protection the Mudejars, since in New Catalonia
and especially in Aragon and Valencia, Muslims constituted an important part of the agricultural labor force.
Lords depended on Mudejars not only because they were numerous, but also because they were relatively
cheap. There are few unequivocal data, but it seems that Muslim vassals paid their lords slightly higher rents and
higher taxes, and in turn received smaller plots of land, than their Christian counterparts. Perhaps as a result of
this, Muslims came to symbolize peasant status in the eyes of some Chiristians, and to represent subjection to
exploitative lordship: hence complaints like that of an Aragonese Christian in 1323 that he and hes fellows were
treated “worse than Muslims” by their lord, or popular sayings like “He who has no Muslim has no money.”
Under the Alfonsine jurisdiction promulgated by Alfonso the Benign, a landlord need have only 7 Muslim
tenants in order to claim seigneurial jurisdiction over them, whereas if the tenants were Christian he needed
15.[372]
Armed robbery of travelers, for example, was frequent and ecumenical. One robber, the noble Pere
Zapara of Morvedre, once killed 3 Jewish merchants on the royal highway, robbing them of 2,000 sous; attacked 3
Christian merchants from Provence, killing one while making off with 5,000 sous; and despoiled 3 Muslim
merchants of 3,000 sous. Certainly no contemporary was blind to the worldly motives of robbers. Nevertheless,
when attempting to mobilizie justive on their own behalf, Jewish and Muslim victims appealed on the basis of their
religious, hence juridical, identitiy. After a Jewish woman of Agramunt was injured by 2 Christians, ithe aljama
urged the kingto act: “Because the Jews are your subjects and serfs, it is feared that if this deed is not punished
with great and worthy vengeance,” others would begin to attack the Jews, who could then not collect terces and
fadiges (i.e., tacesd) on the king’s behalf, which would be to the great detriment of the Crown. The letter
continued: “The said Jews live beneath…your name and your highness.”If the Christians were not daunted by fear
of the king, wrote the Jews, nothing would restarain them, for the Christians knew “that the said Jews canoot
wreak vengeance upon them.” In this was Jewish legal status transformed what we might call ‘random violence”
against an individual into an issue of religious status and identity affecting an entire group. Religious violence,
therefore, is here defined as violence across religious boundaries. I believe such violence was relatively rare. The
majority of altercations took place within religious communities, not across them. [373]
Whatever the percedents, it is clear that before February of 1321, communities in the areas of Toulouse,
Albi, and Carcassonne were petitioning the French monarchy to expel the Jews from France and to segregate the
lepers. The petitioners generously declared themselves willing to administer all the revenues and pious donations
that had had accrued to the lepers, and in exchange to provide for the lepers’ maintenance. Segregation was
necessary, they claimed, because the lepers intended to infect the whole country with their illness by poison and
sorcery. The lepers also provided Jews with consecrated Hosts, which the Jews desecrated. Moreover, Jews had
sex with the wives of their Christian debtors and committed other horrible crimes, all of which merited their
expulsion.
The municipal petition to the king was not received favorably (if indeed it was received at all), so municipal
officials took matters into their own hands. During Holy Week, 1321, the mayor of perigueux ordered the lepers
arrested. Rumors of crimes committed by the lepers had been circulating since earlier in the spring, but now the
lepers were seized and tortured by judicial officials. Many confessed and were burned.
Few of these early confessions survive. Most probably resembled the confession of the leper Johan de
Bosco before officials of the town of “Regale ville” (France). Johan was from Alterque, and on the 16th of May he

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appeared before the officials “free of all jail chains” of the leprosarium of Alterque, had brought two bags full of a
“pessimam” powder and ordered Johan to put this powder in the fountains, waters, and rivers of diverse areas.
The powder would poison the waters so that anyone who drank from them would either die or turn leprous.
Geraldus then gave Johan 20 sous as payment, and 10 sous for expenses. The rest of the confession lists the
dozens of villages Johan visited, poisoning wells and rivers in each place. According to Johan, he was caught in
“locum Regalis ville” when he was seen leaving a well he had just poisoned. Johan claimed not to know the recipe
for the powder, but he believed that anyone who drank it would turn leprous or die within 2 months.
Perhaps in response to confessions like this one, officials in towns throughout the region began arresting,
condemning, and executing lepers on charges of poisoning. Unlike the Shepherds’ Crusade, the attack on the
lepers was carried out by municipal authorities, not mobs of rioters. The violence was therefore judicial in form,
though nevertheless extralegal, since such actions on the part of the municipalities were a clear usurpation of royal
judicial prerogatives. Royal officers were unable to intervene effectively, and municipal authorities notified the
king of their actions only after the fact. Municipal officials were well aware that their actions constituted a direct
challenge to royal authority. Hence in 1342 the town council of Perigueux found it politic to rewrite the history of
1321 and stressed its role as defender of the monarchy: “Since the plague stricked mob of lepers had
rebelled…against the royal magnificence…the infamy and the odious crime discovered, with out lord the king
notified of them as quickly as possible…the said consuls, like true champions of justice…” In 1321, however, they
and their colleagues persisted in what could only be called open rebellion.
King Philip V was in Poitiers presiding over an assembly of southern towns when messengers reached him
from those places that were acting against the lepers. Upon receiving the news, the king took immediate action.
On the 21st of June, he issued an edict ordering the burning of any leper who confessed to having poisoned the
waters. Torture should be used against those who did not confess spontaneously. Those lepers who were
innocent, and any under 14years of age, were to be imprisoned in their places of origin. Most ombiously, the
crime of the lepers was declared one of lese majeste. All their goods theresfore reverted to the Crown, and
jurisdiction over their crimes belonged exclusively to the king, not to any temporal lords.[374]
Christian anxiety about marriage and sexual intercourse with non Christians was an ancient phenomenon,
a feature of the earliest churches (e.g., Cor., 7:12 16) and the subject of canonical restrictions well before it drew
the attention of newly converted Christian Roman emperors as a fitting subject for secular law. This it did soon
enough. The “union” of Jews with Christian women (or at least with those who worked in Imperial weaving
factories) was forbidden by the emperor Constantius as early as 339. By 388 the prohibition was generalized:
No jew shall receive a Christian woman in marriage, nor shall a Christian man contract a marriage with a
Jewish woman. For if any person should commit an act of this kind, the crime of this misdeed shall be considered
as the equivalent of adultery, and freedom to bring accusation shall be granted also to the voices of the public.
This edict would have momentous consequences. Not only did it make intermarriage a crime susceptible
to public accusation, but its preservation in the amber of the Theodosian Code encouraged its reincorporation into
later medieval adaptations of Roman law.[375]
The Jewish law is better than the Muslim law: first, because it comes from God, whose authorship of
Mosaic law is accepted by all; and second, as Augustine put it, because it contains the laws and prophecies that
proclaim the coming of Christ. Just as the law of the jew is closer than that of the Muslims to Christianity, so are
the Jews closer to Christ, for they are branches cut from the olive tree that is Christ. “It follows that the Jew is
closer to the Church, who is a branch cut from the olive that is Christ and has a greater part in him, than the Moor,
who has no connection with him.” The future, like the past, proves the superiority of Jew over Muslim: at the end
of days 144,000 Jews will fall fighting against the Antichrist on behalf of the Christian faith, whereas the Muslims

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will fight for him. As for Muslim law, it was authored by Satan, which adds that Muhammad wrote it at the
instigation of a cardinal named Sergius who was angry at being passed over for pope.[376]
So Jews were stigmatized as attendants of Satan or the antichrist. From Christs words to the Jews who
rejected him (John VIII): ‘Ye are of your father the devil, and the lust of your fathers ye will do’, it was but a short
step to seeing Jews as foul an unclean beings who must be destroyed to make the earth a fit place for the pure and
clean in heart. In innumerable commentaries on the Book of Revelation, Luxuria and Avaritia are noted as marks
of the Antichrist; so the Jews joined the rich as well as the impure as those for whom the Kingdom of Heaven was
unattainable.
One must remember, too, that Islamic law also required circumcision, and Moslems were frequently
polygynous, which was equated by Christians as lechery on a grand scale. The churches above mentioned were all
at some time under Moslem domination or influence. Mention of the Droiturier ape also calls to mind the easy
association that linked Moors with Barbary apes. Moors were dark, ‘barbaric’, hence ‘bestial’. Male apes are well
known for their frequent, and in extreme cases, continual masturbation, in the cruel and depriving conditions of
captivity. In Romanesque sculpture, apes are frequently chained, either together or to a trainer, symbolizing the
captivityof sin on the one hand and the victory of Christiantiy over sin, or Islam. [377]

The Judensau

Fig. 131.). Medieval, anti Semitic stone sculpture "Judensau" (Jew´s Sow) at the church "Ritterstiftskirche St. Peter"
in Bad Wimpfen, Germany. The original is in a museum and a replica "adorns" the church.
Fig. 132.). 1305 stone carving “Judensau” (Jew pig) on the outside Wittenberg City Church, where Martin Luther
preached. A rabbi is looking under the sow’s tail & Jews drinking from the sow´s teats. The inscription ‘Rabini Shem
hamphoras’ bastardizes a name of God. Luther wrote in 1543 the anti Semitic pamphlet "Vom Schem Hamphoras".
Today, the stone carving is contrasted by a nearby monument commemorating the six million Jews murdered by
the Nazis ‘under the sign of the cross’.”
A Judensau (German for "Jews' sow" or "Jewish sow"), also known as Saujude is a folk art image of Jews in
obscene contact with a large sow (female pig), which in Judaism is an unclean animal, that appeared during the
13th century in Germany and some other European countries; its popularity lasted for over 600 years. In Nazi
Germany, classes of German schoolchildren were sent to see the Judensau on German churches and the term
remains extant as a neo Nazi insult.

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From an 18th century etching from Brückenturm. Above: The murdered body of Simon of Trent. Below: The
"Judensau.’
The Jewish prohibition against eating pork comes from Torah, in the Book of Leviticus Chapter 11, verses 2
through 8. The arrangement of Jews surrounding, suckling, and having intercourse with the animal (sometimes
regarded as the devil), is a mockery of Judaism and example of antisemitic propaganda.
The image appears in the Middle Ages, mostly in carvings on church or cathedral walls, often outside
where it could be seen from the street (for example at Wittenberg and Regensburg), but also in other forms. The
earliest appearance seems to be on the underside of a wooden choir stall seat in Cologne Cathedral, dating to
about 1210. The earliest example in stone dates to ca. 1230 and is located in the cloister of the cathedral at
Brandenburg. In about 1470 the image appeared in woodcut form, and thereafter was often copied in popular
prints, often with antisemitic commentary. A wall painting on the bridge tower of Frankfurt am Main, constructed
between 1475 and 1507 near the gateway to the Jewish ghetto and demolished in 1801, was an especially
notorious example and included a scene of the ritual murder of Simon of Trent.
The city of Wittenberg contains a Judensau from 1305, on the facade of the Stadtkirche, the church where
Martin Luther preached. It portrays a rabbi who looks under the sow's tail, and other Jews drinking from its teats.
An inscription reads "Rabini Schem HaMphoras," gibberish which presumably bastardizes "shem ha meforasch"
(see Shemhamphorasch). The sculpture is one of the last remaining examples in Germany of "medieval Jew
baiting." In 1988, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Kristallnacht, debate sprung up about the
monument, which resulted in the addition of a sculpture recognizing that during the Holocaust six million Jews
were murdered "under the sign of the cross".
In Vom Schem Hamphoras (1543), Luther comments on the Judensau sculpture at Wittenberg, echoing the
antisemitism of the image and locating the Talmud in the sow's bowels:
“Here on our church in Wittenberg a sow is sculpted in stone. Young pigs and Jews lie suckling under her.
Behind the sow a rabbi is bent over the sow, lifting up her right leg, holding her tail high and looking intensely
under her tail and into her Talmud, as though he were reading something acute or extraordinary, which is certainly
where they get their Shemhamphoras.”[378]

Fig. 133.). Copperplate engraving in Johann Jacob Schudt's “Jüdische Merckwürdigkeiten”

Fig. 134.) A Murdered child, a pig, devil and three jews An engraving showing two images, on the top a altar like
platform with a murdered child, underneath a 'Judensau', a pig on which a Jew is riding backwards, from which
another Jew is sucking, and with a third Jew, assisted by the devil, eating the pig's excrement.

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 Circumcision
Some Jewish writers devalued pleasure in marital sex. Maimonides held that the purpose of circumcision
was to decresase sexual desire. While some suggested that letting the wife reach orgasm first would promote
conception of a son, Isaac ben Ydaiah, a 13th century provencal follower of Maimonides, suggested that
circumcision reduced sexual pleasure for the woman because the man reached orgasm more quickly, and that this
was a good thing:
He will find himself performing his task quickly, emitting his seed as soon as he inserts the crown. If he lies
with her once, he sleeps satisfied, and will not know her again for another 7 days. This is the way the
circumcised man acts time after time with the woman he loves. He has an orgasm first; he does not hold
back his strength. As soon as he begins intercourse with her, he immediately comes to a climax. She has
no pleasure from him when she lies down or when she arises, and it would be better for her if he had not
known her and not drawn near to her, for he arouses her passion to no avail, and she remains in a state of
desire for her husband, ashamed and confounded.
This contrasted with sex with an uncircumcised man, which lasted so long that the woman would derive great
pleasure and demand more frequent sex, leading to the man’s distraction from all other matters:
She too will court the man who is uncircumcised in the flesh and lie against his breast with great passion,
for he thrusts inside her a long time because of the foreskin, which is a barrier against ejaculation in intercourse.
Thus she feels pleasure and reaches an orgasm first. When an uncircumcised man sleeps with her and then
resolves to return to his home, she brazenly grasps him, holding on to his genitals, and says to him, “Come back,
make love to me.” This is because of the pleasure that she finds in intercourse with him, from the sinews of his
testicles sinew or iron and from his ejaculation that of a horse which he shoots like an arrow into her womb. They
are united without separating, and he makes love twice and three times in one night, yet the appetite is not filled.
Jewish law required a man to grant his wife her right to sexual intercourse (onah). This doctrine
resemebled the Christian one of the marriage debt, except that for Jews only the man owed it to the woman.
Onah was not only for the sake of procreation, but also for pleasure; she had the right to it even if she were
pregnant, or too old to conceive. The frequency of the required sexual relations depended on a variety of factors,
including the status of the husband. The purpose of onah seems to have been to remove from a woman the
possibility of sexual temptation because of insufficient intercourse with her husband. The Tosafist Rabbi Meir b.
Baruch of Rothenburg held that a husband who had not slept with his wife in 2 years could be required by a
rabbinical court to divorce her at her request, and could be fined heavily until he did so. She retained full rights to
her ketubah (contractual marriage payment). A wife who refused to sleep with her husband lost rights to the
ketubah if he divorced her.[379]
French Jews also seem more concerned than their Aragonese counterparts about the possibility that
Jewish women will be attracted to Christians: “She too will court the man who is uncircumcised in the flesh and lie
against his breast with great passion, for he thrusts inside her a long time because of the foreskin….When an
uncircumcised man sleeps with her and then resolves to return to his home, she brazenly grasps him, holding on to
his genitals, and says to him, ‘Come back, make love to me.’ This is because of the pleasure that she finds in
intercourse with him, for the sinews of his testicles sinew of iron and from his ejaculation that of a horse which he
shoots like an arrow into her womb.” Circumcised Jews, on the other hand, not only give their wives little
pleasure, but are often too tired to have sex at all, since they work so hard in Gentile lands.[380]

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 Whatever the case, some monks could not wait until Judgment Day and were not willing to postpone
punishment until the next world, especially for sins committed within the cloister. Sometime after 1140, Abbot
Ailred of Rievaulx recorded an event at the Gilbertine convent of Watton, where a wayward oblate nun fell in love
with a handsome monk. ‘The winding serpent slithered his way into both their breasts and gladdened the vitals of
the man’, in consequence whereof they ‘sowed the garden of love’. Their clandenstine meetings could not long
continue without discovery, and the sudden disappearance of the monk confirmed suspicions. The nun was forced
to confess her love, and the nuns were so outraged that they suggested extreme punishments: to be skinned alive,
burned, or roasted over a slow fire. In the event, she was merely beaten, shackled and fettered and thrown into
the convent prison. When her belly began to swell, the nuns decided to send her packing after her lover, the
pregnant girl having told them, under duress no doubt, where to find him. Instead of pairing them off and sending
them in disgrace into the secular world, however, the monk was seized, thrown on the floor and a knife was thrust
into his hand. He was forced to castrate himself. Then one of the more zealous nuns snatched up the bloody
organs and thrust them in his mistress’ mouth. Abbot Aqilred praised not their deed, but their zeal in protecting
their chastity. [381]

The Blood Libel

Fig. 135.). The "Blood Libel" (The Damascus Affair)

Fig. 136.). Simon of Trent blood libel. Illustration in Hartmann Schedel's Weltchronik, 1493
In England in 1144, Jews of Norwich were accused of ritual murder after a boy, William of Norwich, was
found dead with stab wounds in the woods. William's hagiographer, Thomas of Monmouth, claimed that every
year there is an international council of Jews at which they choose the country in which a child will be killed during
Easter, because, he claimed, of a Jewish prophecy that states that the killing of a Christian child each year will
ensure that the Jews will be restored to the Holy Land. In 1144, England was chosen, and the leaders of the Jewish
community delegated the Jews of Norwich to perform the killing. They then abducted and crucified William. The
legend was turned into a cult, with William acquiring the status of a martyr and pilgrims bringing offerings to the
local church.
This was followed by similar accusations in Gloucester (1168), Bury St Edmunds (1181) and Bristol (1183).
In 1189, the Jewish deputation attending the coronation of Richard the Lionheart was attacked by the crowd.
Massacres of Jews at London and York soon followed. In 1190 on March 16, 150 Jews were attacked in York and
then massacred when they took refuge in the royal castle, where Clifford's Tower now stands, with some

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committing suicide rather than being taken by the mob. The remains of 17 bodies thrown in a well in Norwich
between the 12th and 13th century (five that were shown by DNA testing to likely be members of a single Jewish
family) were very possibly killed as part of one of these pogroms.
After the death of Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln, there were a series of trials and executions of Jews.[24] The
case is mentioned by Chaucer, and thus has become well known. The eight year old Hugh disappeared at Lincoln
on 31 July 1255. His body was discovered on 29 August, covered with filth, in a pit or well belonging to a Jewish
man named Copin or Koppin. On being promised by John of Lexington, a judge, who happened to be present, that
his life should be spared, Copin is said to have confessed that the boy had been crucified by the Jews, who had
assembled at Lincoln for that purpose. King Henry III, on reaching Lincoln at the beginning of October, refused to
carry out the promise of John of Lexington, and had Copin executed and 91 of the Jews of Lincoln seized and sent
up to London, where 18 of them were executed. The rest were pardoned at the intercession of the Franciscans
(Jacobs, Jewish Ideals, pp. 192–224). Within a few decades, Jews would be expelled from all of England in 1290 and
not allowed to return until 1657.
The first known case outside England was in Blois, France, in 1171. This was the site of a blood libel
accusation against the town's entire Jewish community that led to around 31 Jews being burned to death. The
blood libel revolved around Isaac bar Eleazar, a Jewish resident of Blois, who was accused by a Christian servant of
throwing a child into a watering hole. The child's body was never found, and all the Jews who lived in Blois were
killed for the alleged ritual murder. Thomas of Monmouth's story of the annual Jewish meeting to decide which
local community would kill a Christian child also quickly spread to the continent. An early version appears in
Bonum Universale de Apibus ii. 29, § 23, by Thomas of Cantimpré (a monastery near Cambray). Thomas wrote "It is
quite certain that the Jews of every province annually decide by lot which congregation or city is to send Christian
blood to the other congregations." Thomas of Cantimpré also believed that since the time when the Jews called
out to Pontius Pilate, "His blood be on us, and on our children" (Matthew 27:25), they have been afflicted with
hemorrhages:
A very learned Jew, who in our day has been converted to the (Christian) faith, informs us that one
enjoying the reputation of a prophet among them, toward the close of his life, made the following prediction: 'Be
assured that relief from this secret ailment, to which you are exposed, can only be obtained through Christian
blood ("solo sanguine Christiano").' This suggestion was followed by the ever blind and impious Jews, who
instituted the custom of annually shedding Christian blood in every province, in order that they might recover from
their malady.
Thomas added that the Jews had misunderstood the words of their prophet, who by his expression "solo
sanguine Christiano" had meant not the blood of any Christian, but that of Jesus – the only true remedy for all
physical and spiritual suffering. Thomas did not mention the name of the "very learned" proselyte, but it may have
been Nicholas Donin of La Rochelle, who in 1240 had a disputation on the Talmud with Yechiel of Paris, and who in
1242 caused the burning of numerous Talmudic manuscripts in Paris. It is known that Thomas was personally
acquainted with this Nicholas.
At Weissenburg, a miracle alone decided the charge against the Jews. According to the accusation, the
Jews had suspended a child (whose body was found in the Lauter river) by the feet, and had opened every artery in
his body to obtain all the blood. Again, supernatural claims were made: the child's wounds were said to have bled
for five days afterward, despite its treatment.
At Oberwesel, "miracles" again constituted the only evidence against the Jews. The corpse of the 11 year
old Werner of Oberwesel was said to have floated up the Rhine (against the current) as far as Bacharach, emitting
radiance, and being invested with healing powers. In consequence, the Jews of Oberwesel and many other

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adjacent localities were severely persecuted during the years 1286 89. Emperor Rudolph I, to whom the Jews had
appealed for protection, issued a public proclamation to the effect that great wrong had been done to the Jews,
and that the corpse of Werner was to be burned and the ashes scattered to the winds.
A statement was made, in the "Chronicle" of Konrad Justinger of 1423, that at Bern in 1294 the Jews
tortured and murdered a boy called Rudolph. The historical impossibility of this widely credited story was
demonstrated by Jakob Stammler, pastor of Bern, in 1888. It has been speculated whether the
Kindlifresserbrunnen ("Child Eater Fountain") in Bern might refer to the alleged ritual murder of 1294.
Renaissance and Baroque
Simon of Trent, aged two, disappeared, and his father alleged that he had been kidnapped and murdered
by the local Jewish community. Fifteen local Jews were sentenced to death and burned. Simon was regarded
locally as a saint, although he was never canonised by the church of Rome under Pope Sixtus V in 1588. His local
status as a saint was removed in 1965 by Pope Paul VI.
Christopher of Toledo, also known as Christopher of La Guardia or "the Holy Child of La Guardia," was a
four year old Christian boy supposedly murdered by two Jews and three Conversos (converts to Christianity). In
total, eight men were executed. It is now believed that this case was constructed by the Spanish Inquisition to
facilitate the expulsion of Jews from Spain. He was canonized by Pope Pius VII in 1805. Christopher has since been
removed from the canon.
In a case at Tyrnau (Nagyszombat, today Trnava, Slovakia), the absurdity, even the impossibility, of the
statements forced by torture from women and children shows that the accused preferred death as a means of
escape from the torture, and admitted everything that was asked of them. They even said that Jewish men
menstruated, and that the latter therefore practiced the drinking of Christian blood as a remedy.
At Bösing (Bazin, today Pezinok, Slovakia), it was charged that a nine year old boy had been bled to death,
suffering cruel torture; thirty Jews confessed to the crime and were publicly burned. The true facts of the case
were disclosed later, when the child was found alive in Vienna. He had been taken there by the accuser, Count
Wolf of Bazin, as a means of ridding himself of his Jewish creditors at Bazin.
At Rinn, near Innsbruck, a boy named Andreas Oxner (also known as Anderl von Rinn) was said to have
been bought by Jewish merchants and cruelly murdered by them in a forest near the city, his blood being carefully
collected in vessels. The accusation of drawing off the blood (without murder) was not made until the beginning of
the 17th century, when the cult was founded. The older inscription in the church of Rinn, dating from 1575, is
distorted by fabulous embellishments – for example, that the money paid for the boy to his godfather turned into
leaves, and that a lily blossomed upon his grave. The cult continued until officially prohibited in 1994, by the
Bishop of Innsbruck.
On 17 January 1670 Raphael Levy, a member of the Jewish community of Metz, was executed on charges of the
ritual murder of a peasant child who had gone missing in the woods outside the village of Glatigny on 25
September 1669, the eve of Rosh Hashanah.[382]

Muslim
Ambassadors from Genoa met the King at Toulouse, bringing a proposal for a “grand and noble enterprise”
against the Berber Kingdom of Tunis. They wanted French chivalry to lead a campaign to suppress the Barbary
pirates who, with the unofficial support of their slave markets. Assuming that France, since the truce with
England, was free of inquietude, the Genoese felt that her knights, “having nothing to do, would be glad to join in
the warfare.” The proposed objective was Mahdia, (Called “Africa” or Auffrique” by the Europeans of the time,

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and sometimes confused by them with Carthage, the ancient Tunis.) the pirates’ main base and the best port on
the Tunisian coast. With this great stronghold in Christian hands, the ambassadors told King Charles, the power of
the Berber kings would be broken, and they could be destroyed or converted. Genoa offered to supply the
necessary fleet, provision, archers, and foot soldiers in return for the French combat arm knights and squires only,
no servants led by a prince of the royal family to ensure a genuine commitment.
Given the infidel as enemy, the proposal was dressin all the aura of a crusade, and doused in flattery. For
her historic exploits against the infidels, said the ambassadors, the name of France was feared as far as India,
enough in itself to halt Turks and Saracens. (Saracen was a term used indiscriminately for all Moslems, whether
Berbers, Arabs, Moors, or Turks.) The infidels, they warned dominate Asia and Africa: they have entered Europe,
they threaten Constantinople, frighten Hungary, occupy Granada. But supported by Genoa, a French campaign
would be short, and the glory long. “A fine thing for your sovereignty,: they told Charles, “for you are the greatest
King among Christians and have so much renown.”[383]
Muslim women who had sex with Christian men were often enslaved by Christians if not punished by their
own communities.[384]
Although the Moors were finally driven out “the total collapse of Moorish civilization remains one of the
mysteries of history,” writes Cecilia Hill in Moorish Towns in Spain The legacy of superstition and mysticism with
which they infused Spain lives on. By the late 15th century, as a result of the furor over the infamous Torralba case,
the Grand Inquisitor, Don Alfonso Manriquez, felt obliged to issue an edict enjoining all good Christians to report to
the tribunal any instances of their fellow citizens practicing magic. Specifically he asked for reports on persons
invoking spirits for divination purposes; persons reading of keeping grimoires or other magical manuscripts;
persons making mirrors, vials of glass, “or other vessels in order thereby to control or therein to contain some
spirit who should reply to his inquiries and aid his projects.” And not only the practice of astrology was banned, but
also a formidable list of related divinatory arts including geomancy (earth), hydromancy (water), aeromancy (air or
weather), pyromancy (fire), anthroposcopy (facial features), theomancy (oracles), cleromancy (dice or lots),
cheiromancy (hands), oneiromance (dreams), capnomance (smoke), tephromancy (sacrificial ashes), necromancy
(communication with spirits of the dead), “or any other magic craft.”
The main event that brought all this about, the Torralba case, had been concluded in 1528 when a man
named Zugriga confessed to the Inquisition that he had copied from an occult tect a magical formula that had
brought him success at gaming. The book had been handed to him, he said, by his friend Eugenio Torralba, a man
who while in the household service of the Bishop of Volterra had studied medicine and acquired a spirit named
Zequiel who kept him informed of various plots against church officials and taught him palmistry and the casting of
the horoscopes.
Zugriga told the Inquisition that Torralba had instructed him to copy the magical formula from the book in
his own hand, and to do it on a Wednesday the day dedicated to Mercury, god of sharpers and thieves. Torralba,
he said, had also boasted of being conducted to Rome by some magical aerial transport that flew him there and
back with great speed.
Denounced by a repentant Zugriga possibly his gaming luck had declined Torralba was arrested and
examined. He was condemned to make a public abjuration of his heresy and magic and had to wear the heretics
san benito, a yellow garment emblazoned with a cross
But the most far reaching effect of this notorious case was the Grand Inquisitors edict, which in addition to
the prohibitions already listed also denounced those who entertained familiars and flies. This last reference is the
clearest possible reminder that Moorish magic was still prevalent, it being an ancient Arabic belief that 3 million

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flies had once been imprisoned by Solomon in a bottle of black glass and kept safely in a well near Babylon until
Locals in search of treasure broke the bottle and released them. [385]
The Moorish presence in Spain, which left so rich a legacy of art, magic, and occultism, was centered in
Granada for almost 5 centuries. And became an actuality only after Spain itself formerly a mélange of different
kingdoms (Barcelona, Galicia, Aragon, Castile) had become unified. The driving force behind the Arab invasion was
the new found militancy and sense of identity instilled by Mohammed (born about A.D. 571). And by the time of
his death on June 8, 632, the Moors themselves, once a group of warring tribes, had become a nation.
Musa, the governor of Barbary, crossed the Mediterranean to capture Saragosa in the year 714, and within
100 years of Mohammed’s death Islam controlled an empire which, expanding east and west from Alexandria,
stretched from the Bay of Biscay almost to China. Greece and Asia Minor eluded their control, but most of the
Mediterranean was under their sway and the rest of Europe trembled with anxiety about this dark skinned,
distinctly non Christian race and knew no peace until they were eventually ousted from the Continent in the 13th
century. [386]
Turks, who have led a particularly wicked life, when at the point of death, turn into wild boars, and the ring
worn by the man on his finger is retained on one of the boar’s forefeet. The metamorphosis takes place as follows:
the sinner first begins to grunt like a pit, he then falls on all four, and finally rushes out of the house grunting wildly
and leaping over hedges, ditches, and rivers until he has reached the open country. At night he visits the houses of
his friends, and more especially those of his foes, and knows at their doors for admittance. He chases with evil
intent all those whom he meets in the way, and generally makes himself disagreeable. This he continues doing for
forty days, and at the end of that period he betakes himself to the mountains where he abides as a wild
beast.[387]
For example, virtually the same general legal and ethical principles justified to Christians the existence of
Jews throughout Christian Europe. It is tempting to argue that the Islamis concept of dhimmi status survived in
Spain even after that land was reconquered from the Muslims. This status allowed “Peoples of the Book” (i.e.,
Christians and Jews) living in Islamic states to practice their religion privately in relative freedom, though burdened
by higher taxes and some restrictions on dress and social interaction.
Similarly, the protection that Muslims and Jews enjoyed at law in the Crown of Aragon stemmed from the
same legal fiction that legitimated the protection of Jews in France, England, or Germany: That all jews (and
Muslims) were slaves to the king’s chamber, his royal treasure, and therefore not to be harmed by anyone except,
of course, the king himself.[388]
Muslims suffered more than Jews from accusations of well poisoning in 1321, though here, too, the scope
of the accusations was very limited. In some respects, the greater vulnerability of Muslims to such charges is not
surprising. Though studies of 1321 in France have assigned to the Muslims a “purely symbolic” role of distant
enemy in the accusations, in Spain they represented as immediate and more convincing political threat than the
Jews did , since Muslim, not Jewish, armies threatened Christendom. Given the real and constant fear of Muslim
incursions along the Valencian frontiers (Oriola, Alacant, Guardamar…), it is curious that most accusations against
Muslims came not from these borderlands but from the long reconquered northeast.
In Catalonia especially royal officials seem to have been very active. The magnates Oto de Montcada and
Berenguer de Entencia complained to King James that his vicae in Lleida, together with an assessor, notaries, and
an armed troop, had visited Oto’s castles at Aytona and Gilsuto, and Berenguer’s castle of Seros, and demanded
that the bailiffs there surrender Muslims “accused of infecting the waters.’ The bailiffs had refused, so the vicar
was proceeding against them. All of this, the nobles complained, was against custom and ancient usage. Perhaps
because these were important people, the king ordered his vicar not to infringe their rights. It is hard to know that

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lay behind this excursion into seigneurial territory: a conflict between royal and seigneurial officals? Between
municipality and landed magnates? Were the nobles protecting suspected prisoners, or asserting their rights to
judge them themselves.[389]
The famines of 1333, remembered later as “the first bad year,” caused riots in Barcelona against municipal
councilmen, not against the Jews. When the Carmelite friar Bernat Puig preached on Christmas Day 1333, instead
of “sowing peace” and “inducing the populace, as he ought, to endure the high wheat prices patiently,” he said
only that the city councilors had caused the famine by hoarding grain, and that “it was fitting that God should give
the city tribulations and anguishes, because of its evil government [regimen]. Famines in Valencia were perhaps
more severe, and events there took a different turn. In 1326 the Valencian municipal council attempted to restrict
contacts among Christians, Muslims, and Jews in order to control sinful activity that was raising the wrath of God
against the city. In 1335 the council again wrote to the king, informing him of their certainty that hideous sins had
been committed in the city and its hinterlands, namely, sexual liasions between Christians and Muslims, as well as
sodomy between Muslims. These sins, it was said, were the cause of the present troubles, since they corrupted
the air, and since God punished them by beating his people with pestilence, drought, sudden deaths, and famine.
These were complex claims, with complex motivations. They did not, however, attribute any malevolence to
groups. What was at issue was the propensity of individuals (especially Muslims and Christains) to certain types of
sin. If society was at risk, it was not from corporate enmities (Jews, lepers, Muslims, Templars, or any other group
plotting against society) but from the disruptive behavior of sinful individuals.
It is especially striking that the municipality of Valencia did not further pursue the acussation made in 1321
of Jews or Muslims with poisoners, because it did so in the case of another group: women. The belief that women
(especially midwives and herbal healers) could use their medicines both to cure and to kill was an old one, already
formulated, for example, by Plato. A similar theme appears in the Visigothic code, which itself became a soure for
later law in the Crown of Aragon. The 13th century fuero of Albarracin, for example, dedicated a number of articles
to women who prepared abortificacients, potions, and poisons.[390]
For the sake of simplicity, both interfaith sexuality and the violence it generated can be divided into 2
types, that involving majority males and minority females, and that of majority females with minority males.
By far the more common of these was the former, specifically between Christian males and Muslim
females, and its violent result was generally the enslavement of (much less frequently) the execution of muslim
women. These women committed 2 crimes when they had sex with Christians: they violated Christian las
anagainst miscegenation, and they violated Muslim legal prohibitions on sexual intercourse outside of marriage.
Both these crimes carried severe penalties that were routinely commuted to the “socla death’ of enslavement to
the Crown. Since this proved extremely profitable both for the Crown and for accusers, who received as reward a
portion of the enslaved woman’s sale price, Meuslim women who slept with Christians ran a high risk of “losing
their persons.” Accusations against such women were often brought by their own families, or by officials of the
Muslim aljama, but they could also come from Christians eager for profit, or even from the woman’s sexual
partner. This last possibility was vividly illustrated by john Boswell in the context of a royal grant to the monatery
of Roda. In 1356 King Peter granted to the monastery rights over all Muslim women under its jurisdicition
convicted of sleeping with Christians but had to alter his grant in 1357 to exclude those women convisec of
sleeping with the monks themselves. Evidently the monks of Roda (and there are other examples) sought both
financial gain and sexual recreation by “seducing” Muslim women, then denouncing the objects of their desire and
having them enslaved.[391]
Muslims, or rather Muslim males, encountered within their own tradition somewhat less stringent
prohibitions on miscegenation than Chrisitans and Jews did, at least in theory. According to classical Islamic

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jurisprudence, Muslim men could marry Christian or Jewish women (the children would be Muslim), but of course,
on Muslim political superiority. In areas where Muslims were subject to Chrisitians, however as in the Crown of
Aragon, such laws could not be observed in practice, since Christian law denied Muslim males the same right
Muslim jurisprudence allowed them. Though it is difficult to find evidence of these practical limitations in the
surviving Mudejar law codes, which repeat the precepts of classical jurisprudencde even when these are
inapplicable to the reality of Muslim life as a minority, they are clearly apparent in handbooks of religious
instruction like the so called Brevaiario Sunni, written by Yce de Gebir, a Segovian Muslim in 1462. Here the
prohibition on interfaith sexuality is absolute: “Whether men or women, they cshall not sleep with nor marry
infidels.
Despite Yce’s evenhandedness, there was something of a double standard in the enforcement of
antimiscegenation laws in minority (as in majority) communities. Jewish men often slept with non Jews (generally
Muslims: see the following chapter) with little formal sanction from their communities. Jewish women suffered
corporal punishment, exile, or death for the same crime. Because Oro de par, a Jewish woman of Zaragoza,
consorted with Muslim (and Christian) men, the Jewish aljama asked the king to have her disfigured and exiled.
Jewish officials were afraid to act on their own, the petititioners claimed, because they feared violence from Oro’s
Christian lovers. Family, too, could move to protect these boundaries; it was the brothers of a Jewish woman from
Zaragoza who were accused of murderi8ng her because she was pregnant by a Chrisitian. Of course not every Jews
shared this vigilant attitude, certainly not the Jewish butcher of Zaragozawho, together with some associates,
kidnapped the daughter of another Jew and delivered her to a Christian “so that he might deflower her.” But it was
normative.
Even more markedly Muslim communities focused most of their attention of patrolling the interfaith
sexuality of Muslim women, not men. The Muslim aljama of Valencia, for example, purchased King Peter’s
confirmation of its privilege that whenever a Muslim woman was found guilty of adultery (that is, any sexual
intercourse) with a non Muslim, the death penalty would be imposed upon her without possibility of monetary
remission. In individual cases, action was often taken by the families of the women involved, or by the local
community. The Crown’s registers are clogged with notices of Muslim women sentenced to death, flogging, or
enslavement by their communities for adultery, whether with Muslim, Christian, or Jew.[392]
The frequency of Christian male sex with Muslim women is interesting, among other reasons, because it
muddies the illusion of a neat congruence in Christian attitudes toward sex with Muslims on the one hand and with
Jews on the other. There are already hints of disparity in the law codes, as for example in the Furs of Valencia,
where Christian males caught with Jewish women are to be burned, whereas those caught with Muslim women
are to be whipped naked through the streets. Intercourse between Christian men and Jewish women did occur. In
the mid 1260s, for example, a Jewish woman named Goidg de Palafols petitioned King James I for an extension on
his previously granted permission for her to live with her Christian lover Guillemo. Goig writes that she has
brought Guillemo “into her house, her living quarters, and her bedchamber.” The couple is “burning in their love
for each other,” and now that the term on their permission to cohabit is about to expire, they feel like “a thief
whom the lord has ordered to be hanged.” Such things happened, but they were mauch rarer, and less likely to be
tolerated, than relations between Christian men and Muslim women.
The question of why this might be so deserves a chapter in itself, one focusing upon the theological as well
as the social. Here, however, in a vast oversimplification, I will limit myself to one issue: the relative power of the 2
communities. The Muslim community was comparatively poor, predominantly agricultural, its political influence
fragmented among a multiplicity of lords. Perhaps more important, Muslims were a conquered people, defeated
in past battles of a war whose end was not yet in sight. All foreign Muslims were de bona Guerra, enslavable upon

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capture, and native Mudejars, though protected by law, could sometimes be enslaved illegally, or (more
frequently) legally as punishment for a great variety of crimes. By definition, in fact, any Muslim woman involved
in miscegenation lost her freedom and her person. The enslavement of Muslim women involved in such relations
diffused much of the tension inherent in them (from a Christian point view). Sex with slaves was a common
practice throughout the Mediterranean, among adherents of all 3 faiths, and relationships of domination and
dependence within the household. Further, when a Christian penetrated a Muslim woman/slave, he reiterated
those very acts of conquest and degradation that formed much of the basis for Iberian Christian ideas of
masculinity and honor. From the point of view of Christian males, then, sex with Muslim women reaffirmed
religious, gendered, and economic hierarchies and created no problematic kinship ties.[393]
The followers of Islam had of course been numerous in the Peninsula, ever since Tariks first incursion in
711 to the Rock which still bears his name. When the Christian principalities of the north west had begun the work
of reconquest, the Mohammedans had been butchered as a matter of course in every captured town and village.
But before long this initial enthusiasm waned. It was realized above all that such a policy invited reprisals against
the defenceless Christians of the South. Henceforth, the wars assumed more and more of a dynastic, and less and
less of a religious character. When the great cities of the centre and the south capitulated, it was generally on
condition that the former inhabitants should be left to enjoy their property undisturbed: and throughout Spain, in
every great city, by the side of the juderia where the Jews lived and maintained their synagogue, there was the
moreria where the Moors lived maintained their mosque. Political considerations protected the Moors from any
wide spread wave of massacres, such as that which broke the pride of Spanish Jewry in 1391. There was in
consequence in spain no considerable body of crypto Mohammedans, to parallel the crypto Jews: and, when the
Inquisition was set up in 1478, it was with the latter exclusively that it occupied itself.
Persuasion was backed up by force: and, in the end, in 1501, after a succession of revolts and emigration
en masse on the part of some of the hardier spirits, the population of Granada was apparently shepherded into the
Catholic Church. So as to enable this fresh class of conversos (“New Christians out of Moors,” as they were
termed) to learn the rudiments of their new faith, it was stipulated at the same time that the Inquisition should
have no authority over them for 40 years.
This success emboldened Cardinal Ximenes to make a similar experiment in Castile, where the native
Moslems, or mudejares, had hitherto been undisturbed. Here, after some success had been achieved by
preliminary persuasions and threats, the Expulsion of the Jews of 1492 was copied in 1502 in an Edict of Expulsion
fot he Moslems. It was, in fact, a misnomer: for the measure was intended to enforce not exile, but baptism. All
the children were detained and baptized, in the hope that this would encourage their parents also to see the light
of faith; expatriation was made so difficult that many even of the most zealous had to remain, in spite of
themselves. They were permitted to take with them neither gold nor silver nor other prohibited articles: they
were forbidden to take refuge in any Christian land, or in Turkey, or in Africa: and it was difficult to discover any
other place of refuge within the normal man’s reach. In fact, there was for the vast majority no possible
alternative: and whole communities all over the kingdom formally embraced Christianity. In the kingdom of
Aragon, there was no similar legislative measure: but the example of Granada was followed, and the Moorish
population succumbed in the end to blandishments and threats. When in September, 1525, Charles V. proclaimed
that no Mohammedan should remain in his kingdom, he merely gave formal sanction to what was already almost a
fact.
From 1510, therefore, the Inquisiton had begun to think increasingly in terms of “Moriscos” (as they were
termed) as well as of Jews. From time to time, Edicts of ffaith were issued indicating that many had fallen into
error for lack of adequate instruction, and inviting confessions from the delinquents, on the understanding that the

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usual serious consequences would not follow. Those who failed to take advantage of this opportunity were to be
treated, on the other hand, with all the severity of which the Holy Office was capable: while any who confessed
and then fell back again into error were to be treated as relapsed heretics. Spying and informing were
encouraged: and abstinence from wine or pork, or the use of the traditional Moorish dances and songs at
weddings, or above all scrupulous regard for personal cleanliness which distinguished these unbelievers,
henceforth figured, like the indications of observance of the Law of Moses, among the misdoings which might
bring a man to his death.
In some of the extant accounts of this persecution pathos and absurdity are mingled. At Toledo, in 1538, a
little group of Moorish slaves were penanced, on the charge of coming together at night to play musical
instruments and perform zambras (or Moorish dances) and –mostrevelaing sign of heterodoxy! to eat that
peculiar, and to European palates unpalatable, North African preparation known as kuskus. Ten years before, a
tinker, aged 71, was charged with abstaining from pork and wine, and using certain ablutions. He replied that,
having been converted at the age of 45, he had no palate for the foods which had been specified, which he had
never tasted before, and that his trade obliged him to wash himself frequently, in the interests of cleanliness. This
defence was not sufficient to shield him entirely: and he was finally condemned to appear at an auto carrying a
candle, and to pay 4 ducats to cover the expense of his trial. Most pathetic of all is the case of a slave girl of
Moorish birth, who was suspected of being a disguised infidel. A Moorish spy, turned loose on her, won his way
into her affections and, having seduced her, reported to the Holy Ofice her habits in the matter of sexual hygiene,
which were sufficiently discriminating to secure her conviction. [394]
In 1569, Don John of Austria, Philip’s half brother, was appointed to the supreme command, in place of
Delos Veles, whose incapacity had equaled his brutality. The new commander ordered all the Moorish inhabitants
of Granada to leave the city which they had made famous, and to find new homes in the interior as best they
could: and in October Philip, who had transferred his court to Cordova in order to be nearer the seat of operations,
issued an edict in which he gave instructions that the war was to be conducted henceforth with “fire and blood.”
On the other side, the operations were now under the direction of Muley Abdullah ibn Abu (formerly diego
Lopez), the last Moorish king, who had been elected to lead the revolt when Ibn Humeya fell a victim to the
vengeance of one of the women of his seraglio the last typical drama of Moorish Spain. The intitial successesof the
“little King” (as he was called) were striking; for he obtained confirmation of his title from the Grand signor and
extended the area of revolt to the borders of Murcia. THis made the Spanish authorities at last realise the
seriousness of the situation. Don John of Austria was given a free hand, and now ha the first opportunity to display
the military genius which was to culminate at Lepanto. He took the fireld in January, 1570. By the following May,
the Moriscos had been brought to their knees. They submitted almost unconditionally, on the understanding that,
in return for their lives, they would submit to be removed from their lives, they would submit to be removed from
their native district and distributed elsewhere about the country. At the last moment Ibn Abu refused these
humiliating terms, and attempted to raise the standard of revolt oce more; but he was assassinated by one of his
former adherents, bribed by the Spanish authorities. [395]
We know little about the history of the moors in Europe because the inquisition burned thousands of
books written by “their geographers, scientists, poets, historians, and philosophers.” Columbus’ voyage in 1492
marked not only the extension of European hegemony to the new world but the extinguishing of 800 years of
Moorish rule in Spain, when jews and moors, who physically resembled each other, lived peaceably alongside one
another, in strikingly similar cultures.[396]
Under Moorish rule based in Tunis and Egypt, jews of Sicily had some civil rights, including the right to
maintain synagogues. In accordance with the medieval custom of identifying people by dress, jews were required

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to wear a yellow belt and a special turban. In addition they were required to pay certain taxes, not permitted to
carry arms, and excluded from the army. Yet during Moorish governance of Sicily, jews and moors knew one
anothers customs and spoke one anothers languages. Under Moorish dominion before 1000 CE, a “golden age” of
jewish culture flourished in Sicily, Puglia, and the rest of south Italy, a golden age marked by Talmudic study at bari
and the founding of the renowned medical school, in which jews were active, at Salerno.
According to Raphael Patai, whose work is indispensable to this subject, belief in spirits is shared by all 3
faiths: there are “male and female jinn; Muslim, Jewish, Christian, and pagan jinn… In general it can be stated that
belief in the jinn has assumed identical forms among Jews and Moors/muslims down to small details.” Jinn, in
islamic culture, refer to spirits who are a rung below angles. They can take human or animal form, and influence
humanity for good, or evil. Analogues of jinn in Italian Christian culture are saints. In protestant countries, the
belief has been secularized, and politicized into veneration of founding fathers, presidents, popular celbriteis, et
al.[397]
During Teresas childhood in Avila, people were sent to fight in Spanish wars in Italy, France, Germany, the
Netherlands, North Africa, and the new world. Teresa and her brother dreamed of going to Africa, “land of the
Moors,” and of being beheaded as martyrs. When the Cepedas aspired to “hidalgo” (gentleman) class, the episode
of the grandfather’s persecution in Toledo came up. It is unknown if the children knew about the famly’s earlier
history of persecution. In later writings, under the eyes of clerical monitors, Teresa carefully described her family,
not as old Christians, but as “God fearing.” Disliking hermother’s submission to her husband and continual child
bearing, Teresa early vowed to become a nun.
Near Teresa’s childhood home was was an old jewish cemetery on whose site a convent of the order of
Carmel had been built. The order claimed descent from Elijah and “sons of the prophets,” early Christian hermits
who had lived on Mount Carmel had been built. The order claimed descent from Elijah and “sons of the prophets,”
early Christian hermits who had lived onMount Carmel, site close to the present border of Africa with the Levant
where there is archeological evidence of primordial human life. Perhaps attracted to the practice of mental prayer
and contemplation, Teresa entered the carmelit order, an order very close to the “alumbrados” of Spain who
practised mental prayer, a practice that the inquisition regarded suspiciously. Mystics, believing they were under
direct guidance of the holy spirit, had little interest in sacraments and rituals or papal Catholicism. The inquisition,
viewing alumbrados as similar to Lutherans of northern Europe, considered both dangerous.[398]
720: It is pretty clear from the artifacts that are still in existence Moors/Muslims ruled Europe for 700 years. The
wars that went on and the true activity of the time period have basically been cleared off the books. To be able to
obliterate a persons historical existence from an entire continent had to be done with a burning passion of
vengeance. What the Moors truly did? We don’t know. But from the stories Ive come across and tid bit
information here and there it is very clear that the Moors were kidnapping white people and selling them into
slavery. They also had a large affixation with white women whether she was used for slavery or other purposes.
These Moors and other groups are hidden underneath the title Pirate.
While in other studies I encountered a god named Moloch who was also known as Malcolm or MLK
worshipped by the Cannaanites, Assyrians, Phoenicians. Moloch is made of brass in the shape of a bull and his
arms are stretched out infront of him to receive sacrafices. The Fathers sacrifice their sons in the arms of Moloch
who is now Red from heat. They drowned out the screams of the babies with the beat of drums so the fathers
heart wont be moved. Malcolm X was called Detroit Red when younger becase of his natural hair color, he had
brass toned skin & was a Taurus. He was used to build a gateway to hell for black people and the introductory
piece is his autobiography. Martin Luther King Jr. also fits within because of his initials. Both men were religiously
engulfed and defiant towards the ways of society. When you follow their philosophy you get excommunicated.

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 Chapter 12
“Thou shalt not suffer a Witch to Live”
Exodus 22:18
The Inquisition
The root of the difference between the Spanish Inquisition and its medieval precursor, or the Papal
Inquisition which exited contemporaneously with it (and still survives for certain purposes) lay in one seemingly
unimportant fact. In the latter instance, the Inquisitos were appointed by the Holy See: in the former, by the
Sovereign. In the one case, therefore, the Tribunal was essentially an ecclesiastical one, amenable to the authority
of Rome. In the other, though dealing with religious matters, it was in effect a branch of the of the civil power,
independent of all external authority and sometimes going so far as to oppose the dictates of the Papal curia itself.
It was therefore a primary instrument of Spanish absolutism. To this fact, too, is to be traced its vast range of
activity, far outdoing that of its precursor, and its unbridled ferocity. It evolved moreover its own rules of
procedure; though they were based on those of the mediaeval Inquisition, they became unrecognizable.
Moreover, its independent status enabled it to amass wealth, heaped up by repeated confistcations, and this in
itself rendered it a force to be reckoned with in the affairs of the country.
The number of Tribunals of the Holy Office in Spain ultimately totaled 15. They existed, with full panoply
of officials and equipment, at Barcelona, Cordova, Cuenca, Granada, Llerena, Logrono, Madrid, Murcia, Santiago,
Seville, Toledo, Valencia, Valladolid and Saragossa, with another for the Balearic islands situated at Palma, Maorca.
The names of all these places are writ large in the history of human suffering. Some of them, however Madrid,
Seville, Toledo were more active by far than the others, mainly by reason of the presence in their neighbourhood
of larger numbers of New Christians. On the whole, activity was greatest in Old Castile and Andalusia; it was least,
after the first frenzied outburst in Catalonia.[399]
As soon as a new tribunal had been established in any placr, it was customary to publish an “Edic of Grace”
(as it was called), inviting those persons conscious of having committed heretical actions in the past to come
forward spontaneously and confess their transgressions, on the understanding that they would receive merciful
treatment. A “Term of Grace” that is, a time limit, generally of 30 or 40 days was assigned for this purpose. After
the expiration of this period, guilty persons who had not confessed their crimes were liable to be proceeded
against with the full rigour of the Inquisition. Those who presented themselves under the “Edict of Grace” were
required to denounce all those with whom they associated, or whom they believed to be guilty of similar offences,
thus setting the Ho’y Office on the track of a first nucleus of wrongdoers, subsequently to be enlarged as those
implicated were put to the question. At later stages, an “Edict of Faith” was periodically issued, summoning all the
faithful, under pain of excommunication, to denounce to the authorities any person whom they knew (or
imagined) to b guilty of certain specified heretical offences. By this means the Holy Office was provided with a vast
mass of information which kept it busy for some time before the actual arrest of the suspect.[400]
The opening stage of the proceedings before the Inquisition was based upon the fiction that the bishop or
his delegate was judge in an action between plaintiff and defendant. The plaintiff was a special official styled the

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Promotor Fiscal, a kind of Public Prosecutor whose ostensible function was that of adviser to the Inquisitors rather
than accused in the ordinary sense. Before the case came up for consideration, the charges were examined by
“qualifiers” (calificadores) in order to determine wether they presented calidad de oficio that is whether they
came within the jurisdiction of the Holy Office. This “qualification” provided some safeguard, though but a slight
one, in those cases in which it was applied. There were however numerous classes of charges precisely, in fact,
those which needed protection most urgently for which this procedure was not admitted: for neither Judaisers,
Moriscos, renegades, nor persons accused of certain types of immorality, could lay claim to this restraining
influence. [401]
The inquisition was the most powerful agent in the enforcement of legal sanctions against heretics and
witches. So long as heresy was only a minor threat, the Church left responsibility for the correction of dissent in
the hands of the bishops. With the growth both of heresy and of ecclesiastical efficiency, the popes began to press
for firmer measures. First the bishops were encouraged to expand their own’inquistions’, and then, in the years
between 1227 and 1235, the papal inquisition was established. The power of the inquisition was repeatedly
corroborated by papal actions such as the bull Ad Extirpanda issued by Innocent IV in 1252, which authorized the
seizure of heretics’ goods and their imprisonment, torture and execution, all on minimal evidence.
The inquisition moved decisively to assimilate sorcery to heresy. The manuals for inquisitors that began to
appear about 1230 often included questions on witchcraft as well as on conventional heresy. In 1233 Pope
Gregory IX accused the Waldensian heretics really evangelical moralists of attending assemblies where the Devil
incarnate presided over orgies. Pope Alexander IV (1254 61) refused the request of the inquisition to give it
jurisdiction over all sorcery, but he turned over to it all cases of sorcery that clearly involved heresy’. The
inquisitors rapidly learned to use this loophole and to introduce charges of heresy into sorcery trials. The
identification of sorcery with witchcraft had become a bureaucratic and legal convenience. Furthermore,
conviction rates rose rapidly, because inquisitorial procedures were constructed in such a way as to make guilt
easy to prove and innocence difficult to defend. The inquisitors were taught what to look for, and through
examination, threats, and torture usually were able to find witchcraft wherever it existed, and wherever it did not.
Each conviction crystallized the image of the witch more concretely in popular consciousness and established yet
another precedent for generation for future inquisitors. The stage was now fully furnished for the opening of the
great witch craze.[402]
In particular, the activities of the heretical sect known as the Albigenses, roused the Roman Church to
vigorous action. The result was the beginning of a war of extermination. Innocent III conceived a scheme, or
accepted the rough and ready idea of it from some other party, for dealing with all those who had the temerity to
rebel against the Church. The result was the founding, in the first half of the 13th century of the Holy Inquisition,
with Dominique as the first Inquisitor General.
The first Inquisition was established at Toulouse in 1233. Five years later another court was opened at
Aragon. Then in Spain, in Portugal, in France, courts were established and proceeded merrily in the war, deliberate
and concerted, against heresy in all its forms. [403]
The court of Inquisition was founded in the year 1204, or not long after that time. To Dominic de Guzman,
the honor of first suggesting the erection of this extraordinary court is commonly ascribed. He was born in the
year 1170, descended from an illustrious Spanish family. He was educated for the priesthood, and grew up the
most firey and the most bloody of mortals. Before his time, every bishop was a sort of inquisitor in his own
diocese; but Dominic contrived to incorporate a body of men, independent of every human being, except the
pope, for the purpose of ensnaring and destroying Christians. Having succeeded in his diabolical designs, and

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formed a race like himself, (first called preaching) and then Dominican friars, he died in his bed, was canonized as a
saint, worshipped as a divinity, and proposed as a model of piety and virtue to succeeding generations.
The pope gave the Inquisitors the most unlimited powers, as judges delegated by him, and immediately
representing his person; they were permitted to excommunicate or sentence to death, whom they thought
proper, upon the slightest information of heresy; were allowed to publish crusades against all whom they deemed
heretics; and enter into league with sovereign princes, to join those crusades with their forces. About the year
1244, their power was further increased by the Emperor Frederic the Second, who declared himself the protector
and friend of all Inquisitors, and published 2 very cruel edicts, viz: that all heretics, who continued obstinate, would
be imprisoned for life. [404]
In the united kingdom of Castile and Arragon, there were 18 different Inquisitorial courts, having each its
counsellors, termed apostolical inquisitors, its secretaries, sereants, and other officers; besides these, there were
20,000 familiars dispersed throughout the kingdom, who acted as spies and informers, and were employed to
apprehend all suspected persons and commit them for trial to the prisons which belonged to the Inquisition. By
these familiars, persons were seized on bare suspicion, and, in contradiction to the established rules of equity,
they were put to the torture, tried and condemned by the Inquisitors, without being confronted, either with their
accusers, or with the witnesses on whose evidence they were condemned. The punishments inflicted were more
or less dreadful according to the caprice and humor of the judges. The unhappy victims were either strangled, or
committed to the flames, or loaded with chains, and shut up in dungeons during life their effects confiscated and
their families stigmatized with infamy.[405]
Authors of undoubted credit affirm, and without the least exaggeration, that millions of persons have been
ruined by this horrible court. Moors were banished, a million at a time. 6 or 800,000 Jews were driven away at
once, and their immense riches seized by their accusers, and distributed among their persecutors, while thousands
dissembled and professed themselves Christians, only to be harassed in future.
A simple narrative of the proceedings of the Inquisition has shocked the world, and the cruelty of it had
come proverbial. Nothing ever displayed so fully to the eyes of making the spirit and temper of the papal religion.
Let us hear the description which Voltaire, a very competentwitness, gives of it. “Their form of proceeding is an
infallible way to destroy whomsoever the Inquisitors wish. The prisoners are not confronted with the accuser or
informer. Nor is there any informer or witness who is not listened to; a public convict, a notorious malefactor, an
infamous person, a child, are in holy office, though nowhere else, credible accusers and witnesses. Even the son
may depose against his father, the wife against her husband. The wretched prisoner is no more made acquainted
with his crime than with his accuser, and were he told the one, it might possible lead him to guess the other.
“To avoid this, he is compelled, by tedious confinement in a noisome dungeon, where he never sees a face
but the jailers and is not permitted the use of either book or pen and ink or should confinement alone not be
sufficient, he is compelled, by the most excruciating tortures, to inform against himself, to discover and confess
the crime laid to his charge, of which he is ignorant.[406]
The Inquisition varied from country to country, from period to period, and as the torture in the dungeons
was kept secret, no one can definitely say what took place.[407]
The Inquisition made torture more than merely a method of inflicting pain; they transformed it into an art
and science. Great emphasis was put on the psychological approach preceding the actual torture. The accused
was arrested at night, pulled out of bed bu the black robed, masked familiars, and taken to the dungeons in utter
silence. Here he was left for several days in solitary confinement and complete darkness. When he was judged to
have reached the breaking point, the same masked figures suddenly seized him and dragged him to the torture
chamber.

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 Here, behind a long table, sat other mysterious figures with the accuseds records spread out before them.
The floor of the room was covered with sand or sawdust to soak up the blood and along the wall were arranged
the torture instruments, painted red or black. The tortures, naked to the waist and wearing black masks, stood
among the terrible tools of their trade with folded hands. The only light came from flickering candles. On the
walls were inscribed mottoes such as “de Morituis nil nisi bonum” (Say nothing but good of the dead) or “Ad mala
patrata haec sunt atra theatra parata” (Dark theaters are suitable for dark deeds.
The prisoner was not told what charges were laid against him; he was told only to confess. If he did not of
could not, the Inquisitor General warned him, “Remember that you do not pass into our hands for an hour or a
week or even a year but until the day you dig and even then you spend eternity suffering the pains of hell.” If the
prisoner still proved obdurate, he was handed over to the executioners, who usually began by telling him, “We will
torture you until you are so thing that the light will shine through you.” Then the torture commenced.[408]
The ecclesiastical authorities were the first to realize that prisoners must be presented in a degraded or
ridiculous manner in order to destroy sympathy for them. The Inquisition dressed the condemned in “sanbenitos,”
absurd gowns covered with pictures of grotesque devils and leaping flames.[409]
The Inquisition prospered in Spain long after it had been allowed to fall into a decline elsewhere. Many
stories are told of its last days that may or may not be true. When French troops captured Alamanza in 1706, they
claimed to have rescued a number of girls held captive by the Inquisitors. A 15 year old girl told the troops that
she had been abducted at midnight by the familiars of Don Francisco Terrejon, the Inquisitor General, and ordered
to become his mistress. If she refused, she was given 3 choices to be locked inside a giant frying pan and cooked
alilve, to be thrown into a revolving drum studded with knives, or be put into a pit full of poisonous snakes. The
girl had settled for Don Francisco.[410]
The noontide of the Papacy was the world’s moral midnight. The Holy scriptures were almost unknown,
not only to the people, but to the priests. Like the Pharisees of old, the papist leaders hated the light which would
reveal their sins. God’s Law, the standard of righteousness, having been removed, they exercised power without
limit, and practiced vice without restraint. Fraud, avarice and profligacy prevailed. Men shrank from no crime by
which they could gain wealth or position. The palaces of popes and prelates were scenes of the vilest debauchery.
Some of the reigning pontiffs were guilty of crimes so revolting that secular rulers endeavored to depose these
dignitaries of the church as monsters too vile to be tolerated. For centuries Europe had made no progress in
learning, arts, or civilization. A moral and intellectual paralysis had fallen upon Christendom. [411]
The entire system rests upon the assumption that the “mother church,” through its hierarchy, has absolute
control of the persons, minds, consciences and conduct of the individual. And the almost unbelievable part of the
history of the Inquisition is, that these theings were done in the name of religion; the scriptures, the crucifix, the
images of the saints and even the name of God himself were invoked by the officials in their hellish operations;
and the pope and his emissaries were the originators and instigators of the institution.[412]
The annals of the Spanish Inquisition detail confessions obtained under torture of the witch meetings
where participants denied the Christian faith, indulged in sexual orgies, and worshiped the Devil in the form of a
black goat. By 1500 the witch hunter’s guide to judicial procedure, Malleus Maleficarum, was in use throughout
Europe and trial records reflect its dictums. Martin Antoine Del Rio’s Disquitionum Maicarum, published in 1599,
reinforced the rules with the warning: “judges are bound under pain of mortal sin to condemn witches to death
who have confessed their crimes; anyone who pronounces against the death sentence is reasonably suspected of
secret complicity.” Yet, surprisingly enough, Spain dealt more kindly with witches than any other region. Exile or
ducking and flogging were more often than not the harshest punishment imposed.

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 Trial records do provide glimpses of the true nature of Basque witch craft. A woman named Maria, from
Ituren, described the ingredients of the “flying ointment” that enabled her to ride the winds. Her formula
combined an herb called in the Basque tongue usainbelar (water plantain) with the skin of a toad. Another of the
accused witches described the custom of collecting wild plants when they came to blossom to be made into
amulets and philters. Another tradition that is still observed forbids witches to die before passing on their
knowledge to someone else.[413]
Nine years later, at Carcassonne, 3 shepherds and 8 women were convicted of killing cattle and flocks by
evil spells; in 1335 at Toulouse 63 people accused of witchcraft confessed to regular attendance at sabbats and
having intercourse with thte devil in the shape of a black goat. The Inquisition at Carcassonne sent 200 witches to
the stake between 1320 and 1350; at Toulouse during the same period 400 more witches were burned alive.[414]
The Inquisition readily adopted torture, now sanctified in canon law, and justified it as a weapon against
the snares of the Devil. More practically, the Inquisitors favored torture because canon law required a confession
for conviction, and torture could produce a confession when all else failed. The principles by which the Inquisition
would operate for centuries were established in the 13th century: torture; the protection of the identity of
accusers and of witnesses from the accused; the use of informers, paid or unpaid; the refusal to hear defense
witnesses; the lack of counsel for defendants; the reading of the charges to the defendant in a vernacular
deliberately translated faultily from Latin so that the replies could be entered against the original Latin, sometimes
to exactly the opposite effect of what the prisoner had actually said; and denial of appeal.
In 1231, 3 different groups of heretics were reported at Trier. 2 were in the Reformist or Catharist
tradition, but the 3rd was alleged to have stranger rites, including kissing the face of a pale man or the anus of a
cat.
See Evans; Darwin; and Brown. Boniface Viii gave some support to the accused when he ordered the
Inquisitors to draw up lists of the personal enemies of the accused and to refuse to admit their testimony. One
legitimate in the context of the idea system reason for the secrecy regarding the witnesses’ names was their
frequently honest terror of magical revenge. Albert Shannon argues that the secrecy granted witnesses,
unjustifiable though it may seem, was in fact necessary to forestall physical harm to them, especially in the Midi,
where feelings against the Inquisition ran very high. Similar precautions were taken in the secular courts at that
time. In any event a full transcript of testimony that suppressed only the witnesses’ names was given the accused.
Or, if defense counsel was allowed at all, it was very late in the proceedings, often after the interrogations.
Defense counsel was sometimes denied all the information pertinent to the case. The Emperor Frederick II in 1231
and Pope Innocent IV in 1243 both specifically denied the right of appeal to notorious criminals such as murderers,
poisoners, robber, and heretics.[415]
A charge which was in any case considered a heinous one thus became deadly if the accused was so
unfortunate as to have the smallest proportion of infidel blood in his veins. Very little indeed was needed to make
the Holy Office suspct that an individual of New Christian origin was knowingly heretical. Thus, the mere regard
for personal cleanliness or unusual culinary tastes was often enough to convict a person of practicing Judaism or
Islam, and thus cost him his life. Under such circumstances, exculpation was enormously difficult. One is
reminded of the despairing cry of the suspect charged before the Inquisition in the south of France in the 13th
century. “Hear me, my lords! I am no heretic: for I have a wife and cohabit with her and have children; and I eat
flesh and lie and swear and am a faithful Christian.”[416]
In the 15th century, the Christian, combining the legacies of imperial and of Papal Rome, and infusing
something of their own morbid bitterness, evolved the Act of Faith, or Auto de Fe. The more common form, Auto
da Fe, is Portuguese, and illustrates the unenviable notoriety which the smaller country enjoyed in this respect in

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Northern Europe. There was, however, no difference, excepting perhaps in accentuation, between the institution
as it existed in the two countries.
The spectacle was not always a public one. Sometimes, when less serious penalties were involved
(abjurations de levi, as they were termed0, it was held with a minimum of publicity in a church. This ceremony
was called an auto particular, or Private Auto; though the Spaniards, with their love of diminutives, invented a new
word for it, autillo. But in most cases the ceremony was public. This was partly in order to stress the serious
nature of the crime, partly to spread the glories and terrors of the Holy Catholic Faith, partly to provide the
famished populace with a spectacle (it is one of the handicaps of a democratic monarchy that jubilees or
coronations cannot be staged at more frequent intervals) and partly because it was considered improper to
pronounce a sentence involving capital punishment within the precincts of a consecrated building. The Public Auto
(Auto Publico General, as it was technically termed) ultimately became the centre of an elaborate ceremonial.
It would have been announced 2 or 3 weeks before, spiritual benefits being promised to all who were
present. For days, the peasantry would stream in from all the surrounding countryside to witness this great
spectacle. That night, no accommodation would be available for money (though perhaps it was for love) in the
whole city, and thousands might be sleeping out of doors, under the star spangled Andalusian sky. Early in the
morning, they were aroused by a general clanging of bells. This was the signal for the beginning of a great
procession, in which all the clergy of the city took part, headed by the official standard of the Inquisition. In this
pageant appeared all condemned to make public penance. Those abjuring de vehementi carried lighted tapers in
teir hands and wore the sambenito or saco bandito (“sacred sack”), which was termed the abito in te official
sentence. This was an innovation of the Spanish Inquisition. It consisted of a long yellow robe, transversed by a
black St. Andrew’s cross (in the case of those convicted only of formal heresy, only one of the diagonal arms was
necessary). Where the heretic had escaped the stake by confession, flames pointing downwards (fuego revuelto)
were painted on the garment, which in these instances was sometimes of black. Thos condemned to be burned
bore in addition a representation of devils thrusting heretics into the fires of hell. All worel, moreover, a tall mitre
(coraza) simlarily adorned. As a supplementary punishment the sambenito had to be worn, in certain cases, in
public, particularly on Sundays and festivals, even after the release of the prisoner, for months or even for years,
exposing him to universal scorn and derision. After its immediate utility had passed, it was generally hun up in the
parish church of the delinquent, accompanied by a suitable inscription, the family of the wearer being thus marked
out as objects of lasting humiliation and suspicion. These memorials of shame were destroyed only with the
abolition of the Inquisition in the early years of the 19th century.[417]
Anne Llewellyn Barstow, in a definitive hisotyr of the witch craze, evaluated the trial of Sibilla and Pierina
(1384 1390) in northern Italy. “In trying these women, the Inquisition had stumbled across, not the usual heretics,
but members of an old fertility cult ( hence the reverence for animals) who rode out at night on the ‘wild ride,’
dedicated elsewhere to the goddess Diana but centered here on a living woman, Oriente.” Ginzburg’s research is
invaluable but his celtic thesis is not sustained, even for north Italy: Diana and Oriente point to west Asia.
Spanish authorities initiated the burnings in Sicility; Austrian officials continued the burnings in 1726, 1727,
`1731 and 1732. Vito Canozonieri was burned as a heretic because he said that jesus was a clown, the law of Christ
was for madmen, and the virgin Mary was a “magara” (witch). At the last minute he recanted. Today advanced
Italian left catholics regard genuine Christianity as a special madness, authentic Christian teachers as holy clowns,
and the task of true Christianity to be untying the bonds of holy mad people like francis. Feminist scholars,
excavating layers of popular beliefs underneath dominant patriarchal culture, are finding that women burned, or
hanged, as witches were women whose wisdom revering all life remembered the ancient dark mother.

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 In this historical context, a remarkable nun devised a was of keeping private beliefs away from persecution
by inquisitors. In 1515, at the crest of inquisition violence, Teresa di Gesu ‘was born in Avila, Spain, place of a black
Madonna. Thirty years earlier, her grandfather Juan Sanchez had been forcibly converted to Christianity, and then
persecuted as a converso accused of “Judaizing.”
Teresas grandfather, with his infant son (who became Teresas father) in his arms, was one of the accused
in autos de fe in Toledo in 1485. Victims were “paraded through the streets, naked to the waist and barefoot” to a
scaffold, where those deemed “reconciled to Mother Church “ were sentenced to parade again for the next six
Fridays, stripped naked to the waist, and whipped as they walked from church to church. Other penalties included
giving 1/5 of all their possessions to finance the crusade against Granada, the last Moorish kingdom in Spain, Juan
Sanchez, it is reported, was given the additional punishment of wearing a sambenito, a garment of shame with
green crosses back and front, name and alleged offenses, that was hung up in the parish church.[418]

The Church’s view on Women

The fear of women lies deep in the mythic consciousness of men. The assorted concepts behind this fear
are commonly recognized I do not propose to discuss here the forms of the hag, the phallic mother, or the fertile
killer that populate the mythologies of the world; it seems probable that the Inquisitors’ idea of the female witch is
an expression of them. The Christian tradition from the very beginning incorporated the ancient fear of women.
For the Greeks, Pandora let evil into the world from her jar. The Fathers of the Church debated whether all sin
entered the world through Eve or whether the demons originally fell because they lusted after the daughters of
men. Janua diabolic; “the gate by which the Devil enters” was a patristic epithet for woman. The fear of women in
Christianity was heightened by the suspicious attitude that most of the Fathers took toward sexual relationships:
virginity was the most desirable state, and woman was the temptress luring man away from perfection. Woman
was more carnal, more concerned with material things; her lust and her greed turned man’s eyes from the path to
heaven.[419]
The Supreme Temptress of the Garden of Eden could never have been very far from the monks’ minds,
and masons were directed to use whatever imagery seemed best fitted to combat the frailties of the human race,
to depict human behaviour at its worst, and not to be too fastidious in their efforts to vilify Woman, the cause of
the Fall of Man. We shall look at some of the writing of influential theologians, whose work was the constant study
of the monks, and whose burden was that Woman is unclean, that whoever touches her is defiled. The female
exhibitionist is, we feel, the fruit of an unbelievable misogyny.[420]
In Artois and at Lyon, descriptions of the circumstances of the meetings were detailed. In Artois, the
meetings were called conventicles or “assemblies,” and they took place at night, usually between 11 P.M. and 3
A.M., often in the woods. The meetings were held frequently, and some of the more eager witches attended every
night. In earlier accounts, the president was sometimes human, sometimes demonic. But in these trials he is
universally supposed to be the Devil. In Artois he was called “the Great Master of the World,” and the sectaries sat
round him in a circle back to back and face to face, i.e., () () (). The Lyon account, which is by an Inquisitor, is the 1st
to mention the special meetings four times a year that became a prominent characteristic of later witchcraft. The
author wrote that the witches met 3 or 4 times a year in large meetings of special solemnity. The dates of these
meetings were Holy Thursday, Ascension, Corpus Christi, and the Thursday nearest Christmas. Holy Thursday and
Ascension Day could both be celebrations of spring.* On some years Corpus Christi fell close to Midsummer’s Eve,
and Christmas was the pagan feast of the rebirth of the sun. There is no mention here of the autumn festival of All
Hallow’s Eve. The Inquisitor’s explanation is that the witches chose these dates in order to make mock of

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Christianity, but it is strange that these particular feasts were chosen: they come at times associated with pagan
worship, and neither Ascension nor Corpus Christi is more important than a number of other feasts that might
have been chosen if it was the witches’ purpose to mock Christianity.[421]
In 1437, Jubertus seized every opportunity to expectorate upon statues of the Virgin as well. The Inquisitor
at Lyon alleged that the witches retained the host in their mouths after receiving and then took it home either to
use in maleficium, to insult it at the assembly, or simply to desecrate it by mixing it with urine and feces. Another
witch not only desecrated the Eucharist but showed her contempt of Christianity by defecating in the nave of the
Church and urinating into the holy water font. The Inquisitor at Artois reports that the witches there poured holy
water out onto the floor and stamped on it.
Occasionally the alleged outrages were even more lurid. A Jewish sorcerer supposedly burned statues of
Christ and the Virgin and insulted the Agnus Dei by crucifying a lamb and giving it to the dogs to eat, another
indication of how the orthodox could identify witchcraft and Judaism as the 2 most heinous rejections of Christian
society. At Porlezza people groaned and howled during mass and vomited up hairs and other objects, not because
they were witches themselves, but because they had been bewitched by heretics determined to make mock of the
Eucharistic feast.[421]
[500 A.D.] The Salic law, in what is surely a legal understatement, established a fine of 200 shillings as the
punishment for a witch’s eating a person. It also imposed a fine upon men who brought the cauldron to the place
where the witches cooked. This is of course an example of wegeld, the system, very common in Teutonic law, in
which most crimes are punishable by fines. Prison was virtually unknown; death, or occasionally slavery, was
reserved for those who could not pay the fines. The law reads “If a stria is proved to have eaten a man,”
(Ecckhardt, Gesetze, I, 114: article 64, 2, a.). The edict of Rothari in 643 denied that such a crime was possible. The
Salic Law was codified by Clovis at the beginning of the century from ealier existing material and then modified by
ChilpericII (d. 584). It was subsequently revivied and revised manytimes.[422]

An Attempt on King James by Witches

As James VI. advanced in manhood, he took great interest in the witch trials. One of them especially that
of Gellie Duncan, Dr. Fian, and their accomplices, in the year 1591 engrossed his whole attention, and no doubt
suggested in some degree the famous work on Demonology, which he wrote shortly afterwards. As these witches
had made an attempt upon his own life, it is not surprising, with his habits, that he should have watched the case
closely, or become strengthened in his prejudice and superstition by its singular details. No other trial that could
be selected would give so fair an idea of the delusions of the Scottish people as this. Whether we consider the
number of victims, the absurdity of the evidence, and the real villany of some of the persons implicated, it is
equally extraordinary.
Gellie Duncan, the prime witch in these proceedings, was servant to the deputy bailiff of Tranent, a small
town in Haddingtonshire, about ten miles from Edinburgh. Though neither old nor ugly (as witches usually were),
but young and good looking, her neighbours, from some suspicious parts of her behavior, had long considered her
a witch. She had, it appears, some pretensions to the healing art. Some cures which she effected were so sudden,
that the worthy bailiff, her master, who, like his neighbours, mistrusted her, considered them no less than
miraculous. In order to discover the truth, he put her to the torture; but she obstinately refused to confess that
she had dealings with the devil. It was the popular belief that no witch would confess as long as the mark which
Satan had put upon her remained undiscovered upon her body. Somebody present reminded the torturing bailie
of this fact, and on examination, the devil’s mark was found upon the throat of poor Gellie. She was put to the
torture again, and her fortitude giving way under the extremity of her anguish, she confessed that she was indeed

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a witch that she had sold her soul to the devil, and effected all her cures by his aid. This was something new in the
witch creed, according to which, the devil delighted more in laying diseases on than in taking them off; but Gellie
Duncan fared no better on that account. The torture was still applied, until she had named all her accomplices,
among whom were on Cunningham, a reputed wizared, known by the name of Dr. Fian; a grave and matron like
witch, named Agnes Sampson; Euphemia Macalzean, the daughter of Lord Cliftonhall, already mentioned, and
nearly forty other persons, some of whom were the wives of respectable individuals in the city of Edinburgh. Every
one of these persons was arrested, and the whole realm of Scotland thrown into commotion by the extraordinary
nature of the disclosures which were anticipated.
About two years previous to this time, James had suddenly left his kingdom, and proceeded gallantly to
Denmark, to fetch over his bride, The Princess of Denmark, who had been detained by contrary weather in the
harbour of Upslo. After remaining for some months in Copenhagen, he set sail with his young bride, and arrived
safely in Leith on the 1st of May, 1590, having experienced a most boisterous passage, and been nearly wrecked .
As soon as the arrest of Gellie Duncan and Fian became known in Scotland, it was reported by every body who
pretended to be well informed, that these witches and their associated had, by the devil’s means, raised the
storms which had endangered the lives of the king and queen. Gellie, in her torture, had confessed that such was
the fact, and the whole kingdom waited aghast and open mouthed for the corroboration about to be furnished by
the trial.
Agnes Sampson, the “grave and matron like” witch implicated by Gellie Duncan, was put to the horrible
torture of the Pilliewinkis(thumbscrews). She laid bare all the secrets of the sisterhood before she had suffered an
hour, and confessed that Gellie Dunca, Dr. Fian, Marian Lincup, Euphemia Macalzean, herself, and upwards of two
hundred witches and warlocks, used to assemble at midnight in the kirk of North Berwick, where they met the
devil; that they had plotted there to attempt the king’s life; that they were incited to this by the old fiend himself,
who had asserted with a thundering oath that James was the greatest enemy he ever had, and that there would be
no peace for the devil’s children upon the earth until he were got rid of; that the devil upon these occasions always
liked to have a little music, and that Gellie Duncan used to play a reel before him on a trump or Jew’s harp, to
which all the witches danced.[423]
One kind of insight provided by social historians is that witchcraft or witch beliefs performed a social
function. Sometimes the function was conscious and cynical, as when Henry VIII accused Anne Boleyn of practicing
witchcraft in order to seduce him, or when the inquisitors plotted to arrest rich men and confiscate their goods.
Much more frequently, the function was the unconscious need to blame someone for the misfortunes of daily life.
If you are impotent, it is less embarrassing and better for your self image if you can place the blame on a sorcerer.
If your cow dies, or you fall ill with dysentery, it is more prudent to blame a witch than to blame God. Witchcraft
shifts blame for misfortune from an abstract and inscrutable force to an identifiable, punishable individual. If God,
or fate, has caused your illness, you have no means of fighting back, but if a witch is responsible, you may be able
to fend her off or break her power. If you can have her arrested, tried and executed, her power over you will fail,
and your good fortune will return. This belief helps explain the large number of executions; killing the witch is the
only way to make sure that she cannot return to exact magical revenge.
Another important function of witchcraft was the same as that of heresy: to define the boundaries of
Christianity and achieve the cohesion of the Christian community in the face of a terrifying and powerful army of
foes under the generalship of Satan himself. [424]
In the space of 30 years, 1320 1350, the Inquisition at Carcassone heard no fewer than 400 cases and at
least 200 hundred witches were burned, whilst the Holy Office at Toulouse during the same period presided over
some 600 cases and sent 400 witches to the stake.

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 In 1352 8 warlocks were burned at Carcassone; in 1357 no less than 31; whilst from 1387 1400 the
Inquistiors of that town, Durand Salranch and Bouit Liestel, delivered over 67 persons, convicted of Witchcraft and
of various forms of Gnostic heresy, to the secular arm to be punished according to the law.[425]
A monk of Saint Victor wrote:
“The harlot suffers like the others. She who was wont to part her beautiful hair with golden combs, who
painted her beautiful hair with golden combs, who painted her brows and face, who bedecked her fingers with
rings, has become a prey to worms, and the food for serpents; a serpent winds itself around her neck, and a viper
crushes her breasts.
The agony was not only restricted to whores and fornicators; St. Alberic (d.1109), one of the founders of
Citeaux, would have it visited upon women who refused to wet nurse orphans or motherless children, or who only
pretended to nourish them; in his Vision, child brides and unworthy mothers were also included.[426]

Fig. 137.). Spanish Inquisition, Goa Photograph by Granger

The Inquisitors
The Inquisitors were ruthless as they were convinced that they were fighting with the powers of darkness
for the prisoners soul. For the victim to die unrepentant was a victory for the devil. One of the most terrible of
them was Conrad of Marburg who from 1227 until 1233 created a reign of terror in Germany unequalled until the
advent of Hitler.
Conrad was born in the little German town of Marburg in 1180. He became a secular priest and begged in
rags while regarded the most savage penitences on himself. He was regarded as a saint and could have reached
any position in the Church, but Conrad refused all offers and continued his life of extreme austerity and self
imposed punishments.

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 In 1225, Conrad witnessed the execution of Henry Minneke at Goslar, Germany. Minneke had been the
provost of a Cistercian convent, but had preached the doctrine that Christ was really the son of the Holy Ghost
rather than of God the Father. He was burned at the stake for heresy. The sight of the dying man’s agonies
awakened some deep passion in the fanatical priest. “Salvation can come only from pain,” he decided, and
devoted his life to that doctrine.
Elizabeth of Thuringia, who had been married at 13 to the Langrave but was widowed, became so
impressed by Conrad that she put herself completely into his hands. Elizabeth was 18 at the time and the mother
of 3 children, but Conrad ordered her to abandon all worldly possessions, to leave her children and her home and
live among beggars and lepers. She obeyed him but continued to visit Conrad in his private quarters. The rumor
went about that during these meetings, Conrad had ordered the young girl to strip herself naked. Elizabeth
proudly admitted the charge. “And here is the reason!” she said triumphantly, exhibiting a cat o nine tail, still
dripping blood, with which Conrad had scourged her nude body. Later she said anxiously, “If I fear a man like this,
what must God be like?”[427]
It is astonishing that the Inquisitors, many of whom were sincere and intelligent men, never seemed to
realize that the accused would usually admit to anything under torture. As the accused had no conception of what
crime he was supposed to have committed, he would often beg the Inquisitors to tell him so he could confess. This
was never done because the Inquisitors wished the confession to be “voluntary.” A clerk was always employed to
take down a transcript of the accused’s testimony during the torture, and here is part of such a transcript,
describing the torture of a woman in Toledo during the 16th century. The women was accused of having worn
clean underwear of a Saturday. This day being the Jewish Sabbath, it was charged that she was a secret Jew. The
various Inquisitorial groups were in competition with each other to produce the greatest number of heretics and,
lastly, one third of a convicted heretics possessions went to the accuser, one third to the state, and one third to
the Inquisitor. Under such circumstances, there was strong temptation to consider anyone accused a being guilty.
The inquisitors failed to realize that the very ferocity of their methods drove people to such a state of
desperation that they would commit any crime in an effort to strike back at their persecutors. During the 16th
century persecutions in the Netherlands, a half crazed fanatic named Bertrand le Blas attacked a religious
procession and, seizing the Pyx, flung it on the ground while screaming blasphemies. With an iron gag thrust in his
mouth, Le Blas was dragged to the market place on a hurdle. His tongue was torn out, his right hand and foot
were twisted off with red hot tongs, a hook was run through his body, and then he was swung back and forth over
a fire until he roasted to death. As a result, the Dutch insurgent used to cut out the heart of any priest they
captured Spaniards were tied together, locked in a cell, and told to use each other for food. Six months later, one
survivor was released. The “Sea Beggars,” as the Dutch sailors called themselves, used to strip their prisoners
naked, force them to straddle a tightly stretched tarred rope, and then pull them back and forth until they were
cut in two. When the beggars captured monks, they used them as living bumpers for the sides of their ships.[428]
Many of the inquisitors were sadists. Many were libidinous monsters. They took such women as they
wanted, on trumped up charges of heresy, and kept them for the rest of their days as mistresses. When the
French troops captured the city of Aragon, Lieutenant –General M. de Legal ordered the doors of the Inquisition to
be opened, and the prisoners, numbering some 400, to be released. “Among these were 60 beautiful young
women who appeared to form a seraglio for the 3 principal inquisitors.” One of these ladies had a remarkable
story to tell. She related it to the French officer who later became her husband, and to M. Gavin, the author of A
Master Key to Popery. I reproduce the account in her own words.
“I went one day, with my mother, to visit the Countess Attaras, and I met there Don Francisco Tirregon,
her confessor, and second inquisitor of the Holy Office. After we had drank chocolate, he asked me my age, my

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confessors name, and many intricate questions about religion. The severity of his countenance frightened me,
which he perceiving, told the countess to inform me that he was not so severe as he looked. He then caressed me
in a most obliging manner, presented his hand, which I kissed with great reverence and modesty; and, as he went
away, he made use of this remarkable expression, ‘My dear child, I shall remember you till the next time.’ I did
not, at the time, mark the sense of the words; for I was inexperienced in matters of gallantry, being, at that time,
but 15 years old. Indeed, he unfortunately did remember me; for the very same night, when our whole family
were in bed, we heard a great knocking at the door. The maid, who laid in the same room with me, went to the
window, and inquired who was there. The answer was, the Holy Inquisition. On hearing this, instead of protecting
me, he hurried me downstairs as fast as possible; and, lest the maid should be too slow, opened the street door
himself; under such abject and slavish fears are bigoted minds! As soon as he knew they came for me, he fetched
me with great solemnity, and delivered me to the officers with much submission.
“I was hurried into a coach, with no other clothing then a petticoat and a mantle; for they would not let
me stay to take anything else. My fright was so great, I expected to die that very night; but judge my surprise,
when I was ushered into an apartment, decorated with all the elegance that taste, united with opulence, could
bestow. Soon after the officers left me, a maid servant appeared with a silver salver, on which were sweetmeats
and cinnamon water. She desired me to take some refreshments before I went to bed; I told her I could not, but
should be glad if she could inform me whether I was to be put to death that night or not. ‘To be put to death!’
exclaimed she, ‘you do not come here to be put to death, but to live like a princess, and you shall want for nothing
in the world, but the liberty of going out; so pray don’t be afraid, but go to bed and sleep easy ; for tomorrow you
shall see wonders within this house; and as I am chosen to be your waiting maid, I hope youll be very kind to me.’
There follows a long discursive account of the manner in which, through the medium of this servant girl
Mary, Don Francisco sent to his latest victim elegant clothes, valuable presents, and personal messages, both
polite and endearing, and an invitiation to have dinner with him, which, acting on Mary’s advice, the young lady
accepted. Don Faracncisco informed her that, because of certain accusations which had been made against her in
connexion with matters of religion, the Inquisition had pronounced sentence of burning alive “in a dry pan, with a
gradual fire,” but that he, out of respect for her family and pity for her, had managed to stop the execution of the
terrible sentence, at any rate, for the present. The man made it plain, however, and Mary made it additionally
plain, that there was only one way of escaping death, and that anyone other than a born fool would take it.
Probably acting under instructions from Don Francisco, Mary went further and, after securing a promise of
absolute secrecy from the already terrified young lady, offered to show her the implements of torture. And so the
next morning, before anybody was stirring,
“taking me downstairs, she brought me to a large room, with a thick iron door, which she opened. Within
it was an oven, with fire in it at the time, and a large brass pan upon it. With a cover of the same, and a lock to it.
In the next room there was a great wheel, covered on both sides with thick boards; with a little window in the
centre, Mary desired me to look in with a candle; there I saw all the circumference of the wheel set with sharp
razors, which made me shudder. Mary then took me to a pit, which was full of venomous animals. On my
expressing great horror at the sight, she said, ‘Now, my good mistress, Ill tell you the use of these things. The dry
pan is for heretics, and those who oppose the holy fathers will and pleasure; they are put alive into the pan, being
first stripped naked; and the cover being locked down, the executioner begins to put a small fire into the oven, and
by degree augments it, till the body is reduced to ashes. The wheel is designed for those who speak against the
Pope, or the holy fathers of the Inquisition; for they are put into that machine through the little door, which is
locked after them, and then then wheel is turned swiftly, till they are all cut to pieces. The pit is for those who

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condemn the images, and refuse to give proper respect to ecclesiastical persons; for they are thrown into the pit,
and so become the food of poisonous animals.
“We went back again to my chamber, and Mary said that another day she would show me the torments
designed for other transgressors; but I was in such agonies at what I had seen, that I begged to be terrified with no
more such sights. She soon after left me, but not without enjoining me strict obedience to Don Francisco; ‘for if
you do not comply with his will,’ says she, ‘the dry pan and gradual fire will be your fate.’ The horrors which the
sight of these things, and Marys expressions, impressed on my mind, almost bereaved me of my senses, and left
me in such a state of stupefaction that I seemed to have no manner of will of my own.
“The next morning mary said, ‘Now let me dress you as nice as possible, for you must go and wish Don
Francisco good morrow, and breakfast with him.’ When I was dressed, she conveyed me through a gallery into his
apartment, where I found that he was in bed. He ordered Mary to withdraw, and to serve up breakfast in about 2
hours time. When Mary was gone, he commanded mje to undress myself, and come to bed to him. The manner in
which he spoke, and the dreadful ideas with which my mind was filled, so terribly frightened me, that I pulled off
my clothes, without knowing what I did, and stepped into bed, insensible of the indecency I was transacting: so
totally had the care of self presevation absorbed all my other thoughts, and so entirely were the ideas of delicacy
obliterated by the force of terror.”
‘After the seduction of the girl, she was introduced to the other young ladies, numbering 52 in all, the
eldest of which was about 24 years, who formed the seraglio. And for 3 days, gorgeously upholstered, living in the
most luxurious apartments, eating and drinking the finest products of the land, she lived the life of a queen. Then,
after an evening of gaiety, the girl was taken to a small dungeon like room, in which was another young lade.
Mary, who was her conductor on this occasion too, said “This is your room, and this lady your bed fellow and
companion,” and immediately went away. Then…but let the narrator resume her story:
“My perplexity and vexation were inexpressible; but my new companion, whose name was Leonora,
prevailed on me to disguise my uneasiness from Mary. I dissembled tolerably well when she came to bring our
dinners, but could not help remarking, in my own mind, the difference between this repast and those I had before
partook of. This consisted only of plain common food, and of that a scanty allowance, with only one plate, and one
knife and fork for us both, which she took away as soon as we had dined. When we were in bed, Leonora, upon
my solemn promise of secrecy, began to open her mind to me. ‘My dear sister,’ she said, you think your case very
hard; but, I assure you, all the ladies in the house have gone through the same. In time you will know all their
stories, as they hope to know yours. I supposed Mary has been the chief instrument of your fright, as she has been
of ours; and I warrant she has shown you some horrible places, though not all; and that, at the very though of
them you were so terrified that you chose the same way we have don’t to redeem yourself from death. By what
hath happened to us, we know that Don Francisco hath been your Nero, your tyrant; for the three holy fathers.
The red silk belongs to Don Francisco, the blue to Don Guerrero, and the green to Don Aliaga; and they always give
those colours (after the farce of changing garmets, and the shortlived recreateions are over) to those ladies whom
they bring here for their respective uses. We are strictly commanded to express all the demonstrations of joy, and
to be very merry for 3 days, when a young lady first comes amongst us, as we did with you, and as you must now
do with others; but afterwards we live like the most wretched prisoners, without seeing anybody but Mary, and
the other maid servants, over whom Mary hath a kind of superiority, for she acts as housekeeper. We all dine in
the great hall three days in a week; and when any one of the inquisitors heath a mind for one of his slaves, Mary
come about nine ‘o clock, and leads her to his apartment. Some evenings Mary leaves the door of our chambers
open, and that is a token that one of the inquisitors hath a mind to come that night; but he comes so silent that we
are ignorant whether he is our patron or not. If one of us happens to be with child, she is removed into a better

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chamber till she is delivered; but during the whole of her pregnancy she never sees anybody but the person
appointed to attend her. As soon as the child is born it is taken away, and carried we know not whither; for we
never hear a syllable mentioned about it afterwards. I have been in this house 6 years, was not 14 when the
officers took me from my father’s house and have had one child. There are, at this present time, 52 young ladies in
the house; but we annually lose 6 or 8, though we know not what becomes of them, or whither they are sent.
This, however, does not diminish our number, for new ones are always brought in to supply the place of those who
are removed from hence; and I remember, at one time, to have seen 73 ladies here together. Out continual
torment is to reflect that when they are tired of any of the ladies, they certainly put to death those they pretend to
send away; for it is natural to think that they have too much policy to suffer their atrocious and infernal villanies to
be discovered, by enlarging them. Hence our situation is miserable indeed, and we have only to pray that the
Almighty will pardon those crimes which we are compelled to commit.’”
This description, the narrator continues, proved to be a true one. Eighteen months were to elapse before
the French officers opened the doors of the Inquisition, and during this period, while eleven of the inmates
disappeared in the mysterious manner mentioned by Leonora, 19 new girls entered, making the total number at
the moment of deliverance no fewer than 60.[429]
Because any challenge to the authority of the Church was, in medieval terms, a challenge to the order of
society and to the majesty of God himself, society naturally responded to heresy and witchcraft with repressive
measures. The judges of the bishops’ courts, the secular courts, and the Inquisition believed themselves God’s
defenders. To understand is not to forgive. We need not ask of a definition that it be true by their very nature,
definitions are human inventions not necessarily equivalent to objective reality but we are entitled to demand that
it be useful.[430]
As Arago observed, “Outside of pure mathematics, anyone who pronounces the word ‘impossible’ is
lacking in prudence.” Within the framework of historical interpretations of European witchcraft, there are at least
8 degrees of skepticism (in descending order). (1) Virtually no one in the Middle Ages believed in witchcraft, which
was a vicious fraud perpetrated by the Inquisitors and their attendant theologians, who provoked witch scares in
order to increase their own power and wealth. (2) Many people (including Inquisitors and theologians) were
deluded by the superstitious atmosphere of the Middle Ages into believing that others were witches, but no one
believed that he himself was a witch. (3) At least some people were deluded into believing themselves witches. (4)
Some of what these witches believed and practiced was real, deriving from old pagan cults, folklore, sorcery, and
heresy. (5) Witch beliefs and practices as described by the sources (mainly train records) did exist to a substantial
degree. Witches did worship the Devil; they did believe and practice what was attributed to them, though these
beliefs and practices were constantly evolving. (6) A formal witch cult has existed virtually unchanged from ancient
times (the argument of Margaret Murray and the modern occultists). (7) Weird phenomena, such as flying and
shapeshifting, are themselves real. (8) The weird phenomena are not only real, but supernatural, and proof that
the Devil and his minions live.[431]
Straightway the inquisitors set to work: Cumanus, in Italy, burned forty one poor women in one province
alone; and Sprenger, in Germany, burned a number which can never be ascertained correctly, but which, it is
agreed on all hands, amounted to more than five hundred a year. The great resemblance between the confessions
of the unhappy victims was regarded as a new proof of the existence of the crime. But this is not astonishing. The
same questions from the Malleus Maleficarum were put to them all, and torture never failed to produce the
answer required by the inquisitor. Numbers of people, whose imaginations were filled with these horrors, went
further in the way of confession than even their tormentors anticipated, in the hope that they would thereby be
saved from the rack, and put out of their misery at once. Some confessed that they had had children by the devil;

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but no one who had even been a mother gave utterance to such a frantic imagining, even in the extremity of her
anguish. The childless only confessed it, and were burned instanter as unworthy to live.
For fear the zeal of the enemies of Satan should cool, successive popes appointed new commissions. One
was appointed by Alexander Vi. in 1494, another by Leo. X. in 1521, and a third by Adrian VI. in 1522. They were all
armed with the same powers to hunt out and destroy, and executed their fearful functions but too rigidly. In
Geneva alone five hundred persons were burned in the years 1515 and 1516, under the title of Protestant witches.
It would appear that their chief crime was heresy, and their witchcraft merely an aggravation. Bartolomeo de Spina
has a list still more fearful. He informs us that in the year 1524 no less than a thousand persons suffered death for
witchcraft in the district of Como, and that for several years afterwards the average number of victims exceeded a
hundred annually. One inquisitor, Remigius, took great credit to himself for having, during fifteen years, convicted
and burned nine hundred.
In France, about the year 1520, fires for the execution of witches blazed in almost every town. Danaeus, in
his Dialogues of Witches, says they were so numerous that it would be next to impossible to tell the number of
them. So deep was the thralldom of the human mind, that the friends and relatives of the accused parties looked
on and approved. The wife or sister of a murderer might sympathise in his fate, but the wives and husbands of
sorcerers and witches had no pity. The truth is, that pity was dangerous, for it was thought no one could have
compassion on the sufferings of a witch who was not a dabbler in sorcery: to have wept for a witch would have
insured the stake. In some districts, however, the exasperation of the people broke out, in spite of superstition.
The inquisitor of a rural township in Piedmont burned the victims so plentifully and so fast, that there was not a
family in the place which did not lose a member. The people at last arose, and the inquisitor was but too happy to
escape from the country with whole limbs. The archbishop of the diocese proceeded afterwards to the trial of such
as the inquisitor had left in prison.[432]
Gregory IX by his Bulls of 13, 20, and 22 April, 1233, solemnly and officially established the Order of
Preachers as the Pontifical Inquisitors for all dioceses of France to check the anarchy and ravages of the heretics.
The office of Inquisitor was not, however, by any means confined to the one Order, for we often meet with
Franciscan delegates, Cistercians, Canons Regular, as also secular priests.
The Inquisitors at once began to take cognizance of Witchcraft, and indeed it was impossible that they
should not have done so seeing that sorcery and heresy were essentially intermingled. Thus a hag of the sect of
the Cathari, who belonged to Mont Aime in the Champagne district, was arrested with a whole gang of her co
religionists by Robert le Bougre, a Bulgarian (Catharist) convert to Chrisitianity, and subsequently a Dominican.
The accused were charged with having employed the aid of demons as well as with their particular heresy, and this
crone seems to have been the officer of the coven. On 29 may, 1239, about 100 and 80 persons whose trial had
begun concluded within a week were consigned to the flames at Montwimer. Complaints, however, were lodged
protesting against so summary a process; Robert was recalled to Rome, deposed from his office, and confined
within a monastery for life.
At Toulouse, the hot bed of Catharan evil, in 1275 an Inquisitor, Hugues de Baniols, gave judicial sentence
of death by fire on Angele de la barthe, a beldame of some 60 years, who confessed to having had intercourse with
an evil spirit from which conjunction she brought forth a monster whom she nourished with the flesh of infants,
slain by her or dug up from their graves in remote churchyards.[433]
At Besanon in 1521 some curious cases of lycanthropy were investigated by the Inquisitor. Two shepherds,
Michel Verdung and Pierre Burgot, made a detailed acknowledgement of their crimes. Even if they had not
assumed the shape they had been filled with all the desires of wolves, even to coupling with females of that kind.
Burgot confessed that he had on several occasions met a tall dark man, who declared himself to be aservan of the

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lord of hell, evidently the official for the witcdhes throughout the district. Before this man he knelt and renounced
God, Our Blessed Lady, the Saints, his baptism; swearing, moreover, never again to recite the Credo. He then
kissed the stranger’s left hand, which was black and cold as that of a corpse. It may indeed have actually been a
dead hand held from beneath a disguise cloak. In company with Verdung, who seems to have initiated him into
these abominations, Burgot attended the local Sabbat, where he was assigned a familiar named Moyset. A long
tale of murders followed. Both Verdung and Burgot swore that they had killed and devoured five persons,
including a little girl of 4 years old and a child aged 9. They were burned alive at Poligny, and about the same time
a third were wolf, Philibert Montot, was executed.[434]
The cats bad reputation has persisted through time, with some believing it to hold the soul of a witch ofr
even the devil himself. In 1233, the Dominican inquisitor Etienne de Bourbon described how a woman named
Berengere from Fanjeaux in the Aude region attended a summoning of the devil performed by saint 1206. It seems
the saint forced the devil to appear in the form of a black car before 9 heretical and somewhat witchlike women of
Fanjeaux. The ritual massacre of cats (or other animals deemed diabolic) on saint John’s Day can be replaced.[435]
De L’Ancre: The 17th century Inquisitor, De L’Ancre, after burning several lunatics who had killed and eaten
children, found himself swamped by crazed individuals who insisted that they also were cannibals and child
murderers. De L’Ancre obligingly burned as many of these applicants as possible, until he was finally forced to give
up in despair. During the famous Wurzburg witchcraft persecutions of 1629, the Inquisitors were besieged by
scores of persons confessing to all sorts of weird crimes. When a prostitute was burned for claiming that she could
summon Satin by crying “King! King!,” naturally half the little boys in the community ran about shouting “King!” 3
of them were burned alive by the Inquisitors, but this only encouraged the others to fresh efforts. [436]
Jacob Sprenger (1438 1495): Jacob Sprenger produced a very famous work, the Malleus Malaficarum ( Hammer
of Witches), is said to have caused the death of more human beings than any other book. In 1488, Innocent VIII
issued his famous bull against witchcraft, ordering Inquisitors to stamp it out at all costs. Sprenger was appointed
Inquisitor General of Germany. He accepted the appointment eagerly. Most of the accused were women and
Sprenger hated women.
Sprenger considered women as “a foe to friendship, a domestic danger, a delectable deterrent and an evil
of nature painted in fair colors. I would rather have a lion of a dragon loose in my house than a woman. Either a
man must sin by divorc ing his wife or must endure her constant quarreling. When a woman thinks, which
fortunately isn’t often, she thinks evil. They are unable to conceal from other women all they know which causes
most of the trouble in the world. Feeble in mind and body, its not surprising that they so often become witches.
The first woman must have been made from a bent rib, bent in a contrary direction from others, and they’ve been
contrary ever since. If you marry, you’ll suffer perpetual anxiety, constant querulous complaints, a talkative
mother in law, and then your wife will probably betray you with your best friend. If you hand over everything to
her, shell still complain if you reserve even some minute rights for yourself. A woman Is carnal lust personified.
She spends more time trying to attract men than the holiest saint ever spent trying to please God. Even the was
they walk is designed to fill a mans mind with sinful thoughts. Therefore we speak of “witchhunting” not “wizard
hunting’ for if a woman cant get a man shell consort with the devil himself.
Sprenger felt that in dealing with such creatures any legalistic tricks that could insure a convictionwere
justified. “Tell the accused that if she confesses, you will not condemn her,” Another useful device, “Ask the
accused if she believes in witches. If she says no, that’s heresy and enough to have her condemned instantly. If
she says yes, ask he how she knows, unless shes a witch herself and torture her until she confesses.” An infallible
method: “Ask the accused if shell consent to the branding iron test. If she says no, she lacks faith. If she says yes,
she must be a witch who is confident that the devil will protect her.” Very few witches got past Sprenger

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 But in other respects, Sprenger was an extremely discerning observer. The Council of Inquiry had said that
witches could fly through the air, either riding on a broomstick or by means of a magical unguent. Bolts and bars
could not restrain them; they passed straight through solid walls. But in that case, Sprenger argued, why didn’t
witches fly off instead of remaining in dungeons awaiting execution? This problem had never bothered other
Inquisitioners, but it did bother Sprenger. At last he was able to solve the mystery.
A woman appeared before the Inquisition and in an agony of remorse knelt before Sprenger. “Save my
soul, bholy father!” she entreated. “Im a witch. Every night I fly off to attend the Sabbat. Together with other
witches I dance naked in a ring until finally a demon in the form of a handsome young makes passionate love to
me. Then I fly back to my room. Torture me, burn me at the stake, do anything, but save my soul.”
Sprenger saw here the chance of a lifetime. “You do this every night?” he asked eagerly.
“Every night, father, I lock the door, plug up the chimney, seal the windows, but it does no good. Off I go
anyhow.”
“Very well,” announced the Inquisitor General. “Tonight I will keep watch over you, together with several
eminent doctors. Ive always wanted to see a flying witch.”
The woman was locked in a dungeon without windows or chimney and the door was bolted shut.
However, a little loophole was made in the door so Sprenger could watch what happened.
He hadn’t long to wait. The woman threw herself on the bed where she tossed for a few minutes and then
became perfectly rigid. Sprenger and the doctors entered the cell. They shook her hut she did not wake. They
pinched and slapped her but she slept on.
“Light a cnadle and hold it under her foot,” ordered Sprenger.
The woman’s foot was scorched until the cell was filled with the odor of burning flesh. Still she slept on.
Springer sat down to wait. After an hour or so, the woman began to moan and twist. She made motions
with her arms as though flying. Then she awoke with a start.
“What a Sabbat that was!” she exclaimed. “I flew for miles and saw all of my friends. But during the
dancing, I stepped on a sharp stone and hurt my foot.”
“Daughter, you are under an illusion,” Sprenger explained. “You never left this room. You are not a witch
at all and your foot was scorched by this very candle.”
The woman was dumbfounded but her burned foot convinced her. Sprenger told her to perform a mild
penance and avoid such dreams in the future.
Spregner came to the conclusion that witches could not fly; it was merely an illusion inflicted on them by
the devil. But this theory was promptly denounced as dangerously close to heresy. Sprenger, in an agony of
remorse, decided that the woman must have actually flown to the Sabbat and a demon had assumed her shape in
the bed, cleverly transferring the burn to the witchs body on her return.[437]
Frey Tomas de Torquemada (1420 1498): The greatest of all Inquisitors the man whose name has become virtually
synonymous with torture as a fine art was Frey Tomas de Torquemada. Torquemada created the Spanish
Inquisition and made it the most terrible organization of medieval times. In doing so, he virtually exterminated the
Spanish middle class and so crippled Spanish trade that it never completely recovered. He burned 10,220 and
tortured 97,321 during his 18 years in office, yet this fearful man lived a life of self sacrafice and humility. He never
ate meat, wore only his monks robe of coarse cloth, and slept on a plank. Later, when he was offered the high
position of archbishop of Seville for his work in suppressing heresy, he refused, saying, “I prefer the simple title of
‘friar’.” As Inquisitor General, he acquired great wealth but used it only to establish churches and convents.
As a young man, Torquemada was subjected to two psychological blows. Although he came of noble birth
and his family were lords of the town of Torquemada in Castile, his grandfather had married a wealthy Jewess to

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recoup the dwindling family fortunes. As a child, Torquemada was taunted by his schoolmates with not having
“clean” blood, and though as the only son he would someday inherit the title and estates, even the meanest of his
companions felt himself to be superior to the polluted boy. Torquemada grew up with a pathological hatred for
the jews who had brought this disgrace upon him.
When he was a young man, he fell in love with a beautiful girl name Cazilda. Cazilda was of pure Spanish
ancestry, and the brilliant student was able for a time to forget the shame of his mixed blood. Then Cazilda ran
away with a handsome Moor, a descendant of one of the ancient Moorish families who had been in Spain since
the 8th century.
Torquemada never recovered from this second shock. Twice he had been disgraced; first by the Jews, and
then by the Moors. Half mad, he went to his confessor, Father Lopez, a Dominican. Father Lopez urged the
distracted young man to enter the church.
Queen Isabella married King Ferdinand (who were 2nd cousins and stayed married from 1474 1504 had 5
children), thus joining the two independent state of Castile and Aragon. The royal couple launched a war against
the Moors in souther Spain, and in 1481 the fall of Granada established them as monarchs of the whole country.
Isabella remembered her promise to Torquemada and appointed him Inquisitor General of the new nation.
Hitherto, the Inquisition in Spain had been merely an investigating group, but in 1481 Torquemada burned 800
heretics mainly Moors and Jews.
On arriving in a community, Torquemada would invite the populace to report anyone suspected of being a
heretic. Suspects could be identified if there was no smoke rising from their chimneys on a Saturday (thus implying
that they were observing the Jewish Sabbath), if they are meat in Lent, gave a party before leaving on a long
journey (the jewish Ruega), changed their sheets or underwear on a Saturday, cut the fat off meat, or if any of
their relations when dying had turned their faces to the wall. Informers were reminded that they received one
third of the accuseds estate. The accused were tortured until they confessed and gave the names of other
heretics. It was admitted that this method involved the danger of convicting a few innocent people, but as Friar
Francesco Pegna, a noted Inquisitor, justly condemned he should not complain of the sentence which was founded
on sufficient proof and we cannot judge on what is hidden. He should receive the sentence with resignation and
rejoice in dying for the truth.”
Torquemada was not a sadist. He seldom watched the torturing of his victims and attended the autos da
fe only as a matter of duty. He seems to have been dedicated to one driving passion: the extermination of the
Jews and Moors. He cared little about witches or other forms of heresy.[438]
Examination: The procedure was much the same in all the Inquisitions. The prisoner was often kept for months in
one of the dungeons before he was examined. This was probably part of a carefully thought out scheme to wear
down his powers of resistance. On being brought before the tribunal, the accused was asked to speak the truth,
and to promise to conceal the secrets of the Holy Office. Acceptance implied that the examination would proceed;
refusal meant a return to the dungeon and probably the infliction of some form of punishment. In the case of the
examination being continued, a number of questions were put by the president of the tribunal and the prisoners
answers were recorded by a clerk. In a few days, the accused was again brought before the tribunal for further
examination. He was asked to confess his crimes against the Holy Office, and led to believe that the inquisitors
possessed evidence and that they had secured witnesses who were prepared to testify against him. He was not
allowed to know either the nature of the evidence of the identity of the witnesses. Continued resistance and
denial of guilt led to the inquisitors adopting sterner measures. [439]

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 The Inquisition Confessions
The Inquisitors frequently claimed that the confessions extracted by torture must be genuine because the
prisoners seldom retracted afterwards and, legally, torture could not be repeated to point out that torture could
be “interrupted” and then “renewed.” The torture was never officially ended even when a confession had been
secured. It was merely interrupted and, in case of a retraction, could be continued. The Inquisition was full of
legal quibbles of this nature, such as the claim that “the Inquisition never executed anyone” (the actual execution
was technically done by the civil authorities) and the plea tthat “the church abhors the shedding of blood” (which
meant burning at the stake0. As Dr. Bohenzan of Erfurt put it in explaining why he refused to retract a false
confession, “I was racked for 6 hours and another time slowly burned for 8. If I retracted, I shall be exposed to
these torments again. I’d rather die.” A young girl, Maria de Coceicao of Lisbon, was racked until she confessed
heresy, but on being released she recanted. She was racked again, and again she confessed, then recanted , saying
“Every time you release me, Ill deny what was extorted from me by pain.” On the third racking, she refused to say
anything and was finally scourged and banished.[440]
Arnold of Verniolles, who had posed as a priest although only a subdeacon, was one of those interrogated
for heresy in the 13th century by the Inquisition in the south of France. . He confessed to sodomy with several
young men. One of the witnesses against him, the Carmelite friar Pierre Recort, testified that: “When Pierre asked
why he had carried on in this way with youths when he could have had enough women, Arnold told him that
during the period that they were burning lepers, he was in Toulouse and had sex with a prostitute. After
perpetrating that sin, his face swelled up and as a result he was afraid of becoming a leper. He therefore swore
from then on not to know women carnally; and, in order to keep that oath, he carried on in the above manner
with those youths.” For him at least so the witness said he claimed, his sexual partners were fungible. To the
modern ear he may seem to protest too muc, insisting that boys were just a substitute for women in order to
prevent his labeling as homosexual. However, the reasons for his choice of male partners did not mitigate his
offense, nor would he have expected them to; and, more to the point, the witness found the fungibility argument
plausible.[441]
Then la Guardia in southern Spain, the Inquisitors announced that a group of Jews had employed a
magician to put a curse on the country. The magician required the heart of a Christian boy so the Jews had
kidnapped a beggar boy and crucified him, afterwards cutting out his heart. The next ingredient necessary was a
Host. One of the conspirators obtained a Host during Communion and tried to smuggle it out of the church, but
the wafer cast such a radiant light that he was detected and turned over to the Inquisition. Under torture, he
confessed the whole story and told the Inquisitors that the dead boy’s heard was in a box in his room and the body
was buried in a cave in the mountains. The Inquisitors found the box but it was empty and no body could be
located in the cave. This was considered conclusive proof that the boy had been miraculously transported to
heaven. [442]
Even more than elsewhere, family authority in Montaillou centered in the male head of the house, who
usually ruled with an iron hand. The Inquisition record mentions several cases of wives who were beaten and who
were afraid of their husbands. “A man is worth nothing if he is not his wife’s master,” one peasant remarked.[443]
Here, too, the connection between shepherds and the werewolves is striking. Amongst other shepherds
who were proved to be addicted to werewolfery there is the notorious case of Pierre Burgot and Michel Verdun, a
couple of lycanthropic sorcerers who were tried at Besancon in December, 1521, and sentenced to be burned alive
by the Inquisitor General, Frere Jean Boin, O.P.[444]

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Inquisition Cases: A very remarkable case, illustrative in part of this observation, where, however, not the person
who was supposed to be the subject of the demoniacal malady, but its alleged authors, were punished, is thus
reported by Dr. Walt of lgasgow: “ It occurs at Bargarran, in Renfrewshire, in 1696. The patient’s mname was
Christian Shaw, a girl of 11 years of age. She is described as having hd violent fits of leaping, dancing, running,
crying, fainting, etc., but the whole narrative is mixed up with so much credulity and superstition , that it is
impossible to separate truth from fiction. These strange fits continued from August 16996, till the end of March in
the year following, when the patient recovered.” An account of the whole was published at Edinburgh, in 1698,
entitled A true Narrative of the Sufferings of Young girl, who was strangely molested by evil spirits, and their
instruments, in the West, collected from authentic testimonies.”
The whole being ascribed to witchcraft, the clergy were most active on the occasion. Besides occasional
days of humiliation, 2 solemn fasts were observed throughout the whole bounds of the Presbytery, and a number
of clergymen and elders were appointed in rotation, to be constantly on the spot. So far the matter was well
enough. But such was the superstition of the age, that a memotial was presented to his Majestys most honorable
Privy council, and on the 19th of January, 1697, a warrant was issued, setting forth “that there were pregnant
grounds of suspicion of witchcraft in Renfrewshire, especially from the afflicted and extraordinary and
extraordinary condition of Christian Shaw, daughter of John Shaw, of Bargarran.” A commission is signed by 11
privy concillors, consisting of some of the first noblemen and gentlemen in the kingdom.
The report of the commissioners having fully confirmed the suspicions respecting the existence of
witchcraft, another warrant was issued on the 5th of April 1697, to Lord Hallcraig, Sir John Houston, and four
others, “to try the persons accused of witchcraft, and to sentence the guilt to be burned, or otherwise executed to
death, as the commission should incline.”
The commissioners, thus empowered, were not remiss in the discharge of their duty. After 20 hours were
spent in the examination of witnesses, and counsel heard on boths ides the counsel for the prosecution “exhorted
the jury to beware of condemning the innocent: but at the same time, should they acquit the prisoners in
opposition to legal evidence, they would be accessory to all the blasphemies, apostacies, murders, tortures, and
seductions, whereof these enemies of heaven and earth should hereafter be guilty.” After the jury had spent 6
hours in deliberation, 7 of the miserable wretches, 3 men and 4 women, were condemned to the flames, and the
sentence faitfully executed at Paisley, on the 10th of June, 1697. Medico Chirurg. Trans. Vol. V. p. 20, et seq. Trnasl.
Note. [445]
Tens of thousands of such trials continued throughout Europe generation after generation, while Leonardo
painted, Palestrina composed, and Shakespeare wrote. The witches in Macbeth may be difficult to take seriously
today but Macbeth was written in the reign of James I, who hanged more witches than any other English
monarch.[446]
The Malleus Maleficarum: In 1486, Institoris published the Malleus Maleficarum, ‘ the Hammer against the
Witches’, with the pope’s approval and with the bull of 1484 as preface. The Malleus was reprinted in 14 editions
by 1520. Well organized, impassioned, and enjoying papal approval, the Malleus became one of the most
influential of all early printed books. Its influence overwhelmed the moderate tradition within the Catholic Church.
The Malleus declared that the 4 essential points of witchcraft were: renunciation of the catholic faith, devotion of
body and soul to the service of evil, offering up unbaptized children to the Devil, and engaging in orgies that
included intercourse with the Devil. In addition, witches typically shifted their shapes, flew through the air, abused
the Christian sacraments, and confected magical ointments. The great majority of witches were women, and the
reason for this is, Institoris declared, that women are more stupid, fickle, lighter headed, weaker and more carnal
than men. All witches, men and women, must be accused, arrested, convicted, and executed.[447]

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 The Churches Attitude on Women: Thomas Aquinas, the “Angleic Doctor” of the 13th century, stated the
position on women that even the Reformed the Protestant churches were still to hold to more than 400 years
later. Since woman had been created from Adams rib, he said, she was obviously destined for social union with
man and should thus exist neither in authority or servility. She was his partner, but only in matters where she was
biologically indispensable; in other words, procreation. In the wider sphere, another man was a much better
partner than she could ever be. Man, after all, was the head of the family for the very good reason that it was only
in him that “the discretion of reason” predominated, and his superiority was demonstrated even in the act of
intercourse, where he took the active and therefore nobler part, while she was passive and submissive. The
teachings of St. Thomas quinas have remained the basis for theological study in the majority of seminaries so that
his opinions are given new life in every generation of the priesthood.[448]
Theology being the work of males, original sin was traced to the female. Had not a woman’s counsel
brought first woe by causing Adam to lose Paradise? Of all mankind’s ideas, the equating of sex with sin has left
the greatest train of trouble. In Genesis, original sin was disobedience to god through choosing knowledge of good
and evil, and as such the story of the Fall was an explanation of the toil and sorrow of the human condition. The
Christian theology, via St. Paul, it conferred permanent guilt upon mankind from which Christ offered redemption.
Its sexual context was largely formulated by St. Augustine, whose spiritual wrestlings set Christian dogma
thereafter in opposition to mans most powerful instinct. Paradoxically, denial became a source of attraction,
giving the Church governance and superiority while embedding its followers in perpetual dilemma.
More than in some later times, the sexuality of women was acknowledged in the Middle Ages and the
marital debt considered mutual. Theologians bowed to St. Paul’s dictum, “Let the husband render to his wife what
is due her, and likewise the wife to the husband,” but they insisted that the object must be procreation, not
pleasure. [449]
So much emphasis is repeatedly place on compliance and obedience as to suggest that opposite qualities
were more common. Anger in the Middle Ages was associated with women, and the sin of Ire often depicted as a
woman on a wild boar, although the rest of the seven Vices were generally personified as men. In one 14th century
illuminated manuscript, Pride was a knight on a lion, Envy a monk on a dog, Sloth a peasant on a donkey, Avarice a
merchant on a badger, Gluttony a youth on a wolf, Ire a woman on a boar, and Luxury (instead of the standard
Lechery) a woman on a goat. If the lay view of medieval woman was a scold and a shrew, it may be because
scolding was her only recourse against subjection to man, a condition codified, like everything else, by Thomas
Aquinas. For the good order of the human family, he argued, some have to be governed by others “wiser that
themselves”; therefore, woman, who was more frail as regards “both vigor of soul and strength of body,” was by
nature subject to man, in whom reason predominates.” The father, he ruled, should be more loved that the
mother and be owed a greater obligation because his share in conception was “active,” whereas the mothers was
merely “passive and material.” Out of his oracular celibacy St. Thomas conceded that a mothers care and
nourishment were necessary in the upbringing of the child, but much more so the fathers “as guide and guardian
under whom the child progresses in goods both internal and external.” That women reacted shrewishly in the age
of Aquinas was hardly surprising.[450]
What Christianity did offer woman was spiritual equality, a gift of greater benefit to the giver than to the
receiver. By treating her as an important convert, the Church was able to make public use of her in works of
charity and evangelism, while keeping her (on the private level) firmly in her place. Even in the eastern Church
where, because of female segregation, womens pastoral role was of considerable importance, and where widows,
virgins, and deaconesses all had specific places in the hierarchy, they were still forbidden to perform oblations, to
baptize, to teach of pray aloud in church, to approach the altar, of pronounce a blessing. [451]

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 John Aylmer (1521 1594) was an English bishop who categorized women in general as “wanton
flippergibs,” and the occasional good one as “an eel put in a bag amongst five hundred snakes,” so that, even “if a
man should have the luck to grope out the one eel from all the snakes, yet he hath at best but a wet eel by the
tail.[452]
Another unusual form of torture employed at the same Inquisition was specifically designed for women.
Tow, pitch and cotton were wrapped around the vidctim’s arms, and then set on fire and allowed to burn until the
flesh was consumed. [453]
Pope John appears to have been naturally superstitious, and given to such practices as keeping a magical
snake skin to detect poisoned food and drink. Through most of his pontificate John was active in prosecution of
sorcerers and invokers of demons. The year after his election, Bishop Hugo Geraud of Cahors went to the stake for
involvement in conspiracy against the pope and certain cardinals. The Bishop and his accomplices had allegedly
employed wax images and other magical objects to bring about the pontiff’s ruin; after the plot was detected,
various clerics at the papal court confessed under torture that they had dabbled in sundry forms of witchcraft. Two
years later, the Franciscan Bernard Delicieux, earlier a harsh critic of inquisitorial procedures, was brought to trial
on charges of witchcraft. He was acquitted of one charge, that of attempting to bewitch one of John XXII’s
predecessors through drinks and powders. But on the grounds of possession of magical books he was sentenced to
life imprisonment. On three occasions in 1318, 1320, and 1326 Pope John took initiative in the investigation of
those persons in southern France who were forming pacts with the devil, employing image magic, abusing the
sacraments, and committing other such offenses. In a trial with clear political implications, the archbishop of Mila
and an inquisitor charged that Matteo and Galeazzo Visconti, two of John’s main political adversaries, had entered
a pact with the devil, had involked the devil on numerous occasions, and had used sorcery against the pope.
Meanwhile the pope issued commands to the bishop of Ancona and an inquisitor, directing them to prosecute
other political enemies on the charges of Idolatry, heresy, and diabolism. And on two occasions, the pope aided in
investigation of sorcery directed against the French Kings.[454]

Witch Hunts
A witch hunt is a search for people labelled "witches" or evidence of witchcraft, often involving moral
panic or mass hysteria. The classical period of witch hunts in Europe and North America falls into the Early
Modern period or about 1450 to 1750, spanning the upheavals of the Reformation and the Thirty Years' War,
resulting in an estimated 35,000 to 100,000 executions. The last executions of people convicted as witches in
Europe took place in the 18th century. In the Kingdom of Great Britain, witchcraft ceased to be an act punishable
by law with the Witchcraft Act of 1735. In Germany, sorcery remained punishable by law into the late 18th
century.[455]
Even during the great European witchhunt of the 16th and 17th centuries when, under torture, “witches”
gasped out allegations against anyone whose name came to mind public figures, usually of women witches far
exceeded that of men. In the Swiss canton of Lucerne between about 1450 and 1550, for example, 32 witches
were accused, and only one of them was a man; while in the English county of Essex between 1560 and 1680,
when 291 witches were tried, only 23 were men, 11 of whom were closely connected with a woman. The women
involved in such cases were usually married women or widows aged between 50 and 70 (old for the time), sharp
tongued, ugly, very often following the profession of village midwife, a calling that naturally attracted suspicion at
a time of high infant mortality, especially since witches were known to need a regular supply of unbaptized babies
for their banquets. The malleus meficarum (1486), the first great handbook of the witch inquisitors, had no more

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difficulty than a modern psychoanalyst in accepting that this type of woman might readidly believe she had had
intercourse with the Devil himself, a hug, black monstrous being with an enormous penis and seminal fluid as cold
as ice water.
That the elderly housewives of the late medieval and early modern world attracted none of the respect
and admiration vouchsafed to their younger and more decorative sisters was only to be expected. But that so
many should have suffered the fatal malevolence of the witchhunters was another matter. It was as if the higer
the ideal of woman, the greater the sin of the defector. The figures calculated by modern scholars anxious to play
down numbers rather than magnify them are sobering. In the single Swiss canton of Vaud, 3,371 witches died
between 1591 and 1680. In the little town of Wiesensteig in Germany, 63 women were burned in the year of 1562
alone. In Obermarchtal, 54 people 7 per cent of its inhabitants ent to the stake in 2 years and in oppenau 50 out
of a population of 650 in only nine months.[456]
The Last witches to be hanged in England were Mary Hicks and her 10 yr old daughter in 1716, although a
mother and daughter were burned for witchcraft in Scotland 6 years later. It was such a cold day that the 2
women eagerly warmed themselves by the fire that was being prepared to burn them. The last woman to be
burned at the stake in England was Christian Murphy in 1789 for counterfeiting. The last witch to be burned in
Europe was Maria Sanger in Wurzburg in 1749. Torture was legally abolished in Baden in 1831, in Russia in 1847,
and in Bruchsal (a small German community) in 1872.[457]
In the 13th Century, according to Lea, a unique form of torment was invented by Theodore Lascaris,
applicable in cases of suspected sorcery. A lady of the court was accused of this crime, and to induce her to
confess, the emperor “caused her to be enclosed naked in a sack with a number of cats.” The method, despite the
severe suffering caused, failed in its object. [458]
On one occasion, the notary of the Inquisition at Cordova locked a girl of 15 ina room, stripped her naked,
and scourged her until she consented to bear testimony against her own mother. On another, a prisoner was
carried in a chair to the auto, with his feet burned to the bone. It is only fair to state, however, that both these
intances belong to the period of recognized abuse at the beginning of the 16th century.
It is not surprising that the mere threat of torture was sufficient to put a prisoner in an agony of fear.
Elvira del campo, wife of the scrivener Alonso de Moya, was tried by the Inquisition of Toledo in 1567 9 on a
charge of not eating pork and of putting on clean linen on Saturdays. She admitted having committed these
criminal acts, but deniedthat she had had any heretical intentions. This did not satisfy the inquisitors, who
condemned her to the torture.[459]
One of the few trials associated with Italy during this century was conducted by the papal Inquisition in
Lombardy with the cooperation of the bishop of Novara. At this trial a number of sorcerers were prosecuted, one
of whom was a woman from Orta, a village in the diocese. She confessed that she had abjured Christ and baptism,
that she had trampled on the cross, prayed to the Devil on her knees, and killed children with magic.
At Carcassonne in 1329 a Carmelite monk named Peter Recordi was condemned by the Inquisition for
having made images of wax, toads’ blood, and spittle, consecrating them to the Devil and then hiding them in the
houses of women with whom he purposed sexual intercourse. He was also accused of having called up Satan in
person and sacrificed a butterfly to him; the reason for this particular choice of victim is unclear.[460]
With regard to the number of victims who suffered at the hands of the Inquisition, estimates vary
enormously. Llorente, the ex Secretary of the Holy Office who wrote a bitterly antagonistic account of it at the
beginning of the 19th century, based on manuscriptmaterial which is no longer extant, states that all told, from its
foundation down to 1808, the total number of heretics burned in person in Spain alone totaled 31,912, those
burned in effigy 17,659, and those reconciled de vehementi 291,450. These figures are so enormous as to seem

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highly suspicious. It must be recalled, however, that at the outset, the activity and the violence of the Holy Office
was boundless: and to suggest that during the first century of its existence, 10 tribunals burned on an average 30
heretics each yearly a hypothesis which would amply justify this high estimate certainly does not appear to be out
of the question. This reckoning is borne out by the intensly Catholic historian Amador de los Rios, usually most
moderate in his views, who estimates that between 1484 and 1525, the number of those burned in person came
to 28,540, those in effigy to 16,520, and those penanced to 303,847. On the other hand, Rodrigo, the apologist of
the Inquisition, puts forward the impossible assertion tht less than 400 persons were burned during the whole
history of the Inquisition in pain. Even if this refers to those who remained steadfast to the last, and so were
burned alive, it is a manifest under statement: indeed, it should be possible without much difficulty to draw up a
nominal roll far in excess of this number.
As far as Portugal and its dependencies go, the figures can be provided with a much greater approach to
precision. There are extant the records of approximately 40,000 cases tried before the 3 tribunals of that country
from the middle of the 16th to the middle of the 18th century. Of these, upwards of 30,000 resulted in
condemnations. The sentences were carried out at recorded autos de fe totaling approximately 750. In these
1808 persons were burned at the stake (1,175 in person and 633 in effigy) and 29,590 were reconciled. Another
account places the number burned in person at 1,012; but the larger figure is certainly to be preferred, as during
the period of decline, between 1651 and 1760, there were 419 recorded victims. Lists have been compiled of little
less than 2,000 autos which took place in the Inquisition and its dependencies from 1480 down to 1826. But the
precise figures and proportions are after all of no great significance. The institution was an abomination on the
face of the earth, whther its victims were reckoned in hundreds or in thousands.[461]

Chapter 13
Inquisition Torture
The first torture was the garrote. The prisoner was stripped naked, for the executioners required access
to every portion of the body. A bely was then fastened around his waist and he was suspended from the ceiling.
Cords were twisted around various parts of his body and slowly tightened in the manner of a tourniquet. As one
part of his body began to grow numb, he was turned by means of the belt into another position so new cords could
be applied.
If the garrote failed, the Inquisitors then had recourse to the strappado. The victims hands were tied
behind him and he was then hoisted up by his wrists tied behind him and he was then hoisted up by his wrists to a
pulley on the ceiling. For maximum effect, the prisoner was raised slowly and allowed to stand on tiptoe for the
length of time it required to say a psalm Miserere 3 times slowly. He was then lowered, circulation allowed to
return, and hoisted up again with weights attached to his feet for 2 Misereres. If this failed, he was raised almost
to the ceiling and suddenly allowed to drop but brought up with a sharp jerk that dislocated his arms at the
shoulders. Should he still refuse to confess, weights were tied to his legs and he was pulled up to be dropped
again.
The water torture was considered the most terrible and used when other means had failed. The prisoner
was tied to a ladder (the escalera) with his head lower than his feet. An iron prong (the bostezo, yawn) was used
to force his mouth open and a strip of linen (the toca) pushed down his throat. Water was slowly dropped on the

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linen until the prisoner, in his efforts to avoid being strangled, swallowed the strip. The strip was gradually
withdrawn, covered with blood and mucus. The process was then repeated. The amount of water used was
carefully measured and could never exceed 8 quarts at any one time; otherwise the prisoner might suffocate.[462]

An Account of the Process of The Inquisition and

Its Management by Torture
“When the prisoner has been examined 3 times and still persists in the negative, it often happens that he
is detained a whole year or longer before he is admitted to another audience, that being wearied with his
imprisonment, he may more readily confess what is desired; but if he still persists in the negative his accusation is
at length delivered to him intermixt with a number of pretended crimes of a heinous nature, which composition of
truth and falsehood is a snare for the unhappy wretch; for as he seldom fails to exclaim against the feigned crimes,
his judges thence conclude the others of which he makes less complaint are true. When his trial comes on in good
earnest, the witnesses are examined afresh, a copy of the depositions is delivered to him with those circumstances
supprest as might discover the evidence; he replies to each particular, and gives in terrogatories to which he would
have the witnesses examined and the names of others that he would have examined in his behalf; an advocate it
appointed forhim, which tho’ it has the appearance of Justice is really of no use to the prisoner for the advocate is
under an oath to the office, is not admitted to speak to his client but in the presence of the inquisitor, nor to
alledge anything in his favour but what he thinks proper. After the process has been carried on in this manner for
a considerable time, the judges with their assessors examine the proofs and determine the fate of the Prisoner; if
his answers and exceptions are not satisfactory, nor the proofs against him sufficient for conviction, he is
condemned to the Torture. The scene of the diabolical cruelty is a dark underground vault, the prisoner upon his
arrival there is immediately seized by a torturer, who forthwith strips him. Whilst he is stripping, and while under
the torture, the inquisitor strongly exhorts him to confess his guilt, yet neither to bear false witness against himself
or others. The first torture is that of ye Rope which is performed in this manner. The prisoner’s hands are bound
behind him, and by means of a rope fastened to them and running through a pulley, he is raised up to the ceiling,
where having hung for some time with weights tyed to his feet he is let down almost to the ground with such
sudden jerks as disjoint his arms and legs, whereby he is put to the most exquisite pain, and is forced to cr out in a
terrible manner. If the prisoners strength holds out, they usually torture him in this manner about an hour, and if
it does not force a confession from him to their liking, they have recourse to the next torture, viz.: Water. Te
prisoner is now laid upon his back in a wooden trough which has a barr running through ye midst of it upon which
his back lies, and upon occasion his back bone is hereby broke and puts him to incredible pain. The torture of
water is sometimes performed by forcing the prisoner to swallow a quantity of water and then pressing his body
by screwing ye sides of ye trough closer; at other times a wet cloth is laid over the prisoners mouth and nostrils,
and a small stream of water constantly descending upon it he sucks ye cloth into his throat, which being suddenly
removed draws away with it water and blood and puts ye unhapp wretch into the Agonies of Death. The next
torture, viz.: that of Fire, is thus performed, the prisoner being placed on the ground his feet are held towards a
fire and rubbed with unctuous and combustible matter, by which means, the heat penetrating into those parts, he
suffers pains words than death itself.[463]
There are a few eyewitness accounts of the Inquisitions by people who miraculously survived. One of
these lucky individuals was William Lithgow, a Scot, who was in Malaga in 1620 on business and seized by the
Inquisition as a Protestant spy. Lithgow gives the following account:
I was stripped to the skin and mounted on the rack (this was a certical rack upright against the wall) where
I was hung with 2 small cords. Thus being hoisted to the appointed height, my tormentor drew my legs through

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the two sides of the 3 planked rack, tied a cord about each of my ankles and then drew the cords upwards,
bending forward my 2 knees against the 2 planks until the sinews of my hams burst asunder. So I hung for a large
hour.
Then the tormentor laying my right arm above the left, wrapped a cord over both arms 7 times and then
lying down on his back and bracing his feet in my belly, pulled until the 7 several cords combined in one place on
my arm cutting the sinews and flesh to the bare bones which has lamed me so still and will be forever.
Now my eyes began to start, my mouth to foam and froth, and my teeth to chatter like a drummers sticks.
But notwithstanding my shivering lips, my groaning, the blood sprining from my arms, broken sinews, hams and
knees, still they struck me in the face with cudgels to stop my screams.
This their incessant imploration: “Confess, confess, confess in time for thine inevitable torments ensue.”
But all I could say was “I am innocent, O Jesus, have mercy on me!”
Then my trembling body was laid upon the face of a flat rack with my head downward, inclosed within a
circled hole, my belly upmost, my arms and feet pinioned, for I was to receive my main torments. Now ropes were
passed over the calf of my leg, the middle of my thigh, and the great of my arm, and these ropes fastened to pins.
I received 7 tortures, each torture consisting of three complete windings of the pins. Then the tormentor got a pot
full of water in the bottom of which was small hole through which he poured the water into my mouth. At first I
gladly received it, such was the scorching drought of my tormenting pain and likewise I had drunk nothing for 3
days before. But when I saw he was trying to force the water down me, I closed my lips. Then my teeth were set
asunder with a pair of iron cadges. Soon my belly began waxing great like a drum, a suffocating pain as my head
was hanging downwards and the water reingorging itself in my throat, it strangled and swallowed up my breath.
I was 6 hours upon this rack and between each set of tortures I was questioned for half an hour, each half
hour a hell. By ten o’clock that night, they had inflicted 60 several torments but still continued for another half
hour although my body was begored with blood, cut through every part, my bones crushed or bruised and I was
roaring, howling, foaming, bellowing, and gnashing my teeth. True it is, it passeth the capacity of man to conceive
the pain I experienced or my anxiety of mind. When they took me from the rack, the water gushed from my
mouth. They put irons on my broken legs and I was carried back to my dungeon. Every day I was threatened with
fresh tortures if I did not confess and the Governor ordered that all the vermin in the cell be swept up and piled on
my naked body which tormented me almost to death but the turnkey (a converted Moor) used to come secretly,
remove the vermin and burn them in heaps with oil or doubtless I had been miserably eaten up and devoured by
them. Finally, the Inquisitor, despairing of getting any statement from the tough Scot, let him go.[464]
It is impossible to name all the methods employed by the Inquisitors and other agencies of the Romish
system for the purpose of forcing a confession or retraction from the “heretic.” Such a vast number of methods
were used many of which embodied parts of some other method, that it is very hard to classify them all. And then,
methods were frequently used, which were of such a character they can not be described in public print, but a
careful search of histories had been made, and the following list is probably as complete as any heretofore printed:
• Hanged.
• Hanged head down.
• Suspended on a cross over fire.
• Closed up inside of a heated up Iron Bull.
• Placed on stretcher and flayed.
• Headed up in barrel containing spikes and rolled down hill.
• Seated on platform and head struck off with sword.
• Forced to lie on back with feet in stocks 4 or 5 feet high

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 • Suspended in the air by rope and strangled.
• Suspended by one hand and one foot.
• Paraded through the streets naked before burning.
• Molten metal poured into the mouth.
• Chained to wall or floor in dark dungeon.
• Joints pulled apart by ropes to limbs and tightened by windlass.
• Suspended by chains over fire and roasted.
• Placed in stocks and wheeled through city.
• Iron mask placed on head and molten metal poured into it.
• Scourgeed with metal lashes.
• Heated mask forced over head and face.
• Hands forced into hot iron mittens.
• Gag placed in mouth and expanded till the jaws were dislocated.
• The tongue removed with pincers.
• Theumb placed in vise and crushed.
• Crown of knobs placed on head and tightened.
• Mouth forced open and 30 pints of water poured slowly down throat.
• Blinded with pointed hot irons.
• Thrown into deep pit and burned.
• Suspended in air with rope about middle of body.
• Forced over precipice on to spikes below.
• Women drive nude through streets
• Boiled in caldron of oil.
• Strapped back down and abdomen flayed.
• Tongue pierced with hot irons.
• Locked in frame and dropped into pit of water.
• Pressed to death by platform and weights.
• Tied to stakes till starved or torn by wild beasts.
• Finger nails and toe nails pulled out with pincers.
• Limbs broken with clubs.
• Water dropped on head till hole is worn to the brain.
• Tied to carts and horses’ tails and dragged to death.
• Tied up in bags and thrown to wild animals.[465]
When in 1211, the castle of Cabaret fell, its defenders were burned at the stake or destroyed in other
painful ways. The lady of the castle was pitched alive into a pit, which was then filled up with stones. When
marmaude capitulated, 5000 men, women and children were massacred. Other so called heretical sects met with
a similar fate to the Albigenses. One such was the Apostolicals, who dressed in white, with bare heads, after the
manner of the apostles. Gerhard Sagarellus of Parma, founder of the sect, was burned at the stake in the year
1300. Seven years later, his successor, Dulcino of Novara, and this mans wife, Margaretha, were publicly torn to
pieces with hooks and other implements, and their remains thrown into a fire.

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Auto da Fe: An auto da fe was an impressive sight. Voltaire remarked “An Asiatic arriving in Madrid on the day of
an auto da fe would doubt whether here was a festival, a religious celebration, a sacrifice, or a massacre. It is all of
these.” Dr. Geddes witnessed an auto da fe in Madrid in 1682. He says:
There had not been a spectacle of this kind at Madrid for several years before, for which reason it was
expected by the inhabitants with as much impatience as a day of the greates festivity and triumph. When the day
appointed arrived, a prodigious number of people appeared, dressed as splendid as their respective circumstances
would admit. In the great square was raised a high scaffold, and thither from 7 in the morning till the evening,
were brought criminals of both sexes; all the Inqusitions in the kingdom sending their prisoners to Madrid. Twenty
men and women out of these prisoners, with one renegade M ohometan, were ordered to be burned; fifty Jews
and jewesses, having repented of their crime, were sentenced to a long confinement and to wear a yellow cap: and
ten others, indicted for witchcraft and other crimes, were sentenced to be whipped and then sent to the galleys:
these last wore large pasteboard caps, with inscriptions on them, having a halter about their necks, and torches in
their hands, On this solemn occasion the whole court of Spain was present. The grand inquisitors chair was placed
in a sort of tribunal far above that of the king.
At the place of execution there are so many stakes set as there are prisoners to be burned, a large quantity
of dry tinder being set about them. The stakes of the Protestants are about 4 yards high and have each a small
board, whereon the prisoner is seated within half a yard of the top? The condemned then fo up a ladder between
two priests, who attend them the whole day of execution. When they come even with the board, they turn about
to the people and the priests spend near a quarter of an hour in exhorting them to be reconciled to the church of
Rome. On their refusing, the priests come down and the executioner ascending, chains the condemned close to
the stakes and leaves them. Then the priests go up a second time to renew their exhortations; and if they find
them ineffectual, usually tell them at parting that “they leave them to the Devil.” A general shout is then raised
and when the priests fet off the ladder, the universal cryis “Let the dogs’ beards be singed!” This is done by
torches mounted on poles thrust against their faces. This is kept up until all the hair is burned off their heads. Fire
is then set to the tinder and the condemned are consumed.
The intrepidity of the 21 men and women in suffering the horrid death was truly astonishing: some thrust
their hands and feet into the flames with the greatest fortitude, and all of them yielded to their fate with such
resolution that many of the amazed spectators lamented that such heroic souls had not been more
enlightened.[466]
The melancholy effects of the Inquisition are a trifle when compared with those public sacrifices, called
Auto da Fe, or Act of Faith, and to the shocking barbarities that precede them. A priest in a white surplice, or a
monk who has vowed meekness and humility, causes his fellow creatures to be put to the torture in a dismal
dungeon. A stage is erected in the public market place, where the condemned prisoners are conducted to the
stake, attended with a train of monks and religious confraternities. They sing psalms, say mass, and butcher
mankind. Were a native of Asia to come to Madrid upon a day of an execution of this sort, it would be impossible
for him to tell whether it were a rejoicing, a religious feast, a sacrifice, or a massacre; and yet it is all these
together. The kings, whose presence alone in other cases is the harbinger of mercy, assist at this spectacle,
uncovered, seated lower than the Inquisitors, and are spectators of their subjects expiring in the flames.
The following is an account of an Auto da Fe, performed at madrid in the year 1682. The officers of the
Inquisition, preceded by trumpets, kettle drums, and their banner, marched on the 30th of May, in cavalcade, to
the palace of the great square, where they declared by proclamation would be put in execution. There had not
been a spectacle of this king at Madrid for several years before, for which reason it was expected by the
inhabitants with as much impatience as a day of the greatest festivity and triumph. When the day appointed

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arrived, a prodigious number of people appeared dressed as splendidly as their respective circumstances would
admit. In the great square was raised a high scaffold, and thither, from seven in the morning till the evening, were
brought victims of both sexes; all the Inquisitions in the kingdom sending both sexes; all the Inquisitions in the
kingdom sending their prisoners to Madrid.
There was among those who were to suffer, a young jewess of exquisite beauty, and but 17 years of age.
Being on the same side of the scaffold where the queen was seated, she addressed her in the following pathetic
speech: “Great Queen, will not your royal presence be of some service to me in my miserable condition? Have
regard to my youth; and oh, consider that I am about to die for professing a religion imbibed from my earliest
infancy.” Her majesty seemed greatly to pity her distress, but turned away her eyes, as she did not dare to speak a
word in behalf of a person who had been declared a heretic by the Inquisition.[467]

Fig. 138.). Auto da fé in the Plaza Mayor of Madrid Rizi, Francisco 1683
The ceremony was known as the auto da fe (Act of Faith) or gaol delivery. These autos da fe were not held
at any regular times, or even annually, but in accordance with the discretion of the Holy Office. They might be held
at intervals of one year, or every 2, 3 or 4 years. The ceremony, which always took place of a Sunday, was the
occasion of a gathering of all the populace. The victims were to be burned to death in public or otherwise
punished.
“The victims who walk in the procession,” says Dr. Dowling, in his History of Romanism, “wear the san
benito, the coroza, the rope around the neck, and carry in their hand a yellow wax candle. The san benito is a
penitential garment or tunic of yellow cloth reaching down to the knees, and on it is painted the picture of the
person who wears it, burning in the flames, with figures of dragons and devils in the act of fanning the flames. This
costume indicates that the wearer is to be burnt alive as an incorrigible heretic. If the person is only to do
penance, the the san benito has on it a cross, and no paintings or flames. If an impenitent is converted just before
being led out, then the san benito is painted with the flames downward; this is called ‘fuego reuelto,’ and it

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indicateds that the wearer is not to be burnt alive, but to have the favour of being strangled before the fire is
applied to the pile. Formerly these garments were hung up in the churches as eternal monuments of disgrace to
their wearers, and as the trophies of the Inquisition. The coroza is a pasteboard cap, 3 feet high, and ending in a
point. On it are likewise painted crosses, flames and devils. In Spanish America it was customary to add long
twisted tails to the corozas. Some of the victims have gags in their mouths, of which a number is kept in reseve in
case the victims, as they march along in public, should become outrageous, insult the tribunal, or attempt to reveal
any secrets. The prisoners who are to be roasted alive have a Jesuit on each side continually preaching to them to
abjure their heresies, and if any one attempts to offer one word in defence of the doctrines for which he is going to
suffer death, his mouth is instantly gagged.”
On arrival at the place of execution, where a large scaffold had been erected, prayers were offered, and a
sermon preached in which the Inquisition was praised and heresy bitterly condemned. If the prisoner were
prepared to accept and to die in the Catholic faith he had the privilege of being strangled first and then burnt. In
the event of him electing to die a Protestant or a member of any other heretic cult, he was roasted alive. And now
let Dr. Geddes, who was himself the horrified spectator of the auto da fe held at Madrid in 1682, take up the tale.
“The officers of the Inquisition, preceded by trumpets, ikettle drums and their banner, marched on the 30th
of May, in cavalcade, to the palace of the great square, where they declared by proclamation that on the 30th of
June the sentence of the prisoners would be put in execution. There had not been a spectacle of this kind at
Madrid for several years before, for which reason it was expected by the inhabitants with as much impatience as a
day of the greatest festivity and triumph. When the day appointed arrived, a prodigious number of people
appeared, dressed as splendid as their respective circumstances would admit. In the great square was raised a
high scaffold; and thither, from 7 in the morning till the evening, were brought criminals of both sexes; all the
Inquistions in the kingdom sending their prisoners to Madrid. 20 men and women out of these prisoners, with
one renegade Mahometan, were ordered to be burned; 50 Jews and jewesses, having never before been
imprisoned, and repenting of their crimes, were sentenced to a long confinement, and to wear a yellow cap; and
10 others, indicted for bigamy, witchcraft and other crimes, were sentenced to be whipped and then sent to the
galleys; these last wore large pasteboard caps, with inscriptions on them , having a halter about their necks, and
torches in their hands. On this solemn occasion the whole court of Spain was present. The grand inquisitors chair
was placed in a sort of tribunal far above that of the king. The nobles here acted the part of the sheriffs officers in
England, leading such criminals as were to be burned, and holding them when fast bound with thick cords; the rest
of the criminals were conducted by the familiars of the Inquisition.
“At the place of execution there are so many stakes set as there are prisoners to be burned, a large
quantity of dry furze being set about them. The stakes od the Protestants, or , as the inquisitors call them, the
professed, are about four yards high, and have each a small board, whereon the prisoner is seated within half a
yard of the top. The professed then go up a ladder betwixt 2 priests, who attend them the whole day of execution.
When they come even with the aforementioned board, they turn about to the people, and the priests spend near
a quarter of an hour in exhorting them to be reconciled to the see of Rome. On their refusing, the priests come
down, and the executioner ascending, turns the professed from off the ladder upon the seat, chaings their bodies
close to the stakes, and leaves them. Then the priests go up a second time to renew their exhortations; and if they
find them ineffectual, usually tell them at parting, that ‘they leave them to the Devil, who is standing at their elbow
ready to receive their souls, and carry them with him into the flames of hell fire, as soon as they are out of their
bodies.’ A general shout is then raised, and when the priests fet off the ladder, the universal cry is: ‘Let the dogs’
beards be made!’ (which implies, singe their beards). This is accordingly performed by means of flaming furzes,

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thrust against their faces with long poles. This barbarity is repeated till their faces are burnt, and is accompanied
with loud acclamations. Fire is then set to the furzes, and the criminals are consumed.
“The intrepidity of the 21 men and women in suffering the horrid death was truly astonishing; some thrust
their hands and feet into the flames with the most dauntless fortitude; and all of them yielded to their fate with
such resolution that many of the amazed spectators lamented that such heroic souls had not been more
enlightened. The near situation of the king to the criminals rendered their dying groans very audible to him; he
could not, however, be absent from this dreadful scene, as it is esteemed a religious one, and his coronation oath
obliges him to give a sanction by his presence to all the acts of the tribunal. [468]
During the whole reign, indeed, of Philip Vi (de Valois), 1328 58, the Inquisiton dealt with a very large
number of witchcraft trials, many of the accused being first delated for heresy, and upon examniation found to be
versed in necromancy and the black art. Thus in 1335 at Toulouse a solemn auto da fe of no less than 63 persons
was held. 2 witches, Anne Marie de Georgel and Catherine Delort, had made ample acknowledgement of their
diabolic pacts and commerce. They confessed that they habitually attended the Sabbat which was held, especially
on a Friday night, sometimes in the vicinity of Pech David, sometimes in the forest of Bouconne, or again in the low
level country stretching between Touloust and Montauban. There they adored the Demon who was present under
the form of a huge black goat, they had had sexual connexion with him in this shape as well as having been
enjoyed by the foul warlocks who frequented these assemblies; they offered infants, stolen from the cradle, to the
Master of these orgies; they are too of the devils banquets where at no salt was served. Catherine Delort had
taken the lives of her 2 aunts, whose property she was to inherit, by melting from time to time wax images slowly
before a fire; so that these women sidckened and languished as the wax flowed away. Both Anne marie de
Georgel and Catherine Delort held that the Devil was equal in power to God; that their Master reigned of earth,
God only in Heaven; that over the earth and all that therein is the Devil is lord. This shows that they were Gnostic
heretics, Manichees, and they belonged, no doubt, to a secret society of these witches at whose nocturnal
meetings the abominations they described took place. And indeed they were not far wrong in deeming such
assemblies the Devils Sabbat.[469]
At Cambrai in 1460 a sorcerer named Jennin was haled before the Bishops tribunal. Upon his arrest he
endeavoured to stab himself with a knife, but was prevented, and when interrogated confessed to having
entertained a familiar for many years, by whose help he pretended to foretell, of foretold, future events. He had
also abandoned himself to every impurity, and had achieved no small reputation as a confectioner of love philtres
and evil amulets. He was condemned to make public confession of his heresy and sorceries, to renounce the
demon, and to perform some just and exemplary penance. But, as on his return from the scene of the public auto
da fe, he not only tore his sackcloth robe but broke and dashed to the ground the crucifix he was carrying, he was
considered to have merited the doom of a relapsed heretic, was brought to trial, and 2 days after burned at the
stake.[470]
Victims of The Inquisition: LLorente, the Roman Catholic writer, who for years acted as secretary to the Spanish
Inquisition, estimates that from 1481 to 1517, that is during a period of less than 40 years, 13,000 persons were
burnt alive, and 17,000 were condemned to different forms of punishment. These figures are probably under
rather than over the true mark. The triviality of the offences for which punishments, and often death, were
incurred was instrumental in causing the total number of persecution to be so immoderately large. A glance at
the records shows the trifling nature of these offences and the severity of the punishments meted out to the
offenders.
Rochus, a carver of St. Lucar, Spain, for defacing an image of the Virgin Mary rather than sell it to an
inquisitor for a mere trifle, was burnt at the stake. The keeper of the prison at Triano, spain, for showing kindness

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to the prisoners in the castle, was sentenced to 200 lashes and 6 years labour as a galley slave. A woman servant
in the Inquisition, for granting favours to the captives, was whipped in public and branded on the forehead.
Ferdmando, a Protestant schoolmaster, for teaching the principles of his faith to his pupils, was first tortured, and
then burnt. Another Protestant, named John Leon, and some Spaniards of the same faith, on endeavouring to
escape to England, were captured by agents of the Inquisition, tortured, starved, and finally burnt. For refusing to
take the veil and turn nun, but instead taking up the Protestant faith, a young lade was condemned to the
flames.[471]
An Englishwoman, married to a man named Vasconcellos, and living in Maddeira, in 1704, was charged
with heresy and sent to the Inquisition of Lisbon. For 9 months and 15 days this woman, for a crime of which she
steadfastly claimed to be innocent, was kept in a dungeon, on nothing but bread and water, and no better sleeping
provisions than a damp straw bed. In attempts to extort confession she was whipped on several occasions with
knotted cords; her breast was burnt with a red hot iron in three different places and the wounds left to heal
themselves. Finally, she was conveyed once again to the torture chamber and commanded by the execution to sit
in a fixed chair, to which she was bound with cords in a way which prevented the slightest motion. Her left foot
was then bared, and and iron slipper, which had been put in the fire until it was red hot, was fixed on her naked
foot, where it remained until the flesh was burnt to the bone. The woman fainted. She was then flogged so
fiendishly that her back from the shoulders to the waist was one mass of torn flesh. They then threatened to put
the red hot slipper on her right foot. Unable to endure any further torments she signed the paper they held in
front of her.
Jane Bohorquia, a lady of noble family living at Seville, for conversing with a friend about the Protestant
religion, was seized and imprisoned. She was pregnant at the time, but immediately after the birth of a child, and
while still in a lamentably weak state, she was racked with such severity that the flesh was cut through to the very
bones and blood gushed from her mouth. A week later she died. In this case, as on many another occasion, it was
reported that she had been found dead in prison, no official mention being made of the torture to which she had
been subjected. The report read: “Jane Bohorquia was found dead in prison; after which, upon reviewing her
persecution, the Inquisition discovered that she was innocent. Be it therefore known, that no further prosecutions
shall be carried on against her, and that her effects, which were confiscated, shall be given to her heirs at
law.”[472]

Torture Chamber
Some of the Inquisitional Prison Palaces still stand for the delectation of the tourist. That of Evora is now a
hotel, that of Barcelona an antiquary’s shop, that of Coimbra a stable, that of Toledo, until recently, the Posada de
la Hermandad. The site of the notorious edifice at Lisbon is now occupied by the Opera House. A description
printed in the nnual Register in 1821, when the building was at last opened for public inspection, gives an idea of
what it had been like at the height of its power:
On the 8th inst., the palace of the Holy Office was opened to the people. The number which
crowded to see it during the first 4 days, rendered it extremely difficult and even dangerous to attempt an
entrance. The edifice is extensice and has the form of a an oblong square, with a garden in the centre. It is three
stories high, and has several vaulted galleries, along which are situated a number of dungeons, of 6,7,8, and 9 feet
square. Those on the ground floor and in the first story have no windows, and are deprived of both air and light
when the door is shut. The dungeons on the next story have a kind of breathing hole in the form of a chimney
through which the sky ma be seen. These apartments were allotted to prisoners, who it was supposed, might be

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set at liberty. In the vaulted wall of each dungeon there is a hole of about an inch in diameter, which
communicates with a secret corridor running along by each tier of dungeons. By these means, the agents of the
Inquisition could at any moment observe the conduct of the prisoners without being seen by them: and when 2
persons were confined in the same dungeon, could hear their conversation. In these corridors were seats so
placed, that a spy could observe what was passing in 2 dungeons, by merely turning his eyes from right to left, in
order to look into either of the holes between which he might be stationed. Uman skulls and other bones were
found in the dungeons. On the walls of these frightful holes are carved the names of some of the unfortunate
victims buried in them, accompanied with lines of notches, indicating the number of days of their captivity. One
name had beside it the date of 1809. The doors of certain dungeons, which had not been used for some years, still
remained shut, but the people soon forced them open. In nearly all of them, hman bones were found, and among
these melancholy remains, were in one dungeon, fragments of the garments of a monk, and his gridle. In some of
these dungeons, the chimneyshaped air hole was walled up, which is a certain sign of the murder of the prisoner.
In such cases, the unfortunate victim was compelled to go into the airhole, the lower extremity of which was
immediately closed by masonry. Quicklime was afterwards thrown down on him, which extinguished life and
destroyed the body. In several of these dens of misery, mattresses were found, some of them old, others almost
new a circumstance which proves, whatever may be said to the contrary, that the Inquisition in these latter times
was something more than a scarecrow.[473]

Fig. 139.). Torture Chamber of the Inquisition from Moore's Martyrology 1809

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 A very considerable period on one occasion which is no record, as long as 14 years sometimes intervened
between the arrest of a person and the promulgation of sentence; while an interval of 3 or 4 years was
commonplace. During this time, the captive had ample leisure to brood over the treatment he had received and
the exact degree of his guilt. That very large numbers never survived to learn the results of their trial was
inevitable: and, at every auto, there figured the effigies and bones of various persons who had died in the
dungeons of the Holy Office.
That there were abuses was inevitable. Prisoners were kept in chains for years, in dark and insanitary cells,
at the mercy of gaolers who were not always models of deportment: and it not infrequently happened that a
woman was dragged pregnant to the stake. In 1512, the redoubtable Cardinal Ximenes issued an order
threatening with death any official who was found carrying on an intrigue with one of his prisoners. This, however,
was not sufficient to put an end to the abuse; and the case of the amorous Andre de Castro, alcaide of the
Inquisitional prisoners at Valencia in 1590, accused of seducing one female prisoner and kissing or soliciting all the
otherswho appealed to his taste, is enough to put the most hardened realistic novelist of today to the blush. It
must nevertheless be realized, in common fairness, that the prisons of the Holy Office were no worse than those of
any other authority at this period, and that its functionaries were not necessarily more lustful or more cruel.
The expenses of the imprisonment, however long its duration might be, were borne by the accused. In
Sicily, those incurred during the detention of a nun acquitted and released in 1703 after a 4 years’ incarceration
were still being paid off by the unfortunate woman’s heirs as late as 1872![474]
The stone images I had seen when I first came in were used in connection with the strappado. They were
the weights attached to the victims legs when he was hoisted by the pulley. Round and weighing some 30 pounds,
they were carved to represent th e heads of fiends or, ironically, cherubim. [475]
When Napoleon took over Spain in 1808, he officially abolished the Inquisition. Colonel Lemanouski , a
Polish officer with the French troops, says that when the army entered Madrid the Inquisitors barricaded
themselves in their monastery and batterings rams had to be used to force the doors. The inquisitors denied the
existence of torture chambers but the soldier poured water on the floor and found where it leaked out through a
trap door. Under the floor they found dungeons full of prisoners, all nude and many insane. The French blew up
the building with kegs of gunpowder.[476]
“We searched in vain. The holy fathers assured us that they had been belied; that we had seen all, and I
was prepared to give up the search, convinced that this Inquisition was different from others of which I had heard.
But Col. De Lile was not so ready as myself to give up the search, and said to me, ‘Colonel, you are commander
today, and as you say, so it must be; but if you will be advised by me let this marble floor be examined. Let water
be brought and poured upon it, and we will watch and see if there is any place through whish it passes more freely
than others, I replied to him, ‘Do as you please,’ amd prdered water to be brought accordingly. The slabs of
marble were large and beautifully polished. When the water had been poured over the floor, much to the
dissatisfaction of the Inquisitors, a careful examination was made of every seam in the floor to see if the water
passed through. Presently Col. De Lile exclaimed that he had found it. By the side of these marble slabs the water
passed through fast, as though there was an opening beneath. All hands were now at work for further discovery;
the officers with their swords and the soldiers with their bayonets seeking to clean out the seam and pry up the
slab; others with the butts of their muskets strike the slab with all their might to break it; while the priests
remonstrated against desecrating their holy and beautiful house. While thus engaged a soldier, who was striking
with the butt of his musket, struck a spring and the marble slab flew up. Then the faces of the Inquisitors grew
pale as Belshazzars when the handwriting appeared on the wall; they trembled all over. Beneath the marble slab,
now partly up, there was a staircase. I stepped to the altar and took from the candles, 4 feet in length, which was

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burning, that I might explore the room below. As I was doing this, I was arrested by one of the Inquisitors, who
laid his hand gently on my arm, and with a demure and holy look said, ‘My son, you must not take those lights with
your bloody hands; they are holy.’ ‘Well,’ said I, ‘I will take a holy thing to shed light on iniquity; I will bear the
responsibility.’ I took the candle and proceeded down the staircase. As we reached the foot of the stairs we
enetered a large square room, which was called the hall of judgment. In the center of it was a large block and a
chain fastened to it. On this they had been accustomed to place the accused, chained to his seat. On one side of
the room was an elevated part, called the ‘Throne of Judgment.’ This the Inquisitor General occupied; and on
either side were seats, less elevated, for the holy fathers, when engaged in the solemn business of the Holy
Inquisition. From this room we proceeded to the right and obtained access to the small cells, extending the entire
length of the edifice, and here such sights were presented as we hope never to see again. These cells were for
solitary confinement, where the wretched victims of Inquisitorial hate were confined, year after year, till deah
released them of their sufferings, and their bodies were suffered to remain until they were entirely decayed, and
the rooms had been fit for others to occupy. To prevent their being offensice to those who occupied the
Inquisition there were flues, or tubes, extending to the open air sufficiently capacious to carry off the odro. In
these cells we found the remains of some who had paid the debt of nature; some who had been dead apparently
but a short time, while of others nothing remained but their bones still chained to the floors of their dungeons. In
other cells we found living sufferers of both sexes, and of every age, from 3 score and 10 down to 14 or 15 years all
naked, as when born into this world, and all in chains! There were old men and aged women who had been shut
up for many years. Here, too, were the middleaged, and the young man and the maiden of 14 years old. The
soldiers immediately went to work to release these captives from their chains, and took their overcoats and other
clothing which they gave to cover their nakedness. They were exceedingly anxious to bring them out to the light of
day, but I, being aware of the danger, had food given them, and then brought them gradually to the light as they
were able to bear it. We then proceeded to explore another room on the left. Here we found the instruments of
torture of every kind which the ingenuity of man or devils could invent.[477]
What a contrast these magnificent chambers and apartments presented to the dungeons or cells which
housed the prisoners. There were some 300 of these dungeons; dark, damp and small. The only accommodation
provided was a miserable apology for a bedstead, a urinal, wash hand basin,l two pitchers, a lamp and a plate. The
prisoners were given poor and scanty food, they were forbidden to speak or make any kind of noise, and punished
severly for any breach of regulations. Torres de Castilla, in describing the Portugese Inquisition of Goa, says the
places allocated to the prisoners were the
“dirtiest, darkest and most horrible that can possibly be, into which the rays of the sun never penetrate.
The kind of noxious air that must be breathed may be imagined when it is known that a dry well in the middle of
the space where the prisoners were confined and which is always uncovered, is used as a privy, the emanations
from which have no other outlet for escape than a small opening. The prisoners live in a common privy.”
Torture was introduced for the express purpose of extracting confession, being authorized by Pope
Innocent in a Bull issued in 1252. The inquisitors reduced torture to something approaching a fine art,l and in the
process showed the possession of much psychological knowledge and insight, the procedure bneing nicely
calculated to wear down the resistance even of the strongest minded and most powerfully built man. First the
accused was threatened with torture, which threat, in itself, had often the desired effect. If this failed to extort
confession, he was conducted to the torture chamber and shown the instruments used. This torture chamber was
well designed to afflict all except those possessing nrves of iron, with horror, dread and despair. It was an
underground apartment, devoid of windows, and lighted with nothing better than a couple of candles. The
executioner was an extraordinary, awesome apparition. Clothed from head to foot in a black garment, with his

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head and face covered, except for two eye holes, with a black cowl, he presented a most diabolical and satanic
appearance. [478]

Trinity: These pincers have hooked teeth like the fangs of a serpent. The vicious little group which we have
labeled “a trinity” includes the pincers for removing the tongue.

Fig. 140.). 2 Different Type of Pincers designed for Tongue pulling

Pincers: The red hot pincers referred to so heavily and used for mainly facial parts, nipples etc.
The application of painful pressure to the thumbs was long employed in England in order to induce a
prisoner to plead or a witness to give evidence. This pressure, in its simplest form, was supplied by a piece of
strong but thin string tried around the thumb. The invention of the thumbscrew enabled more pressure to be
applied, even to the extent of crushing the digit to a mass of pulp. The excruciating pain induced by this particular
form of torture is evidenced by the fact that few who were subjected to it failed to confess. Bishop Burnet, in his
History, says that after the boot and the “waking” had been tried without avail, the thumbscrews, applied to
Spence and Carstairs, caused them to confess all they knew:
“When the torture had its effect on Spence, they offered the same oath to Carstairs. And upon his
refusing to take it, they put his thumbs in the screws; and drew them so hard, that as they put him to
extreme torture, so they could not unscrew them, till the smith that made them was brought with his tools
to take them off.”[479]

Iron Gag: The Iron Gag, or Mute's Bridle was used to stifle the screams of a victim. The oblong box was forced into
the mouth and the metal collar was tightly fastened around the back of the neck. A small hole in the front allowed
air to pass in and out but muffled any screams. A torturer could press a single fingertip to the air hole and create
an extremely distressing situation for the accused. This was used often during the Inquisition's auto da fe, so the
accused would not interrupt the ceremony with their irritating cries of distress.

Fig. 141.). 2 Iron Gags

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Knob Crown: an open iron band with knobs on the inside, put on the
head and tightened by means of the thumbscrew, pressing the knobs
against the skull. This is called the “iron crown,” and was worn by
religious martyrs on the way to execution.

Fig. 142.). For The Head – Knobby Crown

The Iron Mask: This Iron Mask was put on red hot.

Fig. 143.). Inquisition Torture Mask boiling oil was poured through the ear funnels
Fig. 144.). Máscara de tortura Santísima Trinidad, Santa Inquisición Holy Inquisition. Mask was put on when red
hot. When taken off, it would also take the wearers scalp, skin and eyes with it.

Barrel Roll: Victim was put on belly inside barrel and rolled back and foth long nails were usually on the inside of
the barrel.

Fig. 145.). 2 Pictures of Barrel Rolls. Different castles/ torture exhibits.

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Burned Alive: it was a favourite sentence in the case of those found guilty of heresy. The inquisition condemned
thousands to the flames. It was no less a favourite method throughout all the countries of Europe, Protestant as
well as Catholic, for dealing with sorcerers and witches. This the burning of Gilles de Rais and of Joan of Arc. In the
year 1415, Dr. John Huss, rector of the University of Prague, and Jerome of that same city, a disciple of the doctor,
were both burnt alive for heresy.[480]
Execution by burning at the stake was never considered by the inquisitors of Spain or by the English courts
to be a form of torture.[481]

Fig. 146.). Contemporary illustration of the auto da fé of Valladolid, in which fourteen Protestants were burned at
the stake for their faith, on May 21, 1559

Strappado /Squassation: hang a person by their wrists while behind their back. The victim will be dropped and
swung all while having heavy weights applied to their ankles.

Fig. 147.). Unknown Painting and Location

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 According to the anonymous author of The History of the Inquisition (1828) there were various degrees of
severity with which this form of torture was applied, the precise degree depending upon the will of the judge.
These degrees of torture were indicated when pronouncing sentence. Thus if the judge said, “Let the prisonerbe
interrogated by torture,” he was merely hoisted upon the rope. If the judge said: “Let him be tortured,” this
meant the undergoing of squassation once only. If the juion was two squassations; while the words “severly
tortured” meant three squassations; and “very severly tortured” meant three squassations with “twistings and
additional weights suspended from the feet.”[482]

The Ladder Rack:

Fig. 148.). A Ladder Rack and Instruction sheet on how to use it.
Of these torments employed in combination, there is for the finding in all literature no better, more
terrible and more heartrending a description of the sufferings induced than that recvounted by William Lithgow, a
Scotsman, who, in 1620, was mistaken for a spy, arrested at Malaga, thrown into the dungeons of the Inquisition
and tortured to the very limits of human endurance. The marvel of it all was that the man ever lived to tell his tale.
I reproduce it here in his own words.
“I was by the executioner stripped to the skin, brought to the rack, and then mounted by him on the top of
it, where soon after I was hung by the bare shoulders with 2 small cords, which went under both my arms, running
on 2 rings of iron that were fixed in the wall above my head. Thus being hoisted to the appointed height, the
tormenter descended below, and drawing down my legs, through the two sides of the ankles and then ascending
upon the rack he drew the cords upward, and bending forward with main force my two knees against two planks,

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the sinews of my hams burst asunder, and the lids of my knees being crushed, and the cords made fast, I hung so
demained for a large hour.
“At last the encarouador, informing the Governor that I had the mark of Jerusalem on my right arme,
joined with the name and crown of King James, and done upon the Holy Grave, the corredigor came out of his
adjoining stance and gave direction to teare asunder the name and crown (as he said) of that heretic King, an arch
enemy of the Holy Catholic Church. Then the tormenter, laying the right arme above the left, and the crown
upmost, did cast a cord over both arms seven distant times: and then lying down upon his back, and setting both
his feet on my hollow pinched belly, he charged and drew violently with his hands, making my womb suffer the
force of his feet, till the seven several cords combined in one place of my arme (and cutting the crown, sinews, and
flesh to the bare bones) did pull in my fingers close to the palm of my hands; the left hand of which is lame so still
and will be fore ever.
“Now mine eyes began to startle, my mouth to foam and froth, and my teeth to chatter life to the doubling
of drummer’s sticks. O strange inhumanity of men, monster manglers! I surpassing the limits of their natural law;
three score tortures being the trial of treason, which I had, and was to endure; yet thus to inflict a seven fold
surplussage of more intolerable cruelties: and notwithstanding of my shivering lips, in this fiery passion, my
vehement groaning, and blood springing forth from arms, broke sinews, hams and knees; yea and my depending
weight on flesh cutting cords, yet they struck me on the face with cudgels, to abate and cease the thundering noise
of my wrestling voice.
“At last being loosed from these pinnacles of paink, I was hand fast set on the fllor, with this their
incessant imploration: Confess, confess, confess in time, for thine inevitabletorments ensue; where finding
nothing from me, but still innocent, O, I am innocent, O Jesus! the lamb of God have mercy upon me, and
strengthen then me with patience to undergo this barbarous murder.
‘Then by command of Justice, was my trembling body laid above, and along, upon the face of the rack,
with my head downward, inclosed within a circled hole; my belly upmost, and my heels upward toward the top of
the rack, my legs and arms being drawn asunder, were fastened with pins and cords to both sides of the outward
planks; for now was I to receive my main torments. Now what a Pottaro or rack is (for it stood by the wall of
timber, the upmost end whereof is larger than a full stride, the lower end being narrow, and the three planks
joining together are made comformable to a mans shoulders; in the down most end of the middle plank there was
a hole, where in my head was laid; in length it is longer than a man being interlaced with small cords from plank to
plank which divided my supported thighs from the middle plank; through the sides of which exterior planks there
were three distant holes in every one of them; the use whereof you shall presently hear).
“Now the Alcaide giving commission the executioner laid first a cord over the calf of my leg, then another
on the middle of my thigh, and the third cord over the freat of my arm; which was severally done on both sides of
my body receiving the ends of the cords, from these 6 several places through the holes made in the outward
planks, which were fastened to pins, and the pins made fast with a device: for he was to charge on the outside of
the plankes, with as many pins as there were holes and cords; the cords being first laid next to my skin. And in
every one of these 6 parts of my body, I was to receive 7 several tortures; each torture consisting of three winding
throws of ever pin, which amounted to 21 throws in every one of these 6 parts.
“Then the tormenter having charged the first passage above my body (making fast by a device each torture
as they were multiplied), he went to an earthen jar standing full of water, a little beneath my hear: from whence
carrying a pot full of water, in the bottom whereof there was an incised hole, which being stopped by his thumb,
till it came to my mouth, he did pour it in my belly; the measure being a Spanish sombre which is an English pottle;
the first and second devices I gladly received, such was the scorching drought of my tormenting pain, and likewise I

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had drunk none for three days before. But afterward, at the third charge perceiving these measures of water to be
inflicted upon me as tortures, O strangling tortures! I closed my lips again standing that eager crudelity. Whereat
the Alcaide enraged, set my teeth asunder with a pair of iron cadges, detaining them there, at every several turn,
both mainly and manually; whereupon my hunger clunged belly waxing great, grew drum like imbolstred, for it
being a suffocating pain, in regard of my head hanging downward, and the water reingorging itself, in my throat,
with a struggling force, it strangled and swallowed up my breath from yowling and groaning.
“And now to prevent my renewing grief (for presently my heart faileth and forsaketh me) I will only briefly
avouch, that between each one of these 7 circular charges, I was aye re examined, each examination continuing
half an hour, each half hour a hell of internal pain, and between each torment, a long distance of life quelling time.
“Thus lay I 6 hours upon the rack, between 4 a clock afternoon, and 10 a clock at night, having had inflicted
upon me 60 several torments. Nevertheless they continued me a large half hour (after all my torments) at the full
bending, where my body being all begored with blood, and cut through in every part, to the crushed and bruised
bones, I pitifully remained, still roaring, howling, foaming, bellowing, and gnashing my teeth, with insupportable
cries, before the pins were undone, and my body loosed. True it is, it passeth the capacity of man, either sensibly
to conceive, or I patiently to express the intolerable anxiety of mind, and affliction of body, in that dreadful time I
sustained.
“At last my head being by their arms advanced and my body taken from the rack, the water regushed
abundantly from my mouth; then they recloathed my broken, bloody, and cold trembling body being all this time
stark naked; I fell twice in a sounding trance, which they again refreshed with a little wine, and two warm eggs, not
for charity done, but that I should be reserved to further punishment.
“And now at last they charged my broken legs with my former eye frightening irons, and carried me to the
coach, being after brought secretly to my former dungeon, without any knowledge of the town, save to my lawless
and merciless tormenters. I was laid, with my head and heels alike high, on my former stones. The latter end of
this woeful night, poor mourning Hazier, the Turk, was sent to keep me; and on the morrow the Governor entered
my room, threatening me with still more tortures, to confess; and so he caused every morning to make me believe
I was going to be racked again, to make me confess an untruth; and thus they continued every day of 5 days to
Christmas.
“Upon Christmas day, Marina, the ladies’ gentlewoman, got permission to visit me, and with her license
she brought abundance of tears, presenting me also with a dish of honey, sugar, some confections, and raisins in
great plenty, to my no small comfort, besides using many sweet speeches for consoltation’s sake. The 12th day of
Christmas expired, they began to threaten me on still with more tortures, even till Candlemas. In all which
comfortless time I was miserably afflicted with the beastly plague of gnawing vermin which lay crawling in lumps,
within, without, and about my body; yea hanging in clusters about my beard, my lips, my nostrils, and my
eyebrows, almost inclosing my sight. And for the greater satisfaction to their merciless minds, the Governor called
Areta, his silver plate keeper, to gather and sweep the vermin upon me twice in 8 days, which tormented me
almost to death being a perpetual punishment; yet the poor infidel, some few times, and when opportunity
served, would steal the keys from Areta, and about midnight would enter my room, with sticks and burning oil.
And sweeping them together in heaps, would burn the greatest part, to my great release, or, doubtless, I had been
miserably eaten up and devoured by them.”[483]

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Popes Pear:

Fig. 149.). 3 Different Popes Pears also known as the Pear of Anguish The Pear of Anguish was used during the
The choke pear (or pear of anguish) is the modern name for a type of instrument displayed in some museums,
consisting of a metal body (usually pear shaped) divided into spoon like segments that could be spread apart by
turning a screw. The museum descriptions and some recent sources assert that the devices were used either as a
gag, to prevent people from speaking, or internally as an instrument of torture. Inserted in homosexuals anally and
women vaginally.
Middle Ages had a way to torture women who conducted a miscarriage, liars, blasphemers and
homosexuals. A pear shaped instrument was inserted into one of the victim's orifices: the vagina for women, the
anus for homosexuals and the mouth for liars and blasphemers, applied when red hot.
This religious device is called a mouth pear, this appliance was thrust into the mouth, a spring is released,
which spreads the sections and distends the jaws.[484]

Witches Chair, Mother in law Chair: a chair that has a cage on it where the head is placed inside while sitting.
There are trap doors on the cage and rats or insects will be put inside and will slowly chew off of and eat the
victims face.

Fig. 150.). A 3 Different Witches Chairs The Middle Photo is located at the Torture Museum in Siena

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Head Crusher: a metal helmet with a screw on top and a bar below the helmet. The victims head was placed in
between the helmet and bar. The screw either crushed the head slowly until death, or the helmet bashed into the
head with repeated thrusts over and over until death.

Fig. 151.). 2 Head Crushers Different Castles/Torture exhibits

Iron Maiden: most likely fiction. A big coffin standing upright, built with a head on top resembling a woman. On
the inside resembles long spikes, so when closed youre punctured all over the body. The spikes are to be
strategically placed to avoid puncturing the organs to prolong the sufferage. There is a trap door at the bottom, so
when opened the body falls thru said trap door and is discarded.

Fig. 152.). 2 Iron Maidens. Supposedly a myth torture device. I personally don’t think it is real. Torture and its
devices is an Art of simplicity with application but complexity on how it can be utilized.

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Judas Cradle : large pyramid on a tripod like stand used for impaling people on the point. It can be used to impale
or stretch the vagina, anus, perineum, testicles, scrotum, penis, or tailbone. Because the muscles affected
naturally contract, the victim cannot relax and go to sleep, making judas cradle the worst form of sleep
deprivation. The victim will bleed to death from internal hemorrhaging caused by the tip of the pyramid ripping
through the intestines.

Fig. 153.). 3 Different Judas’s Cradles Different Castles/Torture Exhibits

Iron Boot: pair of metal boots meant to tighten around the victims legs until totally pulverized. A more primitive
version was to nail boards around the victims legs then pound them with a hammer until the shin bone shattered.

Fig. 154.). 3 Different Types of Spanish Boots. The first on the left is utilized by the individual placing their foot
inside the metal boot and molten led, boiling oil or other boiling liquids may be poured in. It also can be used in a
similar format to what is shown on the far right. The shoe in the middle is used more for breaking bones.
Large iron boots to be put on red hot or filled with melted lead after they were donned, occur frequently.
We present an exact picture of the “Iron Boot.”[485]

Brazen Bull : The brazen bull, bronze bull, or Sicilian bull, was a torture and execution device designed in ancient
Greece. According to Diodorus Siculus, recounting the story in Bibliotheca historica, Perillos of Athens invented
and proposed it to Phalaris, the tyrant of Akragas, Sicily, as a new means of executing criminals. The bull was made
entirely of bronze, hollow, with a door in one side. The bull was in the form and size of an actual bull and had an
acoustic apparatus that converted screams into the sound of a bull. The condemned were locked in the device, and
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a fire was set under it, heating the metal until the person inside roasted to death. When a victim is placed inside
the brazen bull, he or she is slowly burned to death. This device gradually became more sophisticated until the
Greek invented a complex system of tubes in order to make the victim's screams sound like an infuriated ox. Even
though this torture was not used as frequently during the Middle Ages as it was used earlier by the Greek and
Romans, it was still used in Central Europe. This torture is similar to being boiled alive.

Fig. 155.). Rome, Italy: Criminology Museum

Fig. 156.). Gračanica, Manastir Built by King Stefan Uroš II Milutin (r. 1282 1321) in 1310. Frescoes painted most
likely b/n 1318 and 1321. The Martyrage of St. Eustace
Biblical scholars link the design of the Brazen Bull to statues of the Carthaginian deity Baal Hammon (often
identified with the Biblical Moloch) in which infants were sacrificed alive within a bronze, calf headed statue of the
deity by being placed on the hands of the statue and sliding down into the bronze furnace. The noises of the
child's screams were often drowned out by drumming and dancing, since the sacrificial altars did not have the
pipes system that the Brazen Bull had (see Tophet). The practices of the city of Tophet are also cited by scholars to
be the inspiration for the Brazen Bull because of Akragas' Carthaginian roots.
The Romans were reputed to have used this torture device to kill some Christians, notably Saint Eustace,
who, according to Christian tradition, was roasted in a brazen bull with his wife and children by Emperor Hadrian.
The same happened to Saint Antipas, Bishop of Pergamon during the persecutions of Emperor Domitian and the
first martyr in Asia Minor, who was roasted to death in a brazen bull in AD 92. The device was still in use two
centuries later, when another Christian, Pelagia of Tarsus, is said to have been burned in one in 287 by the
Emperor Diocletian. The Catholic Church discounts the story of Saint Eustace's martyrdom as "completely
false"[486]

Heretics Fork: The device was placed between the breast bone and throat just under the chin and secured with a
leather strap around the neck, while the victim was hung from the ceiling or otherwise suspended in a way so that
they could not lie down. Usually the Heretic's fork was given to people who spoke the lord's name in vain,
blasphemers, or liars. This way, the punishment made it nearly impossible for them to talk. Also, a person wearing
it couldn't fall asleep. The moment their head dropped with fatigue, the prongs pierced their throat or chest,
causing great pain. This very simple instrument created long periods of sleep deprivation. People were awake for
days, which made confessions more likely. Traditionally, the fork was engraved with the Latin word abiuro
(meaning "I recant"), and was used by the various Inquisition

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Fig. 157.). Heretic fork and one shown in usage.

The Heretic Catcher: The superstition of the days when this instrument was in use is revealed in the belief that
there was some spell about witches and heretics making it dangerous to lay hands upon them.

Fig. 158.). The Heretic catcher. The spiked circle is attached to a long pole. The reasoning for this was not to touch
the criminal. This was also used on the lepers and during the plague.
Romanists had a heretic and witch catcher=a hoop on the end of a pole. The ends of the hoop at the
aperture were so arranged that they opened when the thing was pushed upon the neck then they sprung together
again. Some of them were provided with a spike in the ferrule, with which the constable could prod the culprit’s
shoulders as he pushed him along. The superstition of the days when this instrument was in use is revealed in the
belief that there was some spell about witches and heretics making it dangerous to lay hands upon them.[487]

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Lead Sprinkler : At first sight, it looks like a holy water sprinkler, but in reality it's a bit more complex. The
torturer poured molten metals in one end and its contents slowly rushed to the other side where they fell on any
part of the victim's body. Many executions occurred with this instrument. A common way to execute a victim was
by pouring molten silver on his eyes. This caused a great deal of pain and eventually provoked death.

Fig. 159.). Rose Water Sprinkler & Lead Sprinkler with definition. Also rumored to be the origin of todays salt
shaker design.

Crocodile Shears: Often used to mutilate those who would attempt to assassinate the king, this iron pincer was
heated red hot before being used to clamp down on the victim’s appendages and tearing them from their bodies.
Castrator in Italian

Fig. 160.). Crocodile shears The crocodile shears was an instrument of torture used in late medieval Europe and
typically reserved for regicides. The insides of the blades were generously lined with teeth or spikes. After being
heated red hot, the crocodile shears were applied to the penis, which, once exposed to sufficient tension, was torn
from the prisoner’s body; or severely mutilated.

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Spanish Donkey: our modern day gymnastics horse but shaped with a diamond top. When persons sat on it
weights were applied to their feet.

Fig. 161.). The Spanish Horse

One instrument for execution is an upright plank, the top end beveled on both sides like the point of a cold
chisel, or like an inverted V. The offender sat astride this upright plank, with heavy weights attached to his feet,
and was gradually split in halves. That is the “Spanish Donkey.”[488]

Jougs: Collar found hanging on walls usually in churchs or at the cities gates.

Fig. 162.). Jougs located on Church Walls

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 In Scotland the jougs were usually fastened to a church door, a tree in a churchyard, the post of a church
gate, a market cross, or a market tron, or weighing post, and not infrequently to prison doors.
In Tudor England manners were severe and formal, parents exacting abject deference from their offspring. A child
did not presume not speak or sit down without leave in presence of its parents. A little leniency was extended to
girls, for when tired they might kneel on cushions at the fare end of the room; but boys were expected to stand
with their heads uncovered. It is to be feared that true domestic bliss was almost unknown in olden times.
Teachers were equally tyrannical, and it is a matter of history that Roger Ascham, the tutor of Queen Elizabeth,
used to “pinch, nip, and bob [slap] the princess when she displeased him.” “Persons neglecting to attend church on
the Sunday were frequently put into the jougs.”[489]
In Scotland, the joug an iron collar attached to a stone pillar was often used but the most popular devices
were the stocks, which held the prisoner by the feet, or the pillory, a wooden frame on the top of a short pole with
holes for the prisoners head and hands.[490]

A letter B brand. "B" for Blasphemer

A cross brand, Fig. 163.). Cross Branding Tool

as used by Roman Catholics on German Anabaptists
The practice of branding as a punishment was widespread in Christendom. It was also used on slaves and animals
to indicate ownership. These are slave brands.

Fig. 164.). Branding Irons of the Chruch.

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720: I know theres torture in all 3 volumes. But that’s exactly how it occurred. Thus it shall be explained in said
format. To better clarify the confusion which is embodied inside the words torture, Spanish inquisition, witch
hunts or hunters and the executioner. The Spanish Inquistion as you have just witnessed had their own unique
styles and reasonings for application of certain torture devices to certain heretics. We must understand that a
heretic or the type of individuals that the Inquisitors saught out werent necessarily all criminals in the sense of
theft or other literal crimes. These individuals committed laws against God which was based on an amenable
theology that was still in its maturity development stages. In which these laws against God were fused with the
municipality laws which allowed Inquisitors to use law as a revolving door in and out of a locale at any given time.
The activities and terminology of the Inquisition is embedded in todays western understanding of
existance. For instance, the whole dimension of interrogation, investigation, law procedure, conviction and carring
out of sentence all has a very hard and scarey spirituality in it that makes the modern day man freeze like a deer in
highlights when in law orientated situations. This spirituality comes directly from both the municipality and the
ecclesiastical courts. This theory has support with the amount of souls they have both taken that’s both guilty and
innocent souls. This same energy/spirituality gives the entirety of the race the aura of authority. The amount of
experience from these situations and the amount of souls collected provides a fear that is felt in their presence.
Ive never encountered information on any other race committing these types of acts in large numbers. The Native
American Indians used to do some heinous things to their enemies. But they were enemies, not strangers, not
their own. The Spanish Inqusition and the church chose any and everybody. The philosophies stirred up during
these times can be stated to hae influenced the philosophies of world dominance. As we have already seen the
Pope has laid claim to all souls and there is an actual all souls day (Halloween).
How does one own souls before they enter the earth and after they leave the earth. You own the souls
coming in the planet by controlling the minds of women. You own and control the existence of souls after death
by being the creator and owner of the philosophy humans accept to know in their countenance of being about the
afterlife. Death is only the collector of the soul and the deliverer to whatever otherside dimension you belong.
Death cannot get involved in quarrels his nemesis is you, which is life. He is the mediator of God and the Devil.
Botht Death and the Devil have their own unique section in the picture gallery.

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Medieval
Art
& Artifact
364
 The Art Gallery

1. The Weather…………………………………………pg. 366

2. The Environment…………………………….…….. pg. 374
3. Castles & Gargoyles…………..…………………….pg 382
4. Executioner………………………………………….pg. 392
5. Knight Armory………………………………….…..pg. 399
6. Medical Equipment & The Sickly…………..………pg. 406
7. The Plague…………………………………..……..pg. 414
8. The Monsters………………………………….……pg. 417
9. Witches ……………………………………………. pg 439
10. The Sabbath………………...………….…………pg.443
11. Werewolves……………………………………….pg. 447
12. The Undead & Death Masks……………………. pg. 451
13. Visions of Hell ……………………………….…..pg. 455
14. Death, Demons & The Devil………………….…. pg. 466
15. The Black Virgins, Mary’s & Madonnas……..…pg. 471
16. The Black Moorish Saints……….………………pg. 513
17. The Arch Angels……………………………..……pg. 528
18. The Bejewelled Saints …………….……………..pg. 533
19. The Catacomb Church’s……………………………pg. 536
20. Alchemy, Astrology & Aliens ….………….………pg. 554
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 The Weather

Fig. 165.). The Flood, The City of God (BNF Fr. 28, fol. 66v), third quarter of the 15th century
Fig. 166.).Bibliothèque nationale de France, Français 174, detail of f. 83r (the Flood). Augustine, De civitate dei.
Paris, beginning of the 15th century.

Fig. 167.). The Christmas flood of 1717 was the result of a northwesterly storm, which hit the coast area of the
Netherlands, Germany and Scandinavia on Christmas night of 1717. In total, approximately 14,000 people
drowned.

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Fig. 168.). 1607 Flood — Burnham Woodcut

Fig. 169.).The Plague of Hail (f17a) The Rylands Haggadah (mid 14th Century Catalonia)

367
Fig. 170.). Behringer offers up a 1486 woodcut of a sorceress conjuring up a hailstorm and Giant hailstones fell
here today en Argentina, these are from 2015

Fig. 171.). Medieval image of an earthquake, with ruins and fallen stars, and the dead in holes. British Library MS
Royal 19 B XV f. 11v

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Fig. 172.). The murrain, Hail and locusts
Fig. 173.). A plague of locusts depicted in a bible produced by Nuremberg based printerpublisher Anton Koberger
in 1483

Fig. 174.). In the year A.D. 864, countless locusts with wings and two teeth –harder than a stone–, flew about
everywhere in Gaul and covered the ground like the snow and afterwards flew into the sea all at once and
drowned there. Afterwards, the sea washed this vermin ashore and it caused a great stench so that many people
died." Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550

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Fig. 175.). 1483 "In the year 1483 locusts swarmed in Italy, laid waste to the district around Brixen, and if
Margrave Louis of Mantua had not prevented it they would have destroyed all the crops in Lombardy. He had
them killed, burned or chased away. Afterwards, a darkening of the sun was seen and then came a great dying, so
that more than twenty thousand people died in Brixen and around thirty thousand died in Venice." The Book of
Miracles (f°87), ca 1552

Fig. 176.). Picture of Locusts swarming in unknown region. The largest swarm of locusts documented is at 20 miles
in length and 5 miles in width. At such proportions to have the ability to block out the sun.

370
Fig. 177.). Nicolaes de Bruyn’s mystifying engraving from 1594

Fig. 178.).1556 comet and earthquake in Constantinople Cropped

371
Fig. 179.). In 1546, in the month of August, the fire from the sky struck a tower in which were more than four
hundred tons of powder, in Mechel in Niederland. And exactly half of the city burned down, which is also a special
sign from God.” Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550 The Book of Miracles

Fig. 180.).A woodcut of 1544, representing the damaged Basel by the 1356 earthquake

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Fig. 181.). “In A.D. 1362, at the time of Otto, the emperor from Saxony, a stone — wondrous and big — fell from
the sky in heavy wind and rain. And on many people, little blood red crosses appeared and a great eclipse of the
sun appeared.”

Fig. 182.). The Great Famine and Murrains in England 1315 1322.

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 The Environment

Fig. 183.). Woman selling fish from a barrel, London, c. 1910

Fig. 184.). Here is another, shown courtesy of the British Museum, with the bawling fishwife crying her wares “Rare
mackerel Three a Groat, or four for sixpence”. (A groat was fourpence). The servants half opening the door do not
seem keen to purchase, and the cat recoils in horror, presumably because the fish are “off” and even the cat will
not eat them.
720: I had to put the fish wives here. The term wife is used in the sense of a woman representing the trade.
Similar to how the term Basketball or Mafia wives fo the title of the TV show is being used. Any ways this dynamic
of the “bawdy fish ladies” was spread all throughout Europe during the Medieval times. I believe these women
created the hardcore western archetype of the Hag witch. It is well documented that these women represented
an uncouthe wild virago, usually unattractive with low hygiene and would be forced into said occupation. As you
can see in the picture the basket in which fish were sold would have a strap that goes around the neck for support,
allowing the basket to hang at waist region. For centuries women carried on with this occupation exclusively.
Women sold fish, men were butchers/barbers.
The mentality of these women in combination with the scent most likely supported the build of the witch
stereotype that is known today. If not the witch, which could have been destroyed during the witch hunts/Spanish
Inqusition and embodied into Halloween/Hollywood then it definetly built the spirituality of the modern day Hag.
This hag is identified by lack of hygiene, i.e., cat ladies or rat packers (hoarders). In our western American mind we
would automatically expect a fish smell from a woman who is known to have bad hygiene. In my personal
experience I have witnessed said scent being attached to a woman when I was in grade school. I state this because
in order to have such a scent or a heavy menstrual cycle, a woman has to have a heavy meat diet. Bad mentality
and attitudes can also produce the scent. As well as having to much sex with different men and not cleaning
afterwards. A heavy meat diet on a woman definetly influences a violent type of mind because of blood
consumption which is mixed with different emoitons, hence the violence of fish ladies. Tribal women did not have
similar eating habits nor smells. It is well documented that some tribal people didn’t have menstrual cycles. But as
we are witnessing here it is culturally attached to western habits and thinking in a form that has no material
evidence.

374
Fig. 185.). Title The Four Conditions of Society Poverty (vellum) Creator Bourdichon, Jean (1457-1521)
Fig. 186.). “Mad as a hatter” In 18th 19th century England, Mercury was used in the production of felt, which was
used in making hats at the time. People who worked in these hat factories were exposed daily to trace amounts of
the metal, which accumulated within their bodies over time, causing some workers to develop dementia caused by
mercury poisoning. Thus the phrase “Mad as a Hatter” became popular as a way to refer to someone who was
perceived as insane

Fig. 187.). Ned Ward, The CoffeeHous Mob, frontispiece to Part IV of Vulgus Britannicus, or the British Hudibras
(London, 1710). Courtesy the British Library.

375
Fig. 188.). Tom King's Coffee House by William Hogarth c.1720
Fig. 189.). la prostitution élément d une infra société médiévale

.
Fig. 190.). Depiction of a 1600s London coffee house with women at the table

376
Fig. 191.). The Gloomy Day is an oil on wood painting by Pieter Bruegel in 1565.

720: This painting the Temptation of St. Anthony is

very important. When the picture is blown up
larger and viewed with good lighting. You will see
with much clarity that the beings in the painting
have been in movies provided for children when I
was a child. These beings can be seen in the
Labyrinth, Crystal Palace, Never Ending Story,
Legend and other films, inclusive with other Jim
Henson works. This beings may be of the realm
visited when high on LSD. LSD has a metaphysic to
the acrynym in which Ive coined to be Lucifer Satan
and the Devil. I myself got hi on Acid (another
street name for the drug) when I was in middle
school and another time in high school. I believe
that it is the ergot poisoning which does something
to the mind which induces advanced, expansive
thinking. LSD/Acid is the boat for the exploration,
which in turn becomes the toolery used to conquer
all possibilities of existence. It is not to be tampered
with as a toy, it can cause permanent damage like a
limb falling off. Fig. 192.). Matthias Grünewald Isenheim Altarpiece (reverse
side, The Temptation of St Anthony)

377
Fig. 193.). Actors of the Commedia dell'Arte Francois Bunel Oil Painting

Money

Fig. 194.). A French counter that was minted between 1656 1680

378
 In truth, Nicholas has a strong connection to the subterranean world. The element nickel was discovered
in 1751 and was given abbreviation of the name Nicholas. A mischievous goblin also shares a name with the saint.
In mythology goblins (like dwarves) are connected both to the world underground and to its mineral wealth. In
fact, the German word Kupfernickel meant “copper goblin” before it became the name of the element. Another
form of wealth from beneath the ground is salt. The first site where the worship of Saint Nicholas was established
in France is Saint Nicolas de Port, next to Varangeville, since the Middle Ages an important Lorraine site for the
extraction of salt. As if to remind people of this bond between Nicholas and salt, the church of Varangeville
remains dedicated to Saint Gorgon of Varangeville irresistibly brings to mind the Gargantua of Rabelais, whose
connection to salt is well recounted in the novel. The most famous alchemist of the Middle Ages was named
Nicholas Flamel. Perhaps Saint Nicholas prompted him to seek initiation into the secrets of alchemy.[491]

Fig. 195.). Brothel token, France (nineteenth century)

Fig. 196.). French Brothel Token unknown time period possible facsimile

379
Fig. 197.).Unknown origin most likely Britain or France. Spaceship like object on the one side of coin. 1648

Fig. 198.). Unknown origin similar unidentified flying object in the air 1656

380
 Fig. 199.). Boar's Head Coffee House Southwark England, Elizabeth I, 1558 1603

Fig. 200.). Different prints of Different Reigns of Kings Medieval Life – Paul Lacroix

381
 Castles & Gargoyles
Today we see medieval churches by the thousand spread throughout the length and breadth of Europe in
which an enormous and uncounted number of grotesque representations are to be found, which, as St. Bernard
rightly points out, must have cost a great deal of money to make. Since grotesque carving is by no means essential
to and is in fact almost antipathetic to the aesthetics of Romansque or Gothic architecture, there must have been
very powerful reasons for its inclusion. The generally suggested reason is that these figures represent Satan and
devils from Hell. This explanation is seen not to apply to most of the grotesque figures after only a cursory
examination. Again, if this really was the reason, surely St. Bernard would have known it too and said so?
The real explanation, which is proferred in this book, is that medieval grotesque art stems directly from
earlier pagan beliefs, that therepresentations are pagan deities dear to the people which the Church was unable to
eradicate and therefore allowed to subsist side by side with the objects of Christian orthodoxy.[492]

Fig. 201.). chateau de chambord france

Fig. 202.). Bodiam Castle is a 14th century moated castle. It was built in 1385 by Sir Edward Dalyngrigge

382
Fig. 203.). Ashford Castle. Co Mayo. Ireland

Fig. 204.). Josselyn Castle, Brittany, France

Fig. 205.). England Northumberland Alnwick Castle viewed from Lion bridge. The castle is one of the finest
Medieval castles to be found in England, often referred as the Windsor of the North. It was also a Harry Potter
movie set

Fig. 206.). Hohenzollern Castle, Germany

Fig. 207.). Vorselaar Castle, Belgium

383
Fig. 208.). Sazova Castle, Eskişehir, Turkey
Fig. 209.).The Alcázar of Segovia,in the old city of Segovia
720: There are several reasons on why I put a couple of castles here. One reason because, these feats of
architecture are phenomenal. America and Africa have castles as well. Im pretty sure every continent on the
planet has a few castles. As a pure reminder of the strength all humans used to have and to question the
feebleness we endure now. Architecture and engineering is an extreme ancient science. Now that it comes to
mind to build may had been the first or second test of Adam being kicked out of the garden. If this is true then we
see how far weve come with the assistance of the devil. As humans are to not have knowledge. Ive read in places
that during the Medieval times it was rumored that devils and demons built the castles and bridges. It is safe to
say that from the year 700 to now the entire country of Europe has had somewhere inbetween 1000-1500 castles.
Most of them gone now, but for sure overtime there has been man that were built and torn down.
Castles can never divide them selves from mysticism. From their look alone and enormous size they
impose a fear. Trap doors, moving walls, secret passage ways and enemy cellars have always been apart of a
castle and yes you do find these stories in the medieval times. Yes, it is also very true that it is real. All the
windows that you see in a castle do not have immediate access to them. In a more ancient time castles were
known to have a labyrinth around them. Supposedly the labyrinths, twists, turns and other surprises advanced the
intelligence of the person that went thru it.

Sheela Na Gig
Churches across Europe have stone carvings of both men and women, generally quite grotesque, exhibit
their genitalia. These were once interpreted as survivals of pagan fertility cults, incorporated into churches in a
syncretistic manner, or as celebrations of fertility within a more Christian context. More recently they have been
seen as misogynistic, equating woman with sex organ and emphasizing the threat of feminine lust and temptation.
Perhaps marginal figures in a manuscript or even embroidery represent little more than the artist having his joke,
but stone carvings on churches are usually part of a planned program. Some carvings we recognize as part of
biblical narratives or traditional iconography. [493]

384
 Because our study also takes into account male sexual scriptures, which in France and Spain are more
numerous than female, we shall use a more general term when referring to figures of both sexes, namely, ‘sexual
exhibitionists’ or simply ‘exhibitionists’.
The Sheela is a frightenin hag whose message does not seem to be immoral but is rather aimed at
dispelling any sexual predisposition the viewer might entertain. We suggest in this oook that the function of sexual
predisposition the viewer might entertain. We sugget in this book that the function of sexual exhibitionists is not
erotic but rather the reverse, that these extraordinarily frank carvings were more probably an element in the
medieval Church’s campaign against immorality, and that they were not intended to inflame the passions but
rather to allay them.
Secondly, we pass under review another popular term, used by us as well as others, when describing such
sexual carvings – the word ‘obscene’. In the course of this essay it will become apparent that medieval masons did
not consider these images to be obscene. Crude, vulgar, not without satirical or sardonic humour, they were
executed in the full knowledge tha they might shock or give offence. [494]
In 1631, provinvial statutes for Tuam order parish priests to hide away, and to note where they are hidden
away, what are described in the veiled obscurity of Latin as imagines obesae et aspectui ingratae, in the vernacular
‘sheela na gigs’, i.e. at that time priests had begun to take notice of these ‘fat figures of unpleasant features’ and
to remove them.
…. a Diocesan (Ossory) regulation of 1676 ordering ‘sheela na gigs’ to be burned. Bishop Brehan in
Waterford was ordering exactly the same thing that year…….
….the Kilmore diocesan synod excluded from all sacraments...those whom the synod calls gierador – they
might perhaps be described as ‘living Sheela na gigs’.
This last reference gives support to the evidence that in some country districts ‘Sheela na gig’ was a term
used to indicate women of loose morals or simply old hags. These regulations also contain further evidence that
many sheelas were destroyed or buried, and that once upon a time there must have been a great many more than
we can see today.[495]
These scholars noted a number of Irish deities, e.g. the ‘hag’ goddesses, and ‘war goddesses in their most
hideous form’ with vulvas reaching down to their knees like the remarkable Sheela at Oaksey in Wiltshire.
However interesting and persuasive their evidence may be, it is the overwhelming European corpus of carvings
which dissuades us from ‘going a whoring after strange goddesses’ in a desperate endeavor to find an insular
solution to what is not an insular problem.[496]
The subject of the human head is perhaps the widest and most important in its manifestations in the
ecclesiastical and secular structures of Gothic Europe. Together with the cult of sacred springs and wells, the
severed human head, or animal head, was one of the most worshipful of all the ancient pre Christian symbols.
Both were almost ineradicable. The cult of the head was taken into the Christian Church, and as a result the
severed head is one of the most widespread and common motifs in the Gothic period. Grotesque heads are
exceptionally numerous, as is the motif of the head with foliage coming from the mouth, or the human head mask
embedded in greenery, the eyes staring balefully out, harking back to memories of human sacrifice and tree
worship, widely practised in Europe, as elsewhere. The Celts, from whom so many of the later European peoples
were descended, were, like other northern peoples, head hunters. But apart from cutting off the heads of their
enemies in battle they worshipped the severed head, and believed it to be imbued with every divine power
prophecy, fertility, speech, song and hospitality and, perhaps more than anything else, the power of averting evil.
Thus, the presence of so many heads in our churches janiform, tricephalic, foliate and purely grotesque over and
above the straightforward portrait heads, would have a very obvious explanation. In the same way heads set up

385
on the gateposts of dwellings, or placed on walls or above doors, would have the same ultimate significance –the
protection of the dwelling from evil forces, and the embuing of it with everything lucky and desirable. The classical
writers commented in some detail on the Celtic cult of the human head, and how the Celts set heads up on
gateposts or place them in their temples, and covered them with gold and silver.[497]
Another common pagan motif was that of the severed head being devoured or gripped by the paw of
some fearsome beast. Many examples of this motif in medieval church iconography can be closely paralleled in
the imagery of Celtic and Romano Celtic Europe. Sometimes a monster grasps 2 severed heads, one under each
forepaw, sometimes portrayed in this attitude. No matter what the context, pagan or Christian, the basic concept
of this motif seems to lie in Man’s constant awareness of dark spiritual forces which wait to snap him up and
devour him, like some great ruthless monster. He employed every device he could to thwart these powers, and to
gain the protectionof hisown gods, or God, as the case may be.
The Sheelagh na Gig, too, the enigmatic fertility figure, whose name cannot be satisfactorily translated and
who is found in Ireland, Britain and on the Continent, requires explanation in ecclesiastical contexts, but this
remains elusive. Sometimes the sexuality of the figure is crude and obvious to a degree, sometimes les marked;
but the posture reveals the basic fertility imagery,characterized by the gesture indicating the genitalia, which are
sometimes grossly exaggerated. Many of these figures are female, a few male. Various opinions of their original
purpose have been proposed that they were simply the whim of a coarse minded craftsman, for example, or that
they were reminders in a spiritual context of the sins of the flesh and its temptations. In Ireland, however, by no
means all of these figures are found in religious buildings; and in Britain several have obviously been built into
churches rather than forming a part of the essential structure, like a corbel or a boss.
The Church in medieval times had come to be the storehouse of the subconscious of the people the
lumber room, as it were, in which were bygone, ancient, half forgotten, half formulated beliefs and superstitions,
customs and folklore. The authorities would seem to have been remarkably tolerant of these, and by
countenancing such bric a brac the Church has effectively preserved to an astonishing degree a great deal of our
ancient past.[498]
Mouth pulling, i.e. inserting the fingers of one or both hands into the corner of the mouth in order to pull it
open sideways, may also be phallic in origin, resembling as it does the gesture of the Sheela. Oftern mouth pulling
faces, without bodies, are a shorthand symbol whose significance is only clear when the masks are found, as at
Bruyeres Montberault, along the sma cornice or corbel table as anal exhibitionists, and the female
exhibitionist.[499]
The root of these insulting gestures must lie deep in the past in some sexual observation. Isaiah LVIII
provides a clue:
But draw near hither, ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the whore. Against whom do
ye make a wide mouth and draw out the tongue? Are ye not children or transgression, a seed of falsehood,
enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree?
According to the scriptures, then, tongue pulling and tongue protruding are the gestures ofa wicked
adulterous generation. [500]
720: The pictures youre about to see of different sculptures attached to being in grotesque sexual provocation is
not necessarily done in the guise of perversion. In essence that is the message conveyed hands down and also
what may be instilled in the mind of the innocents who do not have explanation of the activity. Its pretty simple,
the sexual organs give humans life internally by creativity and health/externally by children and enjoyment, the
devil is against humans & life, therefore the flashing of the sexual organs and sexual self esteem scares off devils
and demons. Another science that can be mentioned with these Sheela na gigs is a deep engrated psychological

386
assistance with erectile dysfunction. In totality I believe this is the root reasoning for the overt sexuality of
Medieval times. It was an indirect insurance of heterosexuality and the battling of erectile dysfunction.
Another science not to be overlooked would be the mathematics of shadow casting. The soul of an
inanimate object supposedly is its shadow. The angels of the shadow casted by the sun helps permeate the energy
of the inanimate object on to the people or area. The Gargoyles whose appearance can be compared with devils in
Medieval paintings are either A scaring off the negative energies from outer space and the higher worlds from the
people as a protection mechanism or they are the devils casting the negative energy on to the people by way of
their shadows.

Fig. 210.). Brothel wall carving Nördlingen – a medieval town.

Fig. 211.). Konrad von Hochstaden at the tower of Cologne City Hall Germany standing atop an autofellatio
performing grotesque.
Fig. 212.). West Knoyle male sheela na gig

Fig. 213.). Exhibitionist Corbel Abbey Church of Sainte Radegonde Poitiers, France 13th century

387
Fig. 214.). Gargoyle on Walking Bridge, Wiesbaden, Germany
Fig. 215.). Paris, France, gargoyles on Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, July

Fig. 216.). San pedro de Cervatos (Cantabria, Spain) Romanic 12th century church (1129), it's specially famous
because of its extensive repertoire of explicit sexual scenes in the... canecillos (pieces under the roof)
Fig. 217.). Erotic/rude roof corbel, Collegiate Church of San Pedro de Cervatos, 12th C. Romanesque ..

388
Fig. 218.). The Collegiate church of San Pedro de Cervatos is a collegiate church located in Campoo de Enmedio,
Spain.
Fig. 219.). The Collegiate church of San Pedro de Cervatos is a collegiate church located in Campoo de Enmedio,
Spain.

Fig. 220.). Greek mythological Tricephalus dog (three headed dog) Cerberus, stone sculpture on Notre Dame de
Paris Cathedral, France.
Fig. 221.). Unspecified location. Sources online have tried to use this Sheela Na Gig as an excuse to justify
homosexuality. From the part on the person on the left and no cheek bone representation it differs from the male
right.

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Fig. 222.). Devils dragging a sinner to Hell Cathédrale Notre Dame de Noyon, Noyon, France
Fig. 223.). Unknown Location

Fig. 224.). Unknown location animal performing some form of sexual act on other animal.
Fig. 225.). Possibly Male Sheela Na Gig

Fig. 226.). Modern day gargoyle unknown location

Fig. 227.). Modern day gargoyle unknown location

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Fig. 228.). Modern day gargoyle unknown location
Fig. 229.). Original Ireland Sheela Na Gig

Fig. 230.). In Oxford's Ashmolean Museum you will find a pair of rather cumbersome looking shoes, the result of
hundreds of separate pieces of leather being nailed on top of one another. They tell the story of one John Bigg, the
'Dinton Hermit', who was once the executioner of the King and took to living in a cave for his remaining forty years
Fig. 231.). One of his shoes can still be seen in the British Collection at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.

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 Executioner

Fig. 232). Ludicia Widmann was an executionieress in Nuremberg (mother of J. M. Widmann, born 3 .12. 1645.)
Fig. 233.).Executionersmasks from Cesky Krumlov is a city in the South Bohemia region of the Czech Republic.

Fig. 234.). An Executioners Mask

Fig. 235.). Business card for an undertaker very interesting shows colloquial language from the time 1745
undertaker's trade card morbid anatomy

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Fig. 236.). Iron Mask, German, 1607 1700. This grotesque mask is believed to have been worn by prisoners being
led to their executions in Nuremburg, Germany, during the 1600s
Fig. 237.). Schandmaskes: masks of shame

Fig. 238.). Schandmaske, deutsch, 17./18. Jhdt. Noch im Spätmittelalter wurden Grabschände
Fig. 239.). An German executioner's mask, 17th century Multiple coloured half mask of hammered sheet iron, the
edge hemmed with strong linen
Fig. 240.). Possibly an Executioner mask of Either France or Germany

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Fig. 241.) The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft Demonology. Russell Robbins pg 115

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Fig. 242.). German Executioner Axe Torture Axe 1600 1750 Hache Du Bourreau

Fig. 243). German Executioner's Sword, 2 Half 17 C SOLD

Fig. 244.). German Executioner's Sword, Late 17 C SOLD
Fig. 245.). Executioners Axe in Rothenburg Criminal and Punishment Museum

Fig. 246.).Pig Head shaped branks A

Fig. 247.). Pig Head Shaped Branks B

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Fig. 248.). Early 18th Century Executioner Cloak
Fig. 249.). executionerscloakgermany

Fig. 250.). Pig Head Shaped Branks C

Fig. 251.). Scolds Bridle in use

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 Mary The Elephant

Fig. 252.). Mary The Elephat being hung

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 Mary (c. 1894–September 13, 1916) was a five ton Asian elephant, also known as "Murderous Mary", who
performed in the Sparks World Famous Shows circus. After killing a trainer in Kingsport, Tennessee, she was
hanged in nearby Erwin, Tennessee, in 1916. Her death is sometimes interpreted as a cautionary tale of circus
animal abuse during the early 20th century.
On September 11, 1916, a homeless man named Red Eldridge, who landed a job as a transient hotel clerk
was hired as an assistant elephant trainer by the Sparks World Famous Shows circus. He was killed by Mary in
Sullivan County, Tennessee, on the evening of September 12. Eldridge led the elephant parade, although he was
not qualified, riding on the top of Mary's back; Mary was the star of the show, riding at the front. There have been
several accounts of his death. One, recounted by W.H. Coleman, who claimed to be a witness, is that he prodded
her behind the ear with a hook after she reached down to nibble on a watermelon rind. She went into a rage,
snatched Eldridge with her trunk, threw him against a drink stand and stepped on his head, crushing it.
A contemporary newspaper account, from the Johnson City Staff, said that Mary "collided its trunk vice like
about [Eldridge's] body, lifted him 10 feet in the air, then dashed him with fury to the ground... and with the full
force of her beastly fury is said to have sunk her giant tusks entirely through his body. The animal then trampled
the dying form of Eldridge as if seeking a murderous triumph, then with a sudden... swing of her massive foot
hurled his body into the crowd." It is clear from the photo of her hanging that Mary was either tuskless or had
short 'tushes' common amongst female Asian elephants.
The details of the aftermath are confused in a maze of sensationalist newspaper stories and folklore. Most
accounts indicate that she calmed down afterward and didn't charge the onlookers, who began chanting, "Kill the
elephant! Let's kill it." Within minutes, local blacksmith Hench Cox tried to kill Mary, firing five rounds with little
effect. Meanwhile, the leaders of several nearby towns threatened not to allow the circus to visit if Mary was
included. The circus owner, Charlie Sparks, reluctantly decided that the only way to quickly resolve the potentially
ruinous situation was to kill the wounded elephant in public. On the following day, a foggy and rainy September
13, 1916, Mary was transported by rail to Unicoi County, Tennessee, where a crowd of over 2,500 people
(including most of the town's children) assembled in the Clinchfield Railroad yard.
The elephant was hanged by the neck from a railcar mounted industrial crane between four o'clock and
five o'clock that evening. The first attempt resulted in a snapped chain, causing Mary to fall and break her hip as
dozens of children fled in terror. The severely wounded elephant died during a second attempt and was buried
beside the tracks. A veterinarian examined Mary after the hanging and determined that she had a severely
infected tooth in the precise spot where Red Eldridge had prodded her. Although the authenticity of a widely
distributed (and heavily retouched) photo of her death was disputed years later by Argosy magazine, other
photographs taken during the incident confirm its provenance. (Bonus)
720: This situation is important on many levels. I found this when doing research for volume 1 on lynchings. I had
to apply it to the series in some way. When looking or dealing with this story, you must get past your
sensationalism and emotional thinking in order to explore the possibilities. In the masculine mentality of
conquering there is always another tier to accomplish which will obliterate any and all other competition. An
elephant is a symbol of many things mythologically/magicly in many different cultures. Nonetheless in our modern
world intelligence it is the largest animal on the planet, may be one of the most feared because of said size and is
indigenous to Africa, the most fruitful continent on the earth. To top it off, her name is Mary. Symbolically, she
represents blacks, females, the top female energy(Mary), Africa, circus abuse in America and human savagery. To
hang the biggest being on a planet, is definetly telling the beings of that planet you are here to conquer and rule.

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 Knight Armory

Fig. 253.). Hand and half sword, ca. 1400–1430

Fig. 254.).1500's Italian Cinquedea
Fig. 255.). A very scarce ceremonial dagger, Italy, 19th century
Fig. 256.). An Italian Stiletto 17th Century.

Fig. 257.). Double Barreled Wheellock Pistol Made for Emperor Charles V (reigned 1519–56) Peter Peck (German,
Munich, 1503–1596).
Fig. 258.). Pair of wheellock pistols. Date ca. 1655–65. Culture Dutch, Maastricht.
Fig. 259.). Pistolier armé de quatre pistolets, vers 1580, Liliane et Fred Funcken

399
Fig. 260.).Medieval gun in the military museum at the head of Gold Street, Hradcany Castle.
Fig. 261.). Weapon in the Torture Museum at the Golden Lane

Fig. 262.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor A

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 Fig. 263.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor B
Fig. 264.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor C

Fig. 265.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor D

Fig. 266.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor E

401
Fig. 267.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor F
Fig. 268.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor G

Fig. 269.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor H

Fig. 270.). Picture taken at Museum in Chicago Knight armor I

402
Fig. 271.). 1475 – 1500 Paris, France, Musée de l'Armée (Les Invalides)
Fig. 272.). The Armour of Henry, Prince of Wales, 1608 at Windsor Castle England

Fig. 273.).1480 1490 Ingolstadt, Germany, Bayerisches Armeemuseum, south German

Fig. 274.). 1480 1490 Alemania Siglo XIX
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Fig. 275.). Maximilian field armor with visor for ceremony and tournament, south Germany, 1510 1520 Higgins
Armory Museum
Fig. 276.). Desiderius Helmschmid, German, documented 1513–1579 Equestrian Armor of Emperor Charles V,
Augsburg, c. 1535–1540

Fig. 277.).Armour of George Clifford, Third Earl of Cumberland, a gentleman of the court of Queen Elizabeth I
Fig. 278.). Armour of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II, 1600s.

404
Fig. 279.). 14th century Armor (Italian) Leather covered with Gold trim. Love that splint armour!
Fig. 280.). Knight of the Mirrors from Man of La Mancha

Fig. 281.). English Knight from the time of the battle of Agincourt, from the Azincourt museum
Fig. 282.). 15th Century German Gothic Armour which armors the armpits with articulated plates instead of
chainmaille or a rondel.
Fig. 283). Shaffron, German, c. 1540 horse helment

405
 Medical Equipment & The Sickly

Fig. 284.). This is a late medieval urine wheel from 1506. It is part of the Wellcome Collection in London. Before
stethoscopes and x rays, a pot of piss was an important diagnostic tool in medicine. Doctors, who were often
referred to as "piss prophets," used the wheel to diagnose patients according to the color of their urine. They also
tasted the urine and could even diagnose diabetes due to the sweetness of the pee. From this practice, uromancy
emerged.
Fig. 285.). The Sick Rose: or; Disease and the Art of Medical Illustration: Richard Barnett

Fig. 286.). 18th century medical illustration of hermaphoditism. Paris, 1773. Colored mezzotint. National Library of
Medicine Jacques Fabien Gautier D’Agoty (1717 1785)
Fig. 287.). Journal of Cutaneous and Venereal Diseases, 1884

406
Fig. 288.). MD Medical – Instruments – Instruments used for bloodletting. Leeches.
Fig. 289.). A man sitting in chair, arms outstretched, streams of blood pouring out as a nun places leeches on his
body. Images from the History of Medicine (NLM)
Fig. 290.) A bottle for Mumia , which was discussed in Vol. 1

Fig. 291.). Medical Childbirth Art Painting France 1800

Fig. 292.). Drawing of Birth taking place, note the birthing chair which was open in the seating are and only had a
cushioned rim for sitting

407
Fig.293.).A Monkey rejects the old style clyster for his new 'clysopompe', which he fills with opium and
marshmallow
Fig.294.). A man and woman use a redeveloped clyster for scatological.

.
Fig. 295.). late eighteenth century Pewter, wood

408
Fig. 296.). the iron hand of götz von berlichingen 1480

Fig. 297.). cholreaTwenty three year old Viennese woman, depicted before and after contracting cholera in the
first epidemic in 1831 The Sick Rose: or; Disease and the Art of Medical Illustration: Richard Barnett

409
Fig. 298.). A physician inspects the growth of cowpox on a milking maid

Fig. 299.). The Cow Pock or the Wonderful Effects of the New Inoculation A scene in a vaccine institution; poor
patients crowd in through a doorway on the left; in the room are those whose treatment has had dire
consequences. A comely and frightened young woman sits in an armchair in the centre, the doctor (Jenner, a good
portrait, see BMSat 9925) holds her right arm and gashes it with his knife, while a deformed and ragged boy 1802
holds up a bucket of 'Vaccine Pock hot from ye Cow'. A charity-schoolboy's oval badge on his sleeve is inscribed 'St
Pancras'; from his coat pocket projects a pamphlet: 'Benefits of the Vaccine Process'. From the patients miniature
cows sprout or leap. A pregnant woman (right) stands in profile to the right, a cow issues from her mouth, another
from below her ragged petticoat. A man dressed as a butcher registers despair at the horns which sprout from his
410
forehead. A labourer with a pitchfork sees a cow bursting from a swelling on his arm while another breaks through
his breeches; cows struggle through huge swellings on nose, ear, and cheek. Another patient has only reached the
stage of large carbuncles on forehead and chin. The doctor's medicine-chest and a close-stool stand on the left. On
the chest are bottles, a syringe, &c, and a tub of 'Opening Mixture'. This a haughty assistant ladles contemptuously
into the mouths of the patients as they crowd into the room. On the wall is a picture: a crowd of kneeling
worshippers pay homage to the statue of the golden calf. The scene combines fantasy and realism. After the title:
'Vide - the Publications of ye Anti-Vaccine Society.'

Fig. 300.). The Sick Rose: or; Disease and the Art of Medical Illustration: Richard Barnett
Fig. 301.). Englishman John Lambert (22) exhibited his porcupine skin disorder, Ichthyosis hystrix, in Leipzig.

Fig. 302.). Oedema Exercitationes Practicae, (Leiden, 1694) Author DEKKERS, Frederick (1644-1720)
Fig. 303.). Drainage of tumor Exercitationes Practicae, (Leiden, 1694) Author: DEKKERS, Frederick

411
Fig. 304.). Thyroid Disease” 1817 illustration by Jean Louis Alibert
Fig. 305.). Eleanor of Castile sucks the poison out of Edward I of England

Fig. 306.). Illustration of a “hairy child” born in France in 1597, with umbilical cord sprouting from the forehead,
from an 1831 edition of Aristotle’s Masterpiece
Fig. 307.). Barbara Urslerin presents one of the earliest and most well documented historical cases of
hypertrichosis

412
Fig. 308.). In the 16th century, corrective 'squinting hoods' were used in an attempt to realign the gaze of cross
eyed children
Fig. 309.). Of Lice and Men – A Brief History of Head Lice & Treatments

Fig. 310.). The Hospital for Lunatics. Bethlem Hospital, London the incurables being inspected by a member of the
medical staff, with the patients represented by political figures. Drawing by Thomas Rowlandson, 1789

413
 The Plague

Fig. 311.). Winged phallus pilgrim badge 1

Fig. 312.). Winged phallus pilgrim badge 2
Fig. 313.). Man riding on phallus with tail and sweater on with more phallues in the cartwheel.

Fig. 314.). Pig playing bagpipe or similar insturment

Fig. 315.). A vagina wearing a hat with a phallus on her staff and rope in other hand
Fig. 316.). Stoned winged phallus

Fig. 317.). Led winged phallus

Fig. 318.). Woman riding a running phallus with tail, 3 bells attached
Fig. 319.). 3 marching phalluses, 2 holding a Queen Vagina on their shoulders

414
Fig. 320.). Plague doctor, Frontispiece from Jean Jacques Manget, Traité de la peste, 1721
Fig. 321.). Plague doctor denmark
Fig. 322.). Museum of artifacts — Plague doctor mask, 16th century Ingolstadt Museum

Fig. 323.). Torture during the plague epidemic at Milan, 1630.

415
720: The first 9 pictures of this section are supposedly pilgrim badges. Pilgrim badges were made of cheap
material such as lead or bronze. Some pilgrim badges are small relics that are resembling the saint that was patron
of the monastery they got it from. These badges that are provided here are supposed to work as harms to protect
themselves from the plague. The thought that supports this activit is similar to the Sheela na gigs in which the
sexual organs produce life and the devils/demons are against human production. Therefore the symbol of a life
giving element which shows no literal application, has application from the human thought and intention. If other
symbology is attached to it such as wings, could also influence the language encoded into the object for it to
deflect whatever energy intended.
These badges were many and whatever the populace did that was of a mystical element the church did as
well to combat. On the otherside of things if a social element was introduced from the church the witch
community would bastardize it. This is where things get tricky with the line of religious conflicts with groups of
other people. Which was the basis of the Spanish Inquisition. Im pretty sure the Spanish Inquisition who could
basically use anything to stake somebody to the stake used these badges as an excuse. This is an assumption not a
fact Ive encountered. Nonetheless, the overt sexualized energy that was in Old Europe and in Old America is the
bottom line rule of a free masculine society. In which masculinity was consolidated and mastered during the Dark
ages. These badges are just a toy which is left over from the sexually saturated society known as Old Europe.

Fig. 324.). 1892 Harper's Weekly hand colored wood engraving titled, "In A Public Dispensary -- Treating Patients of
La Grippe." Drawn by C.S. Reinhart.

416
Fig. 325.). Boethius’ Rota Fortuna or wheel of fortune casting a shadow over a dog; engraving emblematic of the
black plague, ca. 1650
Fig. 326.). Plague of Locusts, above an angel blowing a trumpet with the star falling into the pit of hell, Georg
Lemberger, c. 1523. Cipactli López Rodríguez

The Monsters
The “animal functions” shows the appearance of hybrid animals in illuminations in the 13th century and
the increase of these creatures though the 15th century. Man of these illustrations show the bestiary griffin, with
the body of a lion and the wings of an eagle, and others show less popular bestiary animals such as the leucrota,
which has the “haunches of a stag, the breast and shins of a lion, and the head of a horse,“ and the Parandrus,
with the head of a stag and a coat like a bear. Bestiaries popularized classical creatures, such as Sirens. In the
ancient world, sirens were not directly described, but the medieval bestiary envisioned it as a hybrid woman/fish,
making it a threatening borderline creature.[501]
As early as the 7th century, Isidore of Seville applied the word “monster” to groups of people who seemed
deformed in the same ways as individual “monsters.” In his comprehensive compilation of classical knowledge,
Isidore had to address the question of monstrous races because the medieval world had inherited a good deal of
literature on these unusual beings. John B. Friedman’s Monstrous Races in Medieval Art and Thought remains the
finest analysis of these creatures, and he calls them collectively Plinian races, noting the profound impact of the
Roman author Pliny the Elder’s Natural History upon subsequent descriptions. These races include wondrous
creatures that seem to embody the full rance of diversity available to human imagination. There were the
Blemmyae, who lacked heads and necks and bore their facial features on their chests, and the Astomi or “Apple
Smellers,” who lacked mouths and lived from smells, dying in the presence of a foul odor. Even more anatomically
improbable were Sciopods, one legged with a giant foot, who although extremely swift, preferred to spend their

417
time lying on their backs using their foot as a parasol again the sun, or the Panotii, whose ears were so large they
could be wrapped around the body like a blanket. Among themost popular of the Plinian races were Cynocephali,
human formed with heads of dogs. These exotic creatures joined the Cyclops, Amazons, and Pygmies, with which
we are more familiar in the catalogue of monstrous races.[502]
An 8th century text shows this early medieval tension. The Book of Monsters (Liber Monstrorum) describes
many monsters, most inherited from the classical tradition, including the Plinian races.
For example, the Bestiary mentions the manticore, a fierce “beast” with the face of a man. However, the texts
show that people were concerned not only with surface characteristics that seemed to blend species; their
preoccupation showed concern for a mixing of the actual essence of human and animal. For example, the Bestiary
says of centaurs that “the nature of men and horses can be mixed.”[503]
Another extremely popular travel story was Mandeville’s Travels, which was written in French in about
1360, then translated quickly into every major European language.* Mandevile’s work is rich in detail drawn from
many earlier medieval sources and represents almost a compendium of exotic creatures that inhabited late
medieval imaginations. All the Plinian races from the dog headed Cynocephali to giants to Sciopods appear in the
travelogue, and many of the creatures are described with the kind of detail designed to accent their bestiality. For
example, Mandeville said that the Cynocephali, giants, and other monsters cannibals and thus attributed to them
the quality that most defined animals: the desire to eat humans.** The popularity of Mandeville’s Travels
expresses the late medieval preoccupation with monsters.[504]
By the end of the Middle Ages, from about 1450 onward, people seemed to have acquired some
skepticism about the existence of the monstrous races. That is not to say that people had become so certain of
their humanity that they no longer feared ambiguous creatures on the border. People began simply to consider
monsters as a form of hairy wild men who inhabited woods far from civilization. Civilized people perceived the wild
folk to be “like animals, slaves to desire and unable to control their passions.”
The early medieval existence of these creatures along with fauns and satyrs. Jerome acknowledged their
presence in his commentary on the Bible, in which he explained about “pagan hairy woodland demons.”***One of
the most famous literary monsters, Grendel in Beowulf, resembles these wild folk. Grendel seems to belong to the
human race, for he was described as descended from Cain. (The medieval sine qua non of humanity was to be
descended from the first man.) Furthermore, Grendel had a human anatomy, albeit extremely strong, as the
prototypical wild man. However, his behavior defined him as monstrous: he ate human flesh, and he ate alone; he
did not belong to a society of the mead hall, so he envied that society and was bent on its destruction.*** Grendel
was an early medieval example of the creation of an antihuman monstrosity that was a threat to society.[505]
Of course, these explanations of what functions wild people served grow from our 20th century
interpretations of medieval attitudes. Obviously, the question of why the human ind would believe in a semi
human woodland creature was not a medieval question. Instead of speculation on the creature’s existence, they
simply questioned whether it were human or animal. Their response was most often that the creatures were
degenerations of humans.*They began as humans but slipped into the realm of irrational beast. In the same way,
lunatics fell into the category of wild people.** Medieval romances were full of heroes such as Yvain who
experienced a crisis. Lost their minds, and lived in the woods as semi human wild people. In the romance, Yvain
underwent a period of madness during which he retreated to the woods, hunted animals, and “ate their flesh
uncooked, completely raw, like a wild man.[506]
Many people believed Jews were really similar to the pigs they refused to eat. Artists portrayed Jews with
sows as hybrid creatures, and people told tales of Jews revealing their “pig like” true nature. Claudine Fabre Vassas
has detailed the complex webs of folklore, art, and myth that have linked Christian, Jews, and pigs, a tradition that

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ends up equating Jews with pigs in reduction to a bestial level that marked Jews as perpetually “other” and
inferior. For merely one example, Christians equated castrated pigs with circumcised Jews as revealing a bestial
mark on both.
Jews were also identified with owls, a bird that was consistently negative in the bestiaries, representing
sinners and other evils. In art, owls are often shown harassed by small birds, with the explanation that owls are like
Jews who are hated by Christians. Artists also often portrayed the feathered horns of owls as similar to both
horned devils and Jews, who were either reported to have hidden horns or wore horned hates.** As Christians
admired these works of art, their metaphoric significance reinforced the conception of Jews as closer to animals
than Christians.
Just as line blurring metaphors had caused Christians to put animals on trial as humans, there were
instances in which Hews were put on trial as animals. In some places, Jews were executed by being hung upside
down, a punishment reserved for homicidal animals, especially pigs. This was a particularly painful form of
hanging, because people survived several days hung upside down, instead of having their neck broken quickly in a
normal hanging. The Jews of Majorca petitioned the king of Aragon in 1315 to offer them a more humane form of
execution. The king rejected the petition, preserving the upside down hanging of beasts, but did allow for a stone
to be attached to the criminal’s neck to speed death.*** Even more shocking in its direct legal association of Jews
with beasts were charges of bestiality against Christians having sex with Jews. As one jurist (the Belgian Joos da
Damhoudere) remarked, he included intercourse with Turks, Saracens, or Jews as bestiality, “inasmuch as such
person in the eye of the law and our holy faith differ in no wise from beasts …” He also cites the case of a Parisian
man who was executed for having relations with his Jewish mistress, since coition with a Jewess is precisely the
same as if a man should copulate with a dog.”[507]
Chaucer’s gay and jolly Absolon had “Powles window corven on his shoes,” and similar ornature did the
young craftsman fashion for the nobles of Constantinople. Indeed he would no longer make for any who were not
of the highest quality. So skillful was he that without the measure of his last he could make a shoe for any bare
foot, lame or straight, merely by glancing at it. Gold in abundance poured to his coffers, an as he was both a
stalwart fellow and handsome, for there was nobody who could excel him in all the exercises of the arena, in
wrestling and every kind of sport, he was everywhere applauded as a champion. Now it so happened that one day
there came to his window a very lovely maiden accompanied by a large retinue, and she, showing him her naked
foot, desired him to fit her with a pair of shoes, and in Rome, “Nudity of the foot in a woman was a sign of
prostitution, and the brilliant whiteness acted afar as a pimp to attract looks and desires.” But the young man was
already entranced with her beauty, he gazed upon this sight with wide open eyes, and after making and selling the
shoes, beginning from the foot, he absorbed the whole woman in his heart, and deep drank in the deadly evil by
which he was utterly lost. A mere serving man, he sought for dainties from the kings table, and what ground had
he for hope? In his madness he abandoned his house, he sold his goods and chattels, yea, even his patrimony, and
he became a soldier so that by the following of arms he might arise from his lowly condition to the rank of a noble,
and when he sought the lady’s hand, if repulsed, he would be at any rate refused in more courteous phrase.
Before he could dare to unfold his love to his mistress he was determined to make a name for himself in the field,
and indeed through his strength and valour he soon won that eminence among the cobblers of the city.
Accordingly he sought the alliance for which he yearned, and though in truth he deemed himself full worthy he did
not win from her father the lady of his longing. He now blazed forth into the greatest fury, and he desired nothing
so much as to carry off by force the bride who was refused to him on account of his lowly birth and poor estate.
He joined the ranks of a mighty squadron of pirates, and so he prepared to revenge by sea the repulse he had
received on land. Before long he rose to be their general, and he was verily feared both by land and sea, for

419
success always attended him. Whilst he was engaged on one of these bloody forays and laying low every obstacle
in his path, news reached him that his lade was dead. With bitter tears he at once concluded a truce and hastened
to be present at the solemnity of her obsequies. Having assisted at the funeral, he carefully noted the place where
she was buried, and upon the next night, resorting thither all alone, he exhumed the dead woman and lay with
her, knowing her just as if she were alive in his embraces. When this dreadful fornication was over and he rose
from the corpse, he heard a voice bidding him return at the time when she could bring forth and bear way with
him what he had begotten. After the fitting interval he came back, dug up the grave and received from the dead
woman a human head with the warning that he must not allow anybody to see it except those of his enemies
whom he wished to destroy. When he had carefully wrapped this up he placed it deep in a box, and having
complete confidence in his power he gave up fighting at sea, and determined to do battle on the land. To
whatsoever cities or towns he laid siege he displayed this terrible sight of the Gorgon, whereupon the miserable
victims turned to stone they beheld a horror as loathy as that of Medusa herself. He was feared by all, and
recognized by all as their lord and master, for men trembled lest he should cause them to perish suddenly.
Nobody, indeed, understood the cause of this foul plague and instant death. In one and the same moment they
saw and they expired without a word, without a groan; on the battlements armed men passed away without
receiving any wound. Fortified places, cities, whole provinces yielded to him, nobody dared to resist; but yet
everyone was sorely grieved at falling so easily a victim to cheap a triumph. Many men thought him to be a
sorcerer, some declared that he was a god; but whatsoever he sought, he never met with a refusal.[508]
In sooth these (ancient giants) were nothing more than Chitterlings from the waist down – I tell no lies –
the serpent who tempted Eve was a Chitterling, yet it is written of himthat he was wilier and subtler than other
animals. So are Chitterlings. Furthermore some academics maintain that this temper was the Chitterling named
Ithyphallus,(erect penis) into whose shape good master Priapus was once transformed, a great tempter of women
in paradise as they say in Greek, or what we call pleasure gardens in French. [509]

Saint Christopher Cynocephalus

In the Eastern Orthodox Church, certain icons covertly identify Saint Christopher with the head of a dog.
The background to the dog-headed Christopher is laid in the reign of the Emperor Diocletian, when a man named
Reprebus, Rebrebus or Reprobus (the "reprobate" or "scoundrel") was captured in combat against tribes dwelling
to the west of Egypt in Cyrenaica. To the unit of soldiers, according to the hagiographic narrative, was assigned the
name numerus Marmaritarum or "Unit of the Marmaritae", which suggests an otherwise-unidentified
"Marmaritae" (perhaps the same as the Marmaricae Berber tribe of Cyrenaica). He was reported to be of
enormous size, with the head of a dog instead of a man, apparently a characteristic of the Marmaritae. This
Byzantine depiction of St. Christopher as dog-headed resulted from their misinterpretation of the Latin term
Cananeus (Canaanite) to read canineus, that is, "canine". The German bishop and poet Walter of Speyer portrayed
St. Christopher as a giant of a cynocephalic species in the land of the Chananeans (Canaan in the New Testament)
who ate human flesh and barked. Eventually, Christopher met the Christ child, regretted his former behavior, and
received baptism. He, too, was rewarded with a human appearance, whereupon he devoted his life to Christian
service and became an athlete of God, one of the soldier-saints. There are some rare icons that depict this martyr
with the head of a dog. Such images may carry echoes of the Egyptian dog-headed god, Anubis; and Christopher
pictured with a dog's head is not generally supported by the Orthodox Church.(Bonus)

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Fig. 327.). Traditional eastern depiction of a dog-headed Saint Christopher: an icon from the Byzantine
Fig. 328.). St. Guinefort The Folk Greyhound dog Saint
Fig. 329.). The Saintly and Savage Cynocephali
Paul the Deacon mentions cynocephali in his Historia gentis Langobardorum: "They pretend that they have
in their camps Cynocephali, that is, men with dogs' heads. They spread the rumor among the enemy that these
men wage war obstinately, drink human blood and quaff their own gore if they cannot reach the foe." At the court
of Charlemagne the Norse were given this attribution, implying un Christian and less than human qualities: "I am
greatly saddened" said the King of the Franks, in Notker's Life, "that I have not been thought worthy to let my
Christian hand sport with these dog heads." The ninth century Frankish theologian Ratramnus wrote a letter, the
Epistola de Cynocephalis, on whether the Cynocephali should be considered human (he thought that they were). If
human, a Christian's duty would be to preach the Gospels to them. If animals, and thus without souls, such would
be pointless. Quoting St. Jerome, Thomas of Cantimpré corroborated the existence of Cynocephali in his Liber de
Monstruosis Hominibus Orientis, xiv, ("Book of Monstrous men of the Orient"). The thirteenth century
encyclopedist Vincent of Beauvais acquainted his patron Saint Louis IX of France with "an animal with the head of
the dog but with all other members of human appearance… Though he behaves like a man… and, when peaceful,
he is tender like a man, when furious, he becomes cruel and retaliates on humankind".
The Nowell Codex, perhaps more commonly known as the manuscript containing the Anglo Saxon epic
Beowulf, also contains references to Cynocephali. One such reference can be found in the part of the manuscript
known as The Wonders of the East, in which they are called "healfhundingas" or "half dogs." Also, in Anglo Saxon
England, the Old English word wulfes heafod ("wolf's head") was a technical term for an outlaw, who could be
killed as if he were a wolf. The so called Leges Edwardi Confessoris, written around 1140, however, offered a
somewhat literal interpretation: “[6.2a] For from the day of his outlawry he bears a wolf's head, which is called
wluesheued by the English. [6.2b] And this sentence is the same for all outlaws.” Cynocephali appear in the Old
Welsh poem Pa Gur? as cinbin (dogheads). Here they are enemies of King Arthur's retinue; Arthur's men fight them
in the mountains of Eidyn (Edinburgh), and hundreds of them fall at the hand of Arthur's warrior Bedwyr (later
known as Bedivere). The next lines of the poem also mention a fight with a character named Garwlwyd (Rough
Gray); a Gwrgi Garwlwyd (Man Dog Rough Gray) appears in one of the Welsh Triads, where he is described in such
a way that scholars have discussed him as a werewolf.

421
 Medieval travellers Giovanni da Pian del Carpine and Marco Polo both mention cynocephali. Giovanni
writes of the armies of Ogedei Khan who encounter a race of dogheads who live north of the Dalai Nor (Northern
Ocean), or Lake Baikal.[18] Polo's Travels mentions the dog headed barbarians on the island of Angamanain, or the
Andaman Islands. For Polo, although these people grow spices, they are nonetheless cruel and "are all just like big
mastiff dogs" According to Henri Cordier, the source of all the fables of the dog headed barbarians, whether
European, Arabic, or Chinese, can be found in the Alexander Romance.[510]
One proof that the dog is seen in the Celtic imagination as a possible intermediary between this world and
the Otherworld is the worship devoted to the holy greyhound Guignefort in the region of Chatillonsur Chalaronne.
Basing his work on the testimony of Etienne de Bourbon, Jean Claude Schmitt showed that the worship of Saint
Guignefort was situated at the heart of an entirely pagan belief that Christianity attempted to eradicate.[511]

Fig. 330.). Dog Headed Cannibals, woodcut from Cartha Marina, 1530
Fig. 331.). Dog headed men from Livre des merveilles du monde, a 13th century travelogue with stories told by
Marco Polo

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 The Giants
The Strange Case of Teutobochus
King of the Mastodons
The Discovery
In January of the year 1613, a group of stonemasons set out to dig a well near the ruined castle of
Chaumont not far from junction of the Rhone and Isere Rivers where Marius had prevented Teutobochus from
following Hannibal's path into Italy. The spot the masons chose was a sandpit on a piece of level ground that the
locals called the Field of Giants. Eighteen feet down they found some large bones. The masons notified the
landowner, the Marquis de Langon, of their find and, after doing the heavy lifting to remove the bones from their
well, exited stage right. They were mere bit players in this drama. Langon called in the professors at Montpellier to
examine the bones and the governor of the province sent some of the bones to the professors at Grenoble for a
second opinion. The decision of the experts was unanimous: Langon's workers had unearthed the bones of a giant.
The belief in giants was still very strong in seventeenth century France. Giants are part of all the world's
mythologies where they fill many different roles. Many giants are cast in purely symbolic roles as representations
as the forces of nature and creation. Other giants fill more down to earth roles in the history of a community.
These giants represent the challenges that the group faced in the past and the heroes who overcame those
challenges. It was only reasonable to assume that the great men of the past must have had great stature to match
their great achievements. Respected authorities reenforced local legends. The Bible spoke of Giants such as
Goliath, Og of Bashan, and the sons of Anak. Herodotus, Pliny, St. Augustine, and Bocaccio all wrote about the
discovery of giant's remains. Many of the bones in the past were identified as belonging to specific individuals,
such as Orestes, Theseus, and the cyclops Polyphemus. Closer to home, large bones were regularly kept in
churches as relics of the saints. The bones of large, unknown quadrupeds, regularly discovered in the earth,
provided proof of the truth of the community's legends even as the legends provided an explanation for the bones
In living memory, just such a giant had been discovered nearby in Lausanne, Switzerland. In 1577, a storm
uprooted an oak tree near the Abby of Reyden. When some workmen investigated the damage, they found large
bones between the roots. The bones were taken to the city hall, where the leading citizens of the city admired the
find and debated their origin. Some thought they were the remains of fallen angels. After seven years, they turned
to Fleix Plater, a well known anatomy professor in Basel, to settle that matter. Plater examined the bones and
pronounced that they were not from angel, but instead, the skeleton of a giant nineteen feet tall. He provided the
town council with a drawing of the giant, which they incorporated into the arms of the city. Other bones of giants
had been discovered even closer to Chaumont in 1456, 1564, and 1580.
The largest figure, on the left, is based in the bones of a 300 foot giant described by Boccacio as having
been discovered in Sicily in 1371. Kircher thought that number was a typo and that the Sicilian giant was really only
30 feet tall. The tiny man next to his ankle is a normal man of Kircher's day. Next comes Goliath, then the Lucerne
giant, and, on the far right, a giant Kircher called Gigas Mauritanae.
The usual fate of giants' bones was for them to be put on display at the local church or town hall and to be
brought out for special occasions until they fell to pieces. Alternatively, they might be picked up by a wealthy
collector with an interest in the new natural philosophy and displayed in his cabinet of curiosities, also until they
fell to pieces. In either of those cases, the Chaumont bones most probably would have vanished from history.

423
What saved them from historical oblivion was their coming to the attention of two entrepreneurial souls in a
neighboring village.
Pierre Mazurier (or Mazuyer), the barber surgeon from Beaurepaire, and David Bertrand, the town clerk,
watched as men of influence and means traveled to Chaumont to view the giant's bones. It's possible that the two
had been involved with the bones from the very beginning as the first two officials called by Langdon to identify
the bones or it may be that they didn't hear about the bones until the traffic to Castle Chaumont began. In either
case, they reasoned that people all over France would pay to view the remains and gained permission from Langon
to take the bones on a tour. To supplement the exhibition, the entrepreneurs contracted to have pamphlet written
by Jacques Tissot, a Jesuit in the nearby town of Tournon. The title reveals the story that Mazurier and Bertrand
told their audience.

Fig. 332.). From: Mundus subterraneus by Athanasius Kircher, 1678. The largest figure, on the left, is based in the
bones of a 300 foot giant described by Boccacio as having been discovered in Sicily in 1371. Kircher thought that
number was a typo and that the Sicilian giant was really only 30 feet tall. The tiny man next to his ankle is a normal
man of Kircher's day. Next comes Goliath, then the Lucerne giant, and, on the far right, a giant Kircher called Gigas
Mauritanae.
True history of the life, death, and bones of Giant Teutobocus, King of Teutons, Cimbri and Ambrones,
defeated 105 years before the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. With his army of four hundred thousand, he was
defeated by Marius, the Roman consul, killed and buried near the castle called Chaumont, and now Langon, near
the town of Romans in Daulphiné. There his tomb was found, thirty feet in length, on which his name was written
in Roman letters, and the bones therein exceeded 25 feet in length, with one tooth weighing 11 pounds, all being
monstrous in both height and size, as you can now see the in the city.
In an official record of the discovery, Mazurier gave a detailed description the tomb and each of the bones
including the skull, which he described as being five feet long, ten feet around, with eye sockets the size of dinner
plates. Unfortunately, Mazurier wrote, most of the bones turned to dust after being exposed to air, and the only

424
parts that remained of the skull were two fragments of jaw, two complete teeth, and fragments of maybe four
others. Mazurier also described two silver medals that he claimed were in tomb, each bearing the likeness of a
man on one side and the letters M A on the other, all of which he took to mean Marius.
The show was a resounding success and soon orders came that they were to proceed to Paris and present
the bones to eleven year old King Louis XIII. On seeing them the king asked a courtier if there really had been such
giants. Yes, the courtier replied, imagine what a great army they would make. The king was less enthusiastic. They
would soon eat the country clean, he commented. The boy king’s skepticism may have been shared by some of his
court. A few weeks after the bones arrived, a secretary to the king wrote to Langon requesting he send more
evidence from the discovery: the silver medals, the inscribed stone from the tomb, a detailed drawing of the tomb,
and the official report of the discovery.
The terms of the agreement with the court allowed the king to keep the bones for at least eighteen
months. During that time, Mazurier stayed in Paris and capital society debated whether of not the bones were
authentic.[512]
The evil giants of Orphism were identified with the evil spirits begotten by the fallen angels.
One explanation for the rebellion was that it occurred after the creation of Adam, when the angels, lusting after
the daughter of men, came down, fornicated with them, and engendered a race of evil giants or demons. The 2nd
idea, most common among Christians, was that the angels fell before the creation of man, the cause being a pride
and lust for power that led them into jealousy of God.[513]

The Bleymees

Fig. 333.). 1444 1445 The adventures of Alexander the Great

Fig. 334.). 1646 Originally published in A Declaration Now appears in Reading the Medieval in Early Modern
Monster Cultureby Serina Patterson in Studies in Philology Despite monsters' lingering effects on Europeans'
nightmare
By the 7th or 8th century there had been composed a Letter of Pharasmenes to Hadrian,[d] whose
accounts of marvels such as bearded women (and headless men) became incorporated into later texts. This
included De Rebus in Oriente mirabilibus (also known as Mirabilia), its Anglo Saxon translation, Gervase of Tilbury's
treatise, and the Alexander legend attributed to Leo Archipresbyter (it).
The Latin text in the recension known as the Fermes Letter[e] was translated verbatim in Gervase of
Tilbury's Otia Imperialia (ca. 1211) which describes a "people without heads" ("Des hommes sanz testes") of a
golden color, measuring 12 feet tall and 7 feet wide, living on an isle in the River Brison (in Ethiopia).

425
 The catalogue of strange peoples from Letter occur in the Anglo Saxon Wonders of the East (translation of
Mirabilia) and the Liber Monstrorum; recensions of both these works are bound in the Beowulf
manuscript.[26][22] The transmission is imperfect. No name is given to the headless islanders, eight feet tall
in the Wonders of the East.[g][27][28] Epiphagi ("epifugi") is the name of the headless in Liber
Monstrorum[h][29] This form derives from "epiphagos" in a modified recension of the Letter of
Pharasmenes known as the Letter of Premonis to Trajan (Epistola Premonis Regis ad Trajanum).
The blemmyes or the headless people have also been illustrated and described on medieval maps.
The Hereford Mappa Mundi (ca. 1300) places the "Blemee" in Ethiopia (upper Nile system), deriving its
information from Solinus, perhaps via Isidore of Seville.
The Blemee have their face on their on chest.
1) Blemee with face on chest
People with face at shoulders.
2) People with eyes at the shoulders.
—Hereford Map (c. 1300)

Fig. 335.). Augustin De Civitate Dei contra Paganos (c. 1475). The antipodes. Illumination by Maître François.
Fig. 336.). 1444 - 1445: The adventures of Alexander the Great · Medieval BooksMedieval ManuscriptIlluminated
One Blemee standing has his face on their chest, and another below him has "eyes and mouth at their
shoulders". Both varieties of Blemmyae occur according to Isidore,[j][37][38] who reported that in Libya, besides
the Blemmyae born with a face on the chest, there were reputedly "others, born without necks, [and] have their
eyes on their shoulders".[39] Some modern commentators believe the two different types represent the male and
female blemmyes, with their genitals explicitly drawn.[40][41] Another example is the Ranulf Higden map (ca.
1363), which bears an inscription regarding the headless in Ethiopia, although unaccompanied by any picture of
the people.
Headless placed in India.
—Andrea Bianco map (1436)
By the Late Middle Ages, world maps began to appear that located the headless people further east, in
Asia, such as the Andrea Bianco map (1436) that depicted people who "all do not have heads (omines qui non
abent capites)" in India, on the same peninsula as the Terrestrial paradise.[l] But other maps of the period such as
the Andreas Walsperger's map (ca. 1448) did continue to locate the headless in Ethiopia.[m][44][45] The post

426
medieval map of Guillaume Le Testu (pictured above) illustrates the headless and the dog headed cynocephali
north beyond the Himalayan mountains.
The Travels of Sir John Mandeville writes of "ugly folk without heads, who have eyes in each shoulder"
with their mouths "round like a horseshoe, in the middle of their chest" living among the populace in the big island
of Dundeya (Andaman Islands) between India and Myanmar. In other parts of the island are headless men with
eyes and mouth on their backs.[47] This has been noted as an example of blemmyes by commentators,[48][49]
though Mandeville does not use the term.
A Blemmyae from Schedel's Nuremberg Chronicle (1493).
Examples of chapters on monstrous races (including the headless), taken from earlier sources, occur in the
Buch der Natur or the Nuremberg Chronicle. The Buch der Natur (ca. 1349), written by Conrad of Megenberg,
described the "people without heads (läut an haupt)"[n] as shaggy all over the body, with "coarse hair like wild
animals",[o] but when the printed book versions appeared, their woodcut illustrations depicted them as smooth
bodied, in contradiction to the text. Conrad lumped peoples of various geography under "wundermenschen", and
condemned such wondrous people as earning physical deformities due to the sins of their ancestors.[514]

Dragons

+
Fig. 337.). Found in a garage in Oxfordshire, England
Fig. 338.). Dragon wounded by a knight (f°23r) «Messire Lancelot du Lac», par Gaultier Moap, France, 1470 [BNF
Ms Fr 112(3)]
Fig. 339.).Most likely a fictional Dragon

427
Fig. 340.). Bibliotheque Nationale De France Francais Detail Of F Lancelot Fighting The Dragons In The Val Sans
Fig. 341.). St. Margaret and the Dragon Prayer Book of Anne de Bretagne Illuminated by Jean Poyer France, Tours,
ca. 1492–95 The Pierpont Morgan Library, Purchased in 1905 MS M.50 (fol. 20v)

Fig. 342.). Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550 The Book of Miracles

428
Fig. 343.). Augsburger Wunderzeichenbuch, c. 1550 The Book of Miracles
Isidore of Seville [7th century CE] (Etymologies, Book 12, 4:4 5): The dragon is the largest serpent, and in
fact the largest animal on earth. Its name in Latin is draco, derived from the Greek name drakon. When it comes
out of its cave, it disturbs the air. It has a crest, a small mouth, and a narrow throat. Its strength is in its tail rather
than its teeth; it does harm by beating, not by biting. It has no poison and needs none to kill, because it kills by
entangling. Not even the elephant is safe from the dragon; hiding where elephants travel, the dragon tangles their
feet with its tail and kills the elephant by suffocating it. Dragons live in the burning heat of India and Ethiopia.
(Book 16, 14:7): Dracontites is a stone that is forcibly taken from the brain of a dragon, and unless it is torn from
the living creature it has not the quality of a gem; whence magi cut it out of dragons while they are sleeping. For
bold men explore the cave of the dragons, and scatter there medicated grains to hasten their sleep, and thus cut
off their heads while they are sunk in sleep, and take out the gems.
Hugo de Folieto [c. 1110 72 CE] (from British Library MS. Sloane 278, Druce translation): The scripture
teaches us that the greatest of the serpents is the dragon and that it deals death by its poisonous breath and by
the blow of its tail. This creature is lifted by the strength of its venom into the air as if it were flying, and the air is
set in motion by it. It lies in wait for the elephant, the most chaste of animals, and encircling its feet with its tail it
tries to suffocate it with its breath, but is crushed by the elephant as it falls dead. But a valuable pigment is
obtained from earth which has been soaked with its blood. The reason of their hostility is this. The poison of the
dragon boils with exceeding great heat, but the blood of the elephant is exceedingly cold. The dragon therefore
wishes to cool its own heat with the blood of the elephant. The Jews say that God made the great dragon which is
called Leviathan, which is in the sea; and when folk say that the sea is ebbing it is the dragon going back. Some say
that it is the first fish created by God and that it still lives. And this beast, at one time called a dragon and at
another Leviathan, is used in the Scripture symbolically. The dragon, the greatest of all serpents, is the devil, the
king of all evil. As it deals death with its poisonous breath and blow of its tail, so the devil destroys men's souls by

429
thought, word and deed. He kills their thoughts by the breath of pride; he poisons their words with malice; he
strangles them by the performance of evil deeds, as it were with his tail. By the dragon the air is set in motion, and
so is the peace of spiritually minded people often disturbed in that way. It lays wait for a chaste animal; so he
persecuted to the death Christ the guardian of chastity, being born of a chaste virgin; but he was overcome, having
been crushed by him in his death. As for the precious colour which is got from the ground, that is the Church of
Christ adorned by his precious blood. The dragon is the enemy of a pure animal; likewise is the devil the enemy of
the Virgin's Son.
British Library Harley MS. 4751 [c. 1235 CE] ( Druce translation): The dragon is the greatest of all serpents,
or of all living things upon the earth. The Greeks call it "Dracon," whence the Latin name is derived, so that it is
called Draco. And this creature often stealing forth from its caverns mounts into the air, and the air is violently set
in motion and glows around it. It is also crested and has a small mouth and narrow passages through which it
draws its breath and thrusts out its tongue. Moreover its strength lies not in its teeth but in its tail, and it injures by
a blow rather than by a bite. It is harmless as to poisons, but they say poisons are not needful to this creature for
dealing death, because if it has caught any one in its coils, it kills him. From which not even the elephant is safe by
the greatness of its body. For lurking about the paths by which the elephants are accustomed to go, it binds their
legs in its coils and kills them by suffocation. Now they are bred in Ethiopia and in India, where it is so hot that
there is heat upon the very mountain tops. / To this dragon the devil is likened, who is a most enormous serpent.
As it often rushes forth from its cavern into the air and the air glows around it, so does the devil, raising himself
from the depths (of hell), transform himself into an angel of light and delude stupid people with the false hope of
glory and human joy. As it is said to be crested, so is he himself the king of pride. It has its power not in its teeth
but in its tail, and so his power being lost, he deceives with a lie those whom he attracts to himself. It lies hid about
the paths by which the elephants go, and so the devil always pursues men who are fond of display. It binds their
legs with coils and if it is able entangles them, and so he entangles their road to heaven with the knots of sins; and
it kills them by suffocation, and so if any one dies entangled in the chain of sins, without doubt he is condemned to
hell.
Bartholomaeus Anglicus [13th century CE] (De proprietatibus rerum, book 18): The Dragon is most greatest
of all serpents, and oft he is drawn out of his den, and riseth up into the air, and the air is moved by him, and also
the sea swelleth against his venom, and he hath a crest with a little mouth, and draweth breath at small pipes and
straight, and reareth his tongue, and hath teeth like a saw, and hath strength, and not only in teeth, but also in his
tail, and grieveth both with biting and with stinging, and hath not so much venom as other serpents: for to the end
to slay anything, to him venom is not needful, for whom he findeth he slayeth, and the elephant is not secure of
him, for all his greatness of body. Oft four or five of them fasten their tails together, and rear up their heads, and
sail over sea and over rivers to get good meat. Between elephants and dragons is everlasting fighting, for the
dragon with his tail bindeth and spanneth the elephant, and the elephant with his foot and with his nose throweth
down the dragon, and the dragon bindeth and spanneth the elephant's legs, and maketh him fall, but the dragon
buyeth it full sore: for while he slayeth the elephant, the elephant falleth upon him and slayeth him. Also the
elephant seeing the dragon upon a tree, busieth him to break the tree to smite the dragon, and the dragon leapeth
upon the elephant, and busieth him to bite him between the nostrils, and assaileth the elephant's eyen, and
maketh him blind sometime, and leapeth upon him sometime behind, and biteth him and sucketh his blood. And
at the last after long fighting the elephant waxeth feeble for great blindness, in so much that he falleth upon the
dragon, and slayeth in his dying the dragon that him slayeth. The cause why the dragon desireth his blood, is
coldness of the elephant's blood, by the which the dragon desireth to cool himself. Jerome saith, that the dragon is
a full thirsty beast, insomuch that unneth he may have water enough to quench his great thirst; and openeth his

430
mouth therefore against the wind, to quench the burning of his thirst in that wise. Therefore when he seeth ships
sail in the sea in great wind, he flieth against the sail to take their cold wind, and overthroweth the ship sometimes
for greatness of body, and strong rese against the sail. [This is usually said of the sawfish.] And when the shipmen
see the dragon come nigh, and know his coming by the water that swelleth ayenge him, they strike the sail anon,
and scape in that wise. [515]

The Yale

Fig. 344.). The unicorn is a fierce beast that can only be captured by a maiden British Library, Royal MS 12 F.
Fig. 345.). Yale, from the Aberdeen Bestiary. It was rumored that the yale's horns could twist
Fig. 346.). Yale, paint on vellum from a French manuscript, c.1450, Museum Meermanno

The yale or centicore (Latin: eale) is a mythical beast found in European mythology and heraldry. Most
descriptions make it an antelope or goat like four legged creature with the tusks of a boar and large horns that it
can swivel in any direction.
The name might be derived from Hebrew ‫( יָﬠֵ ל‬yael), meaning "Ibex". The yale was first written about by
Pliny the Elder in Book VIII of his Natural History. The creature passed into medieval bestiaries and heraldry, where
it represents proud defence.
The yale is among the heraldic beasts used by the British Royal Family. It had been used as a supporter for
the arms of John, Duke of Bedford, and by England's House of Beaufort. Its connection with the British monarchy
apparently began with Henry VII in 1485. Henry Tudor’s mother, Lady Margaret (1443–1509), was a Beaufort, and
the Beaufort heraldic legacy inherited by both her and her son included the yale. Lady Margaret Beaufort was a
benefactor of Cambridge's Christ's College and St John's College and her yale supporters can be seen on the college
gates. There are also yales on the roof of St George's Chapel in Windsor Castle. The Yale of Beaufort was one of the
Queen's Beasts commissioned for the coronation in 1953; the plaster originals are in Canada, stone copies are at
Kew Gardens, outside the palm house.
In the US, the yale as a heraldic symbol is weakly associated with Yale University in New Haven,
Connecticut. Neither the University's coat of arms nor most of its other heraldry features the yale, and the school's
primary sports mascot is a bulldog named Handsome Dan. But a yale is depicted on the official banner of the
President of the University, which, along with a wooden mace capped by a yale's head, is carried and displayed
during commencement exercises each spring. Yales can be seen above the gateway to Yale's Davenport College
and the pediment of Timothy Dwight College. The student run campus radio station, WYBCX Yale Radio, uses the
yale as its logo.[516]

431
Fig. 347.) Extinction of endangered species Hours, France ca. 1475 1500.BNF, Latin 1173, fol. 41v

432
Fig. 348.). The basilisk and the weasel Wenceslas Hollar
The Basilisk Hen:
Bibliography Information
Easton, Matthew George. "Entry for Basilisk". "Easton's Bible Dictionary". .
Encyclopedias International Standard Bible Encyclopedia Basilisk
BASILISK
baz' i lisk (tsepha`, tsiph`oni, from obsolete root tsapha`, "to hiss":
Isaiah 11:8; 14:29; 59:5; Jeremiah 8:17; Proverbs 23:32 m. In Proverbs 23:32, the King James Version has "adder,"
margin "cockatrice"; in the other passages cited the King James Version has "cockatrice," margin "adder" (except
Jeremiah 8:17, no margin)):
The word is from basiliskos, "kinglet," from basileus, "king," and signifies a mythical reptile hatched by a
serpent from a cock's egg. Its hissing drove away other serpents. Its look, and especially its breath, was fatal.
According to Pliny, it was named from a crown like spot on its head. It has been identified with the equally
mythical COCKATRICE (which see). In all the passages cited, it denotes a venomous serpent (see ADDER; SERPENT),
but it is impossible to tell what, if any, particular species is referred to. It must be borne in mind that while there
are poisonous snakes in Palestine, there are more which are not poisonous, and most of the latter, as well as some
harmless lizards, are commonly regarded as deadly. Several of the harmless snakes have crownlike markings on
their heads, and it is quite conceivable that the basilisk myth may have been founded upon one of these.[517]

433
 It was the same horror of aiding and abetting demons and enabling them to extend their power over
mankind that caused a cock, which was suspected of having laid the so called “basilisk egg,” or a hen, addicted to
the ominous habit of crowing, to be summarily put to death, since it was only by such expiation that the evil could
be averted. [518]
The unfortunate fowl, suspected of laying an egg in violation of its nature, was feared as an abnormal,
inauspicious, and therefore diabolic creature; the fatal cockatrice, which was supposed to issue from this egg when
hatched, and the use which might be made of its contents for promoting intercourse with evil spirits, caused such
a cock to be dreaded as a dangerous purveyor to His Satanic Majesty, but no member of the Kohlenberg Court ever
thought of consigning Chanticleer to the flames as the peer of Wycliffe or of Huss in heresy. [519]
In 1474, the magistrates of Bale sentenced a cock to be burned at the stake “for the heinous and unnatural
crime of laying an egg.” The auto da fe was held on a hyeight near the city called the Kohlenberg, with as great
solemnity as would have been observed in consigning a heretic to the flames, and was witnessed by an immense
crowd of townsmen and peasants. The statement made by Gross in his Kurze Basler Chronik, That the executioner
on cutting open the cock found 3 more eggs in him, is of course absurd; we have to do in this case not with a freak
of nature, but with the freak of an excited imagination tainted with superstition. Other instances of this kind have
been recorded, one in the Swiss Prattigau as late as 1730,although in manyt cases the execution of the
gallinaceous malefactor was more summary and less ceremonious than at bale. The oeuf coquatri was supposed
to be the product of a very old cock to furnish the most active ingredient of witch ointment. When hatched by a
serpent or a toad, or by the heat of the sun it brought forth a cockatrice or basilisk, which would hide in the roof of
the house and with its baneful breath and “death darting eye” destroy all the inmates. Many naturalists believed
this fable as late as the 18th century, and in 1710 the French savant Lapeyronie deemed this absurd notion worthy
of serious refutation, and read a paper, entitled “Observation sur les petits oeufs de poule sans jaune, que l’on
appellee vulgairement oeufs de Coq,” before the Academy of Sciences in order to prove that cocks never lay and
that the small and yolkless eggs attributed to them owe their peculiar shape and condition to a disease of the hen
resulting in a hydropic malformation of the oviduct. Afarmer brought him several specimens of this sort,
somewhat larger than a pigeon’s egg, and assured him that they had been laid by a cock in his own barnyard. On
opening one of them, M. Lapeyronie was surprised to find only a very slight trace of the yolk resembling “a small
serpent coiled.” He now began to suspect that the cock might be an hermaphrodite, but on killing and dissecting it
discovered nothing in support of this theory, the internal organs being all perfectly healthy and normal. But
although the unfortunate chanticleer had fallen a victim to the scientific investigation of a popular delusion, the
eggs in question continued to be produced, until the farmer by carefully watching the fowls detected the hen that
laid them. The dissection showed that the pressure of a bladder of serous fluid against the oviduct had so
contracted it, that the egg in passing had the yolk squeezed out of it, leaving merely a yellowish discoloration that
looked like a worm. Another peculiarity of this hen was that she crowed like “a hoarse cock” (un coq enroue), only
more violently; a phenomenon also a source of terror to the superstitious, but ascribed by M. Lapeyronieto the
same morbid state of the oviduct and the consequent pain caused by the passage of the egg (Memoires de
l’Academie de Sciences. Paris, 1710, pp. 553 560.)
A Greek physiologus of the 12th century, written in verse, calls the animal hatched from the egg of an old
cock, a name which would imply some sort of winged creature. It was “sighted like the basilisk,” and endowed also
in other respects with the same fatal qualities.[520]

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 Magic

Fig. 349.). The Cat Piano : Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments

Father Kircher reports in Book VI of the Musurgia Universalis of an artist who invented, in order to dispel
the melancholy of a prince who was beset by worries, a cat piano. Instead of strings, his instrument contained a
number of cats’ tails inserted into narrow sheaths, beneath which there went up and down the hammers
corresponding to keys, bearing on their extremities a sharp point. The cats are chosen by sex and age and arranged
side by side in separate boxes according to the pitch of their voice.
Under the agile fingers of the pianist, the points of the hammers artfully attacked the animals’ tails. These
responded first with meows quick and sharp, but then, enraged by the frequency of the pricks, they changed,
crescendo et rinforzando, into sounds that could enliven the most sullen spirit, and make even the mice break out
in dance.
The story of the cat piano (German Katzenklavier, French piano des chats) is surely one of the most strange
and vexing affairs in the entire domain of speculative organology. The earliest images of the instrument date from
around 1600, and purport to depict the (probably spurious) use of the cat piano in the witches’ Sabbath. Another
tradition, indicated by the anecdote of Athanasius Kircher, suggests that the instrument was employed in the
treatment of the mentally ill — making the cat piano an unlikely aid to what we would now call “music therapy.”
Such a clinical use of the instrument appears as late as 1803, in a book entitled Rhapsodien über die Anwendung
der Pyschischen Curmethode auf Geisteszerrütungen (Rhapsodies on the Application of Psychological Methods of
Cure to the Mentally Disturbed) by the German medical scientist Johann Christian Reil (1759 1813), who would
later coin the term “psychiatry.” Beyond being the sadistic implement of animal cruelty which it might appear to
modern eyes, the cat piano raises unanswered (and perhaps unanswerable) questions about the relationship
between music and noise, human and animal.[521]
435
Fig. 350.). Illustration of the cat piano from La Nature, Vol. 11 (1883).

Fig. 351.). A German 16th Century Magician's Mirror, from the collection of the Cuming Museum
Fig. 352.). Magickal Ritual Sacred Tools: Dancing With Dragons Scrying Mirror. Black

436
Fig. 353.). Magickal Ritual Sacred Tools Dancing With Dragons Scrying Mirror
Fig. 354.). Scrying Mirror in Windsor Museum
Fig. 355.). Boxing Hares Scrying Mirror

Fig. 356.). Mandrake herb Man root

Fig. 357.). Different styles of pin dolls

437
Fig. 358.). This calf’s heart stuck with pins, on display in the National Museum of Scotland, shows evidence of
sympathetic magic practices being carried out in Scotland.
Fig. 359.). Animal testicles pierced with silvers of thorn wood

Fig. 360.). Artifact's from the Witch Museum. The WitchWitchcraftWitches

Fig. 361.). Real Witches at Work: Portraits of English Pagans, LIFE Magazine, 1964
Fig. 362.). Stoppered and waxed, bottle is said to have captured and still holds a witch!

438
Fig. 363.). Poison Rings
Fig. 364.). Poison cabinet
Fig. 365.). Poison cabinet (most likely an assassins)

Fig. 366.). Witch bottles can be used as protection from curses and to drive the evil back to the perpetrator.
Fig. 367.). In witchcraft a stang is a wooden staff with a forked top. A stang can have 2 or 3 forks made of wood,
antler, horn or metal. Some stangs incorporate or antlered skull.

Witches

Fig. 368.). King Solomon before the Djinn by Jacobus de Teramo, 1473
Fig. 369.). Witch conjuring demons from a circle. Two other witches flying brooms.

439
Fig. 370.). A Lady accompanied by her familiars making a pact with the devil
Fig. 371.). A water witch or dowser, redrawn from a sixteenth century woodcut.

Fig. 372.). Witch Milking Axe Handle. J. Geiler von Kaisersberg, Die Emeis. Strassburg, Johannes Grienniger, 1517.

440
Fig. 373.). A goat riding witch brings down a storm from the Compendium Maleficarum of Francesco Maria
Guazzo (1628).

Fig. 374.). This wood carving from the medieval period shows witches cooking a thunderstorm. It wasn’t until the
publication of Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus Maleficarum or, Hammer of Witches in 1487
Fig. 375.). A witch and a devil making a nail with which to make a boy lame, woodcut, 1720

441
Fig. 376.). Witches at a Sabbath having supper with the Devil and his demons
Fig. 377.). Satan requesting the trampling on the cross

Fig. 378.). Witches raising storm at sea. From Olaus Magnus' Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus. 1555
Fig. 379.). Behringer offers up a 1486 woodcut of a sorceress conjuring up a hailstorm

442
 Fig. 380.). John Hammond pamphlet The Devil on 1 Side & The Woman on the other issued 1643.

The Sabbath

Fig. 381.). Engraving of a Witches' Sabbath

443
Fig. 382.). Any dancing around in a circle is considered the dance of the devil.

Fig. 383.). Uit Pierre de Lancre 1613

444
Fig. 384.). Witches’ Sabbath, Claude Gillot, 1673-1722 Paris

Fig. 385.). Witches Sabbath, 18th Century Performing The Osculum Infame

445
Fig. 386.). Bacchanalia Painting by Peter Paul Rubens

Fig. 387.). Witches' Sabbath, 1821–23. Oil on plaster wall, transferred to canvas; Museo del Prado, Madrid

446
 Werewolves

Fig. 388.). Beast of Gévaudan

Fig. 389.). A werewolf hunting kit most likely false.

Fig. 390.). The furious beast that is supposed to be a hyena. The text tells of two peasants who were made into
national heroes for fighting the beast—a twelve year old boy who led an attack on the creature on January 12,
1765
Fig. 391.). A priest administering last rites to the dying wife on the right while the cursed husband is standing on
the left, a miniature from Topographica Hibernica, c. 1196 1223

447
Fig. 392.). De Monstrorum Caussis, Natura, et Differentiis, Libri Duo author Fortunio Liceti published in 1694.
Fig. 393.). Douglas, Adam. “The class image of the bloodthirsty werewolf.” The Beast Within. London: Chapmans
Publishing Ltd., 1992. Print.

Fig. 394.). Louis XV meets the king of the Wolves, 1765

Fig. 395.). Marie-Jeanne Valet vs. the Beast of Gevaudan

448
Fig. 396.). Male and female werewolves being executed in a broadside, Werewolves from Jülich, printed by Georg
Kress, 1591. Broadside of Werewolves from Jülich, Germany. Georg Kress, 1591.

449
Fig. 397.). Werewolf, by Lucas Cranach the Elder, c. 1512 Gilles Garnier ( 1573)

450
 The Undead

Fig. 398.). Body snatchers at work, Old Crown Inn, Penicuik

Fig. 399.). Grave robber gun

Fig. 400.). Anglesey, Talwrn, Llanffinan, St Finan's Church Victorian grave of Owen and Sarah Thomas of
Rhydyrarian Bach, Gaerwen
Fig. 401.). Mortsafe in Old Kinnernie

Fig. 402.).Mortsafes Scotland Kirkyard

Fig. 403.). Mortsafe, Greyfriars Kirk

451
Fig. 404.). 'Mortsafe', or iron coffin case, 19th century.
Fig. 405.). Metal Coffin

Fig. 406). British Mortsafe

Fig. 407.). Metal coffin

Fig. 408.). Mortsafe 1

Fig. 409.). Mortsafe 2

452
Fig. 410.). Mortsafe 3
Mort safes: The coffin shaped mort safes in this photo were originally buried underground with the coffin placed
inside of them to avoid the bodies being dug up by body snatchers and the corpse sold to anatomists. These
"metal basket" type coffin covers were buried with the coffin and removed after a couple of weeks, when the
corpse was no longer fresh enough to be worth money to grave robbers, then used again to protect fresh graves.
The mort safes in this photo are located at Logierait Kirkyard in Scot...

The Death Masks

Fig. 411.). Two men in the process of making a death mask, New York, c. 1908
Fig. 412.). (1469-1527) Niccolò Machiavelli (Life Mask)
453
Fig. 413.). The earliest European death mask is that of England's King Edward III, who reigned from 1312 to 1377
Fig. 414.). Isaac Newton (1642 1727) – cause of death kidney stone aged 84.
Fig. 415.). Death mask of Saint Francis Borgia

Fig. 416.). Dante Alighieri 1321

Fig. 417.). The Death Mask of Mary Queen Of Scots
Fig. 418.). Ulysses S Grant (1822 1885) – cause of death throat cancer aged 63

Fig. 419.). Martin Luther (1483 1546) – cause of death apoplectic stroke aged 62.
Fig. 420.). Napoleon Bonaparte (1769 1821) – likely cause of death gastric cancer aged 51.
Fig. 421.). Death Mask of Nikola Tesla

454
Fig. 422.). Ludwig van Beethoven 1770 1827 likely cause of death liver damage from heavy alcohol consumption
aged 56

Visions of Hell
Without further particularizing, it must wsuffice to say that all the features in the Hell of the Christian
fathers, and of the Christian religion generally, may be traced in the Amenti og Egypt, the Sheol and Gehenna of
the Jews, and the Orcus of Virgin; and that he Hells of the Koran and of many other creeds are offshoots from the
same originals; while the Scandinavian Walhalla, with its Purgatort, Niflheim, and its everlasting Tartarus,
Nastrond, are merely variants of the same diea, except that ice and cutting wind, as representing the Norseman’s
idea oif misery, take the plave of unquenchable fire in the economy of punishment. The central core, the
innermoswt circle of Dante’s Inferno is, not fire, but thick ribbed ice. The breath of Lucifer freezes; itdoes not
burn. [523]

Fig. 423.). Pieter Bruegel The Younger The Triumph of Death

455
Fig. 424.). EL INFIERNO Pieter Huys (Amberes, c. 1519 c. 1584

Fig. 425.). Jacobi de Ancharano (alias de Teramo), Litigatio Christi cum Belial, verdeutscht BSB Cgm 48 ([S.l.] 1461)

456
Fig. 426 Hans Memling Last Judgment

457
Fig. 427.). Confusion of Tongues The Construction of the Tower of Babel on SOCKS German Late Medieval (c.
1370s) – Depiction of the construction of the tower.
Fig. 428.). Mouth of hell, detail Hours of Catherine of Cleves

Fig. 429.). Triptych of Temptation of St Anthony by Hieronymus Bosch 1505-06 Oil on panel

458
Fig. 430.). BARTOLOMEO DI FRUOSINO Inferno, from the Divine Comedy by Dante (Folio 1v) 1430 35 Manuscript
(Ms. it. 74), 365 x 265 mm Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris

459
Fig. 431.). FRANCKEN, Frans IIThe Damned Being Cast into Hell Oil on oak cm Residenzgalerie, Salzburg Bodleian
Library, MS. Douce 134, f. 67v (‘Lucifer composite devil with many heads) being judged by Christ in majesty, while
the saints intercede for him Livre de la Vigne nostre Seigneur. France 1450 1470

460
Fig. 432.). Giotto Arena Chapel Le jugement dernier, Giotto di Bondone
Augustine, La Cité de Dieu (Vol. I). Translation from the Latin by Raoul de Presles. Paris c. 1475 (c.) c. 1478 1480

Fig. 433.). Jaws of Hell. detail. c.1250 60. English. Bodl Auct.D.4. BL by tony harrison,

461
Fig. 434.). Fra Angelico Hell, detail (Triptych The Last Judgment, Winged Altar), circa 1395.

Fig. 435.). Hell. Herri met de Bles. Interior of the Doge's Palace Venice. Sala dell'Avogaria de Comùnca ~ 16th
century

462
Fig. 436.). painting of hell by the Limbourg brothers in Les Tres Riches Heures a prayer book of the Duc de Berry
printed in 1416.
463
Fig. 437.). Jacob Isaacsz van Swanenburg - The Harrowing of Hell, 16th-17th century

Fig. 438.). Beware the beast of 10,000 hands. The Gates of Hell and Lucifer in The Visions of the Knight Tondal,
1475, Simon Marmion. The J. Paul Getty .
Fig. 439). Hortus deliciarum (Jardín de los deleites en latín) (1167)

464
Fig. 440.). The Fall of the Damned by Peter Paul Rubens, about 1620

465
 A late 12th century illustration of Hell, more elaborate than that of the Silos Beatus or the Chaldon fresco,
was to be found in the Hortus Deliciarum, the Garden of Delights, by the abbess Herrad of Landsberg. This
manuscript exists only in photographs as the original was destroyed in the Franco Prussian war. Folio 253 depicts a
Hell in which devils and snakes torment the lustful, and simoniac bishops and Jews are boiled in cauldrons; a monk
with a moneybag is led toward satan by a devil, while another force feeds a rich man with coins, and a crawling
figure stabbed by demons vomits toads. Through flaming holes in the frame of the design heads poke out, and
naked bodies strive to crawl – yet another antecedent of the painting of Hieronymus Bosch. The punishment of
the rich in this miniature b rings us to the subject of Avaritia.[524]

Death, Demons & The Devil

Fig. 441.). Jean Colombe Death in art

Fig. 442.). John Taylor and the devil; pamphlet by Henry Walker,

Fig. 443.). Book of Hours, use of Rome. 15th century

Fig. 444.). Young man and death from Book of HoursLife of St Margaret (Paris, Bibl. Mazarine, ms. 0507, f.113) c.
1490

466
Fig. 445.). Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Français 4962, detail of f. The Order of
The Good Death
Fig. 446.). Death attacking a man, from a Dutch Book of Hours. c. 1480 (Very Rare White Death)
Fig. 447.). Les trois âges de la vie humaine - Barthélemy l'Anglais, Le Livre des

Fig. 448.). Devils trying to stop the Harrowing of Hell by shooting at Jesus. Fifteenth century.
The Foretress of Faith Alfonse de Spina. La Forteresse de la foi, traduction française. Bibliothèque municipale de
Valenciennes, ms. 244, fol. 27.

467
Fig. 449.).Illustration of the Grim Reaper on horseback, MS 1766.
Fig. 450.). Belzebub (Beelzebub), Compendium rarissimum totius Artis Magicae..., Wellcome Library, London, ca.
1775
Fig. 451.). Asmodée (Asmodaï)

Fig. 452.). Stephen Ellcock Fall of the Rebel Angels from Vincent of Beauvais, Le Mirouer historial (French
translation of Speculum historiale), Paris 1463

468
Fig. 453.). The devil carrying off a group of political dignitaries. June 1832

469
Fig. 454.). Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Français 2225, detail of f. 3v. Louenges à
Notre Dame. 15th century
Fig. 455.). Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 11308, image 27. Psalter mit Kalendarium, c.1235

Fig. 456.). At the beginning of the 17th century, a book of black magic was published, attributed to the mythical
Faust and known by the title Höllenzwang.
Fig. 457.). devil on horseback book of hours, Paris ca. 1420 LA, Getty, Ms

470
 The Black Virgins, Mary’s & Madonnas
In a chronicle of the year 1255 it is written that St. Louis, on his return from the Crusade, ‘left in the
country of Forez several images of Our Lady made and carved in wood of black colour which he had brought from
the Levant’. The Virgin of Myans is referred to as ‘La Noire’ in a document of 1619, referring back to an incident of
1248. There is documentary evidence that the Virgin of Pezenas was black in 1340. Notre Dame de Bon Espoir in
Dijon is reported to have been black in 1591. The painting of 1676 in Bruges records the already ancient Spanish
Black Virgin, Our Lady of Regula. Our Lady of Modene is known to have been black since 1623. The meticulous
description and sketch of the Black Virgin of Le Puy given by Faujas de St. Fons in 1778 is powerful evidence that
the statuette was black by design, and had been so from its origins, which are no later than the 12th century.
Saillens estimates from the evidence that is available that by the middle of the 16th century, before the
depredations of the Huguenots, there were 190 statuetes of the Black Virgin in France, mostly in Auvergne,
Bourbonnais, Pyrenees, Rhone, Provence and Savoy.
Spokesmen for the Church, when asked to explain the origin of Black Virgins, tend to invoke candle smoke
or general exposure to the elements. After a time, they would say, as at Einsiedeln, the faithful become
accustomed to a sooty image, and the clergy pander to their prejudice by the use of paint were necessary. Apart
from the considerable contrary evidence of clerical antipathy to Black Virgins and disregard for parishoners’
wishes, thus rationalistic hypothesis raises 2 important questions. If the presumed polychrome faces and hands of
the Virgin and Child have been blackened by the elements, why has their polychrome clothing not been similarly
discoloured? Secondly, why has a similar process not occurred in the case of other venerated images.[524]
In fact, almost all Black Virgins are carved in wood, either of indigenous timber such as oak, apple, olive,
pear, or in cedar. Ebony was virtually unknown in Western Europe until the 13th century.
In 1944, Leonard W. Moss, entering the church at Lucera in southern Italy, came across his first Black Virgin
and asked the priest, ‘Father, why is the Madonna black?’ The response was, ‘My son, she is black because she is
black.’When, in December 1980, I visited Orcival, whose wonder working Madonna figures in all the lists asked the
proprietress of the souvenir shop opposite the church why she was called black. The answer, in a tone which
brooked no further cross examination, was ‘Because she is.’
The priest’s answer to Moss may seem a charming example of holy simplicity, but there was no mistaking
the open hostility, when, on 28 December 1952, as Moss and Cappanari presented their paper on Black Virgins to
the American Association for the Advancement of Science, every priest and nun in the audience walked out. My
impression of the reaction of the clergy to the subject of Black Virgins has been one of helpful courtesy tinged with
genuine disinterest in and ignorance of the subject. As a result, many cults are dying.[525]
There exists in France an organization that has been in continuous existence since the 12th century, that
has some features both of an order of chivalry and of a religious order, though it is not quite either; a secret
society which does not spurn the right sort of publicitiy; a political grouping specific aims that is also interested in
ancient esoteric wisdom and hidden mysteries. Its full name is the Order of the Prieure Notre Dame de Sion, and
its chief aim seems always to have been the restoration of the Merovingian blood line to the throne. It is also
passionately concerned with the cult of the Black Virgin and has remarkable record of equal rights for women.
The Grand master of th Prieure’ 1981 4, Pierre Plantard, is reported as saying that the Sicambrians,
ancestors of the Frankish Merovingians, worshipped Cybele as Diana of the 9 Fires, or as Arduina, the eponymous
goddess of the Ardennes. The huge idol to Diana/Arduina which once towered over Carignan, in north east France,
between the Black Virgin sites of Orval, Avioth and Mezieres, near to Stenay, where the Merovingian king and
saint, Dagobert II, was murdered in 679, points circumstantially to a link between the 2 cults. In this connection

471
Plantard mentions that one of the most important acts of Dagobert, when he acceded to the throne after his Irish
exile, was to continue the ancient tradition of Gaul, the worship of the Black Virgin. The Black Virgin, he insists, is
Isis and her name is Notre Dame de LUmiere.
Why this emphasis on Isis who was, after all, a universal goddess of countless names? She identifies
herself with Artemis of the Cretans and with Cybele when in the Golden Ass she tells Apuleius, ‘For the Phrygians
that are the first of all men call me The Mother of the Gods at Pessinus.’ Only the Ethiopians ‘of both sort, that
dwell in the Orient and are enlightened by the morning rays of the sun, and the Egyptians, which are excellent in
all kind of ancient doctrine and by their proper ceremonies accustom to worship me, do call me by my true name,
Queen Isis.’ But in Gaul, Isis was no more prominent as a universal goddess than Cybele or Artemis/Diana, who
have as good a right to be considered precursors of the Black Virgin. May the reason for the Prieure’s insistence
on the primacy of Isis not be the importance attached to some Egyptian connection? Victor Belot in La France des
Peleriages, referring to Sara, the black Egyptian servant who accompanied her mistresses to Les Saintes Maries de
la Mer, writes: ‘Sara will give birth to the cult of Black Virgins particularly venerated in certain places, although
many authors prefer to leave this privilege to Isis, the Egyptian goddess.’ These 2 possibilities are not, of course,
mutually exclusive. In other words, Sara, beloved of the Gypsies, may also be an avatar of Egyptian Isis.
The most important of the 3 Marys to disembark at what was then still the Isle of Ratis, on whose acropolis
Artemis, Isis and Cybele had been worshipped since the 4th century BC, was St. Mary Magdalene, whose cult is
intertwined with that of another repentant harlot, St. Mary the Egyptian. Now, at Orleans, where there is an
ancient cult of the Magdalen, St Mary the Egyptian was one of the titles of the Black Virgin. If there is some
mystery linking Isis, Egypt, Mary the Egyptian, Mary Magdelene and the Black virgin, in what way does it involve
the Prieure? Kings often claim illustrious ancestry: the Mikado is the son of Heaven; the British royal line is
descended from the gods of the north and the heroes of troy; the founder of the Ethiopian Empire was the son of
the Queen of Sheba and Solomon.[526]
The 9th century was an important era for the cult of the Black Virgin. In 888, not long after the liberation of
Barcelona, the little, dark Madonna of Motserrat was discovered by shepherds in the mountain cave where, long
before, a Gothic bishop had hidden from the Moors. At roughly the same period another Virgin, destined to
become the patroness of her people, Our Lady of the Dark Forest, was carried up by St. Meinrad to the Hermitage
where the Abbey of Einsiedeln now stands. A monk of Mony St. Michel, where Louis XI was to found his order of
chivalry, visited the Holy Land in 867, where he would have been in a position to acquire sacred images, though it
is possible that devoition to the statue of Our Lady of the Dead at Mont Tombe in the crypt of the abbey church
dates from even earlier. In 876 Charles the Bald transferred the chemise (chainze) of the Virgin from achen to
Chartres, where the cult of holy well ‘of the strong’, and of ‘The Virgin Who Will Give Birth’, Our Subterranean
Lady, has been attributed to the Druidic era.[527]
The return of the Black Virgin to the forefront of collective consciousnees has coincided with the profound
psychological need to reconcile sexuality and religion. She has always helped her supplicants to circumvent the
rigidities of patriarchal legislation and is traditionally on the side of physical processes healing the sick, easing the
pangs of childbirth, making the milk flow. She knows how to break rigid masculine rules, bringing dead babies back
to life long enough to receive baptism and escape from limbo to paradise, looking with tolerance on the sins of the
flesh as when she acts as midwife to a pregnant abbess or stands in for a truant nun tasting for a time the illicit
pleasures of sin. Politically, she is in favour of freedom and integrity, the right of peoples, cities and nations to be
inviolate and independent from outside interference. Nowhere is this more evident thatn in the history of the
Queen of Poland, the Black Madonna of Czestochowa.[528]

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720: With proper understanding from an Authors experience when you write a book, you also live that book, you
inculcate that book and all of its energies and degrees, as the book is birthed out of you. I am the return of the
Black Madonna by full birth right. The intelligence that is required to decipher this energy was not going to come
through any female nor male. Not saying it wasn’t capable to occur, Im stating that the modern day intelligence is
to inferior to comprehend, disseminate, fragment, repair and modify said energy. If there are individuals with said
intelligence they lerk in the shadows of existence.
To be clear what I mean is, my Great Grandmothers name is Margaret. Her father was an Irish man of the
name Schofield. St. Margaret killed a dragon from the inside out. My Grandmothers name is Mary Margaret and I
recently found out she was raised Catholic. My Mothers name is Donna Denise which etymologically is Madonna
(Italian for Mother) and Dionysus (French Goddess). Then I was born with the name Keenan which is Irish for
Ancient and Booker is Anglo-Saxon for Bookmaker. When I started this journey I didn’t know I was connected to
Poland. As a child I loved eating Polish sausages, I wouldn’t dare touch one today though. I was born in Chicago,
which has the largest Polish population in the world outside of Poland. The first book I wrote was The Black Mans
Bible. Its an Memoir in vol. 2 we learn a Memoir is a Demon. I didn’t know this when I wrote it. In this book I was
incarnated with King Ahasuerus of Persia, you know him today as King Xerses I who, fell in love with a Polish Jew.
During the writing of Volume 1 I met a blue eyed blond haired woman by the name of Monika who is a die hard
catholic, she was also a Virgo. She fell in love with me and we consummated the magic. She even asked me to
marry her. Her principle of being a Virgo(Virgin), a Catholic, from a bloodline of soliders and cops, raised in Europe
and calling me her Murzyn(Polish for Moor) sort of gave me acception in the total realm of Europe and knighted
me and this work Ive completed
I would have not been able to do that or this book series without the Black/Bloody Mary that I met when I
moved to Las Vegas/Sin City. My Samoan (Rare/ Untampered DNA) Goddess was born on the week of The Birth of
the Nativity of Jesus, but also born on The Day of Death in the Mayan calendar system. I as well am born on The
Day of Death. Together male and female death principles combined inclusive with her living in Europe and having
been to all the countries also compiled the energy of this book and the introduction of the Black Madonnas. As her
birthright nickname by her family was Blackie. She was a virgin to my world and all of this type of information.
The mother of my children I gave the name Venus years ago, before I found out that the planet Venus
ruled over her zodiac sign Taurus and also the Libra sign. She held on to this name and also used this name as the
Mother Goddess of Sacred Prostitution. Our relationship evolved into a Pimp/Prostitute scenario after the birth of
my second son Hanibaal. I use the word evolve because the level of intelligence that Pimps and Prositutes go thru
is an introductory phase to Hollywood/Wonderland world. I opened up the gates of Sacred Prostitution thru a
Black Venus. The energy of the Venus is very wild and unpredictable but in essence brings wealth. This is in
synchronicity with the actual activities of the planet which is a violent aggressive planet. This is also why it
symbolizes love. The Black venus which is an energy principle is symbolized in the dolls that predate Egypt. These
dolls are not seen with a child or any facial expressions. They are only identified with enormous breasts and an
enormous ass. Sometimes you will see a heavy gut. All of this permeates a sexual vibration that stems from the
dolls. Understand that the Venus is the GrandMother to the Madonna. As these Venus dolls are found in locations
of our mysterious ancestors and their practices. We don’t know what she is saying, what she was used for or what
aspect of femininity she represents. Due to the fact that similar dolls have been discovered all across the planet in
diverse locations it is easy for us to assume that she embodies all the aspects of femininity as so does her
daughters. Until now.
The Mother of the Black Madonna and daughter of the Black Venus is divided up into different Goddesses
amongst several civilizations who are physically represented by a type of woman I will refer to as a Sybil. These are

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the most powerful Goddesses who hold the major archetypes when the ancient civilizations were birthed. Their
names are Isis, Libya, Diana, Hecate, Athena, Ixchel, Sekhmet, Lilith, Ishtar, etc.,. Not to foget there are a couple
amongst the Native American Indians, the Nordics and the Asiatics as well. Goddesses like Nut who is before Isis
represent the unknown black space between the Homo stages of humans and ancient civilizations. This black
space holds the secrets to how the human intelligence sky rocketed whether it took a century or was over night no
one can say.
These Sybil women were the ancient oracle women who gave all answers through their mumbling. That’s
what the information states. That these women were so archaic and maybe traumatized from the events of the
time that all they could do was mumble. This mumbling was taken as divine answers. The understandings of
existence were greater during these times and taken far more seriously, then our sponge bob world could imagine.
As the Egyptians state, vowels are sacred. There is a magic to mantras and octaves that humans create while
enunciating words. During these times the languages obviously held more direct keys to higher forms of
intelligence and also planted a specific wiring in the mind on how to comprehend existence. This mathematical
system hidden in octaves is the root to how ancient architecture was completed. These Sybil women were held as
direct intermediaries with the Gods. As I stated they lived on hills just like witches today at your local night club do
their devilish deeds on high heel stilletos (an Italian knights dagger). One reason they were separated from the
community and why they were held to be superior to the average woman, is because of the rites they went thru.
These women, as was stated to be hardcore occult practices in Vol. 2 were drinking blood of babies and
performing arcane sex rites. This time period is at the beginning stages of the ancient civilizations and slowly
dwindled out overtime intentionally.
Inanna is the precursor of Ishtar, Astarte, Aphrodite, and Venus, goddesses whose powers are more
specialized than hers. All now belong to the archaeology of myth, save the Venus of astrology. There is one
contemporary of Inannas still active today, however, who retains her awesome cultic power, and that is Kali,
goddess of time. The Aryan invaders of north west India no doubt encountered dark goddesses among the
Dravidians of the Indus Valley, whose advanced civilization may have been related to that of the Sumerian
Chaldeans. It now seems probable that reed ships plied between Mesopotamia and India from the beginning of
this period, so it would not be suprising if some cross cultural, iconographical similarities should exist between
Indian goddesses and those of the Middle East. One of Kali’s names, as the first manifestation of being, is Lalita
and Lilith returns the compliment when she acknowledges that Kali is one of her 14 names. The philological
evidence relates the Lilith stem to words of licking, swallowing, lechery and darkness, all consistent with the myth
of Kali. Dark, sensuous lilac is derived from the Persian word for midnight blue indigo, itself an import from the
Indus. It may carry echoes of the Hindu Vishnu as Narayana, the primal being, moving in the waters. According to
Plutarch, there is also a mountain in India called Lilaeus which produces a black stone known as clitoris, with which
the inhabitants of the country adorn their ears.[529]
720: Plutarch makes mention of this in his Moral series that would be vol. 5 pg. 466. He states that there is a
mountain where a woman goes to worship the gods at night time, as she is a moon worshipper. The Gods get
angry at this and send 2 lions to tear her apart. The womans name was Lilaeus. After the moon grew a mountain in
the location in which she was murdered at, it was given the name Liaeus. In this mountain they find this black
stone they call clitoris. This word clitoris we all know. It is the seat of female enjoyment the vulva that erects at
the top of the opening of the vaginal canal. It is the only organ known to man that’s entire function is excitation of
pleasure and sexual enjoyment. In which males have no clitoris. If a woman does not have orgasms,sexual activity
or use her clitoris in anyways it can and most likely will fall off. This can also happen with the breasts and its
nipples which are also dark cmplected on all women. The vagina as well is dark complected versus the rest of a

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womans skin and the lips of the vagina will have dark lining. On the inside of it its as black as the bottom of the
ocean and outerspace. When babies are born their genitalia is black. As I stated earlier in the book labia may
equal to lamia. Now we see the clitoris is a black stone created off of the soul of a moon worshipping woman. It is
safe for me to say that if I were to detail all the medical terms used for the vagina, I will discover the blackhole of
existance. They’ve made the vagina regardless of race, size, age or scent a wormhole, a stargate. As it already was
before the words were applied. But, our materialized, literal world finds unexplained primordial chaos as the great
enemy. This primordial chaos is the woman and understanding of nature which in essence wold leave us all
running around naked. Well talk on this later.
Anus in Latin means ‘old woman’ as well as fundament, changing to ‘nonna’ in Vulgar latin, from which our
word ‘nun’ derives. As the old gods and goddesses declined into fairy tale characters Anath(Egyptian Goddess), no
doubt, turned into Mother goose, the kindly nanny who soothes the nursery in the telling of tales, though her
other side may appear as the wicked stepmother or godmother.
The sycamore, many breasted with figs, is the Egyptian tree of life which gives forth a milky substance.
Hathor shares it as a symbol with Nut, Diana of the Ephesians and with Zacchaeus?St Amador (who climbed one
and received there an invitation to entertain Jesus to dinner). This story is told only by St. Luke, but it seems to
refer to the same occasion at that at which Mary anointed the feet of the Lord and wiped them with her hair. As
well as a tree, Hathor was, like Lilith, the ladder on which the righteous could ascend to heaven. She was well
known on the Red sea coast of Somalia, which may itself be the land of Punt which was originally her home, and
that, in some versions, of the Queen of Sheba. The Queen of Sheba is also known as the Lady of Byblos, the city
where the coffin of Osiris, enclosed within a tree after being washed ashore, was made a pillar of a temple. At
Byblos she was a serpent goddess whose cobra symbolized the eye of wisdom.
720: Im pretty sure this is the woman that predates Medusas stories in Greek mythology. If so, the Greek
mythology definetly demonized the true essence of what the Cobra serpent Goddess of Byblos represented.
Byblos is the root word to Bible.
The beloved in the ‘Song of Solomon’ is black because she has been exposed to the sun. St. Mary the
Egyptian suffered the same fate from her long life of penance in the desert and, at death, a lion dug her grave.
One of the reasons given for the blackness of our virgins is that Mary, too, was very sunburnt. The most important
function of the Black Virgin is her power to stay the destructive hand of god, tempering justice with mercy.
Once upon a time, God’s dove and God’s raven were sundered, and the raven of the Ark became accursed.
It, like the dove, had once been white and was blackened in performance of its Promethean role of bringing the
light and fire of consciousness to mankind. Marie Louise von Franz describes the raven as the light bringer par
excellence, the creative depression which is God’s messenger. The process, however depressing it may seem, is
the way.[530]
One of these, sometimes met with elsewhere as a companion of Black Virgins, is St. Maurice (Maurus +
Moorish, black; Maurs=Mars) to whom one prays to be delivered from unwanted parents. [531]
Cybele is the Phrygian mother of the gods whose prototype has been traced back to the Neolithic
matriarchal civilization of Catal Huyuk. She was first worshipped as a black stone, and it was thus that she
journeyed to Rome in 205 BC, sent by King ttalus of Pragmum at the request of the Senate. It had been advised in
the Sibylline books that only she could save them from the showers of stones and the inroads of Hannibal that
beset them. She was carried by matrons to the Palastine site of what was to be the Virgin of the Ara Coeli (qv),
and placed in the Temple of Victory. Annually, on 25 March, the Christian Lady Day, her statue, whose head
consisted of a black stone, was bathed in the River Almo (Almus=nourishing, cf. Alma Mater). To the Romans she
was simply ‘Mana Mater’, the Great Mother, and the earliest Phrygian name for her consort was Papas, father,

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which is still the Greek word for priest. In Pessinus, the black stone, which in Rome became the head of the
goddess, was considered to be her throne. Can it have been a memory of this traidition that led Hincmar, the 9th
century Archbishop of Rheims, to assert that the appropriate colour for the throne of the Virgin was black? The
name Pessinus, though presumably from the old Phrygian language, awakens echoes surprisingly relevant to the
significance of Cybele through the only 2 Greek words with the root pess. Pessos is an oval stone especially used in
playing draughts, a cubic mass of building, the dark edge of the pupil of the eye, and a pessary Pesso means to
bake, ripen, ferment or digest.
By the 3rd century AD Cybele was the supreme deity of Lyons, capital of the 3 gauls, where a Black Virgin
cult flourishes today. Julian the Apostate favoured her xult and composed a beautiful prayer in which he
apostrophized her as the Virgin: ‘Wisdom, Providence, Creator of our souls’. Bulls were sacrificed to her at the
Vatican in the last years of the fourth century and, as late as 410 AD she was still publicly honoured in Gaul.
Originally a mountain goddess, generally accompanied by lions, she became the tutelary deity of cities and frontier
citadels, protecting her people from war and pestilence, and speaking to them in subterranean oracles and
ecstasies. Her nameis etymologically linked with the words for crypt, cave, head and dome and is distantly related
to the Ka’aba, the cube shaped holy of holies in Mecca that contains the feminine black stone venerated by Islam.
Her youthful companion was the lesser consort god, Attis, who was castrated and transformed into the pine tree.
In his memory and to honour the goddess, her priests, the Galli, were also eunuchs.[532]
The leading role played by Mary at the Crucifixion and Resurrection needs no retelling. Fourteen years
after the Ascension, most of which time she was put to sea by the Jews in a leaky boat without oars or rudder,
accompanied by her servant, Martilla, who had once called to Jesus, ‘blessed is the womb that bore you and the
breasts that gave you suck’ (Luke 11.27). Other passengers included Cedonius, a blind man healed by Jesus;
Maximinus, one of the 72 whose feast day, ‘8 June, coincides with that of St. Melanina (black) and precedes that of
St. Pelagia (a penitent whore); Lazarus, Martha, Mary Salome, Mary the mother of James, and Sara the black
Egyptian servant.
They landed at Ratis, later Les Saintes Maries da la Mer, and Mary preached against idolatry in the
neighbourhood of Marseilles. The ruler of the country came to pray to the idols for a child. Mary dissuaded him
and appeared to his wife in a dream on 3 successive nights threatening the wrath of God unless the saints were
looked after. The wife then became pregnant and the ruler set off with her and the new born baby to discover
whether Peter preached the same truth as Mary Magdalene, on whome he bestowed all his worldly goods. During
the voyage his wife died, and, after praying to the Magdalene, the ruler left her on a hell with the baby, covering
them with his cloak. He then journeyed on to Jersualem where St. Peter took him on a tour of the city. Two years
later he returned to the hillside where he found the baby alive, still sucking its dead mother’s milk. He prayed once
more to the Magdalen and his wife was restored to life. They returned to Marseilles and were baptised by
Maximus who became the first bishop of Marseilles and Martha settled in tarascon (qv) where she quelled the
Tarasque, the dragon of the Rhone.[533]
720: St. Melania is obviously a representation of melanin. The words are to close. For further verification, yes, it is
very true that there are harlot saints. Sarah La Kali (Gypsy Black Madonna) is a variation of Lilith, (Judaic) who is
actually a remake of Lamia (Queen of Libya). Medusa is a carbon copy of Lamia. Lamia and other snake Gods and
goddesses come from Libya. Hence the word labia major and labia minor, where the snake enters. These snake
Gods and Goddesses are half human at the top and half human at the bottom. This race of snake beings must be
the Chitterlings referred to earlier. When Greece encountered the Goddess Lamia they inculcated her into
Medusa. The story of Medusa may be the story of white male dominance conquering black female rule. As
Medusa didn’t have children and neither does the representation of that time period which would be the Venus

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dolls. In The Black Mans Bible I was incarnated with CeCrops. CeCrops established Athens, Greece with the
Draconian Law. He is a chitterling half man, half snake as well.
So my theory is correct on all of these Goddesses being connected chronogically and especially though the
live women of today. Through the energy of the word clitoris and all women in western understanding using the
English language submit to this word for their vulva organ that gives them pleasure. They are calling it a black
stone whether they know it or not. Which brings us to St. Melania who was in an incestual marriage with her first
cousin. She also owned over 20,000 slaves. Her feast day is December, 31, New Years eve. There are deep
significances here that have to be further investigated. Sarah La Kali is the transformation piece directly out of
Egypt which supports what I was stating earlier about the Gypsy people. St Mary the Egyptian Harlot didn’t have
sex for money she did it out of her own wills. This I believe is one of the stories placed in time to start the
stereotype or view of the “whore”.
The stereotype of the whore has been an overt psychological problem for males who are sexually
inadequate or inexperienced. This stereotype also brings problems to the male understanding of ownership and
trust. In which overtime ownership and trust has been confirmed with paper and pen and not human decision. A
whore is mysterious as the beauty of a woman can bring confusion to a males mind. The concept of happiness is
what both men and women want to achieve. It is hard for a male to tell if a woman is happy, if she is not overtly
excited. For instance, a womans vagina always stays wet, how does a man know if shes achieved an orgasm or not.
One reason why cunt and cunning have the same root. So to guarantee that she is man makes toys, puts her toes
to her ears and make sure shes squirting everywhere. Now we know. The element of “the whore” resides in all
women and all women want to let her show her face every now and again. You must understand that at all times
women are respresentations of and channel the outerspace realms, this is all women of all ages and races. The
Black Venus, Mary, Madonna, Magdelene is just the mother to them all, each one representing a different
variation relative to the time period.
There are other colors relative to the black solidarity that are actually the basis of how we see the world.
The Black-Red is for the black virgin of course. It is the blood of a new, the breaking of the helm of the virginity. It
is the color of love, the planet venus. It is the warning of the beginning. Red excites the bull. After the innocence
has remained pure for so long, it must experience the filth in order to be whole. This stage is from birth to around
18-25. The next phase is the Black-Green stage which is from 25-50. The soiling of her sexuality must begin. She
must get wet in the morning like the dew on the grass, the mysterious wild mist of the night has rested. The worm
must travel the dirt and maintain moisture for growth. Growth of the follower that reaches towards the sun for
warmth and comfort. This is sun is both the man she keeps her flower fresh for and the son of hers that she will
raise to in essence take care of her in her older stages. This is only if she remains the Black Mother Mary. The
Black-Green stage is the growth stage that must also take care of others sickness which is also symbolized by
green. The Black-Blue stage is her lovely grandma or nagging hag stage. If her sex life and worship has not been
fulfilled correctly the nagging hag will come forward. If she is getting her cuckold on then her husband is the
contented cuckold. This is the stage before death hence, the color blue used to symbolize death before black. The
heavens are blue and her waters should be calm unless as I said earlier she has fallen from grace and into hag
status.
Here is the definition to the name Mary: The name may have originated from the Egyptian language; it is
likely derivative of the root mr "love; beloved" (compare mry.t-ymn "Merit-Amun", i.e. "beloved of Amun").
The name was early etymologized as containing the Hebrew root mr "bitter" (cf. myrrh), or mry "rebellious". St.
Jerome (writing c. 390), following Eusebius of Caesarea, translates the name as "drop of the sea" (stilla maris in
Latin), from Hebrew ‫ רמ‬mar "drop" (cf. Isaias 40:15) and ‫ םי‬yam "sea". This translation was subsequently rendered

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stella maris ("star of the sea") due to scribal error, whence Our Lady's title Star of the Sea.[2] Rashi, an 11th-century
Jewish commentator on the Bible, wrote that the name was given to the sister of Moses because of the Egyptians'
harsh treatment of Jews in Egypt. Rashi wrote that the Israelites lived in Egypt for two hundred ten years, including
eighty-six years of cruel enslavement that began at the time Moses' elder sister was born. Therefore, the girl was
called Miriam, because the Egyptians made life bitter (‫מר‬, ַ mar) for her people.
Now you have to understand the power in this name. Women always want to get “married’. We say
“merry” Christmas. In the Bible it is partying is referred to as drink and be “merry”. Washington D.C. our nations
capitol is located in Mayland. Our law is underneath Maritime law. The largest Ethiopian population in America is
in Washington D.C. A friend recently asked why has Marilyn Monroe gotten so much popularity as of late. I stated
because her name is Mary. Theres a lot more to it thatn that but that’s it for short. For long, I will state not only
does she represent free sexuality (whoreism) but she was the representation of the white version of
Mary/Madonna at that time. As a white Madonna represents the last degree of the black Madonna which is
extreme whoredom. This is ok. I use the word whoredom in a neutral light. I know our social context today views
whoredom in a negative light. They only do this so witchs can rule and have men culturally blinded into voluntary
slavery. White women historically have embodied the bottom line of what the black madonnas are and what all
women have the capability to be, and the key element to a womans rule.
As we see in tribal condition all the peoples are basically nude. This is womans rule, where there is no
allowance of sexual fantasy and other perversions. Why isn’t there any allowance because she is naked at all
times, therefore a woman isn’t really considered a gift, something unattainable. In some African tribes you have to
trade some bulls for a wife or whatever possessions you had was usage for dowerywhether that be the woman
having dowery for the man or vice versa. It is very clear that women today having to wear clothes kills their
power. A womans full desire is attention and for you to worship. This is going to be achieved with a nude body
more so then a clothed one. Even when clothes are on the woman they are usually tight, to show provocativeness
of the bra, panty line etc., So when women wear clothes they must go overboard with extravagant accessories
such as makeup and the like to provide illusion to catch a servant. In ancient times a high preist male would have
to be eunuch to have the highest hierarchy next to the Goddess. Because women know they are designed for
submission and I don’t care how wild a so called hag, witch, whore, a snake headed goddess wants to get. I put
this 10 inch dick on her silly ass, she will cooperate, put on the apron and flip my flapjacks accordingly, lightly
brown please. Women have power amongst weak men, Not GODS.
The Black Madonna may have mass energy but her pretty little cunt deserves the fucking as well. She has
to bend over like the rest of em. You must understand that a womans lively hood is in her tits and her pussy. Her
tits maintain life and her pussy brings life into the planet its that simple. Grow the fuck up, people. The White
Madonna is the arcane result of sexuality as its proven this is what white males made them to be during Medieval
times. White women are about the only women on the planet who freely speak about their whoredom, enjoy and
embrace both submission and dominant roles in sexuality and go about it in an indiscriminate way. All of this
energy that they mastered gave them permission to have their own Maries and Madonnas as other races on this
planet do not and most likely will not. Another reason the Black and White races are the only ones to have Maries
and Madonnas is because we together are both Alpha & the Omega. On the human geneaology scale the black
man is first and the white male is last. Who came first the chicken or the egg.
Now Ive mentioned women many women that are in our current Hollywood cutlrue. Its times to go in on
the most maximized of this energy which would be Madonna . All we have to do is look at some of her songs
during the late 80s and we will clearly see a metaphysical similarity with the black madonnas. Madonna was and
is a representation of the arcane degrees of the black Madonna. That would be extreme whoredom mixed with

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materialism, beauty mania and seeking worship. We can see this with the songs “Like a Virgin”, “Material World”
and “Like a Prayer”. The song Like a Prayer is key In supporting the theory. Please understand that at that time
when the song came out Im pretty sure many white people knew about the Black Madonna. So the language
spoken in the video of a black male Christ and kkk crosses burning did a lot of play on the white psyche, ten what it
did for the negro mind. For what reason? I don’t know. What results played out? I don’t know. But it did adjust
something Im sure of it. Not only did Madonna repetitively date black men but was known to have terrible
relationships with white men. Today, to my knowledge she is single with a bunch of black kids adopted from
Africa. It is very clear that the artist Madonna is the white version of the black Madonna and she represents
extreme whoredom, which is good.
Why do I say whoredom is good. Well the black Madonna is seen by herself. She is a single mother. Her
child is the sign that demands charity to be given. The man that impregnated her is out fucking other mothers or
creating mothers. As love and reproduction demands. The single mother system keeps love a fresh. It is a system
of rotation mixing for a while and then flying the coupe. One of the definitions of the cuckold is being a step
father. You must submit with gifts to the single mother to get her horny cunt. After a woman gives birth, her
biology changes to desire more sex. This program is put in place to ensure security of her, her children and to keep
the attraction from males high. She can no longer play the game of silent and innocent. The child is a symbol that
she has been involved in the hanky panky. With the birth of a child, she is now in a stage of desperation. All men
want a desperate, deprived woman, because the man has an instilled program of wanting to be the hero that
saves the day in which by an unspoken rule he is supposed to get the vagina as he has earned it. Single mothers
which our world is now full of have large mental issues from the abandonement from the father. One of these
issues is filling the void of loneliness. This loneliness can cause the infanticide we see in vol 1 & 2. It can also turn
the woman to extreme cannibalism of the baby. As in the old curtural dynamic women judged eachothers value
on how well kept her man and children look in public. That line separated in the 80’s when technology began to
mix more into society and the digital age was birthed. The lines of separation between man and woman had to get
larger to make room for 3rd parties like porn, sex toys, drugs, tv, cell phones, internet, music and all other types of
unimportant bullshit. People ask me how Im able to comprehend what I read, read the amount I read and write
so many books. Its simple I only do whats important, I do not partake in your fun bullshit. Fun is the cloak to
laziness. Women use fun as a form of external feel good that replaces their sexual responsibilities, which in turn
leaves them unconquered and then their voice has power. When your not fucking the shit out of her, her empty
words have importance. This is part of the reason they get turned on from you “working”, youre dieing off faster.
Work you to death and feed you congested foods so you will not be able to beat the pussy down and get in contact
with outer space and receive the intelligence of the black. She wants to have power, just to have power and do
nothing with it.
The majority of the time women want to “spend time” which is a bunch of nothing. They want to waste
your time. If you gain more than what she is worth than she is replaceable, all women know this. This is why they
will stagnate the process of success, because a mans success is a threat to a womans security of blind slavery of
the male. In essence success, is a male concept and foreign to woman understanding by majority rule, this is
especially the case if raised by a single mother. Not that they don’t understand it, they don’t need it to survive. All
they need is a vagina and doesn’t necessarily have to be used in order for her to survive. Its all of this type of shit
where white males ust say fuck it, shes a witch, send her ass to the stake. Im not going to run around in my mind
about confusion that wont bring a benefit. This is exactly what women will provide, mental stress and agony for
no real reason. Women will excite your anger, because they think if they can get you angry that means you care

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about them. Its all very childish. This is why they are labeled as children in the bible and in western cultural
thinking.
If the times before Egypt were so advanced and great then how come there is no evidence of them. Just
mere scraps of archaeology laying around. Because there was no real building and extreme high advanced
civilization. The women were naked and that was the focus. You can tell that was the focus by the sexual oriented
archaeology we do find that is left over. This sexual archaeology is in synchronicity on how the old civilizations
were built which are based on all natural elements not mixed artificial elements. The cultural demonizing of sex
that the western mentality produces is in synchronicity with the false, irrelevant, irresponsible mentalities that it
produces in the people. We were probably all running around fucking and sucking all day like Bonobo primates
and just like the bonobo primates the women ran the tribe. They were all sitting around their picking the berries
off the trees. Which is all fine and dandy until the heat and mosquitos get to pricking the arse. Ah ha, now we
need the the off spray can and air condition. We need science. Science and its answers has removed the feminine
simple logic of supplying joy instead of explaining truth in which they aren’t built to explain. Just like African tribes
aren’t built for mass production. The matrix is the canal of the vagina. This is the digital zone of all human
manifestation and computation. It is digital, this is why the colors red, green and blue needed to be added to this
situation. Because these are the colors that all colors come from, the prism when light is added. To seek the light
could be the bright pink inner muscles of the vagina. Etymologically the word matrix means womb.
The bull is the animal of St. Luke,the reputed painter or sculptor of many Black Virgins. [534]
Luke the Evangelist (Ancient Greek: Λουκᾶς, Loukãs) is one of the Four Evangelists—the four traditionally
ascribed authors of the canonical Gospels. The early church fathers ascribed to him authorship of both the Gospel
according to Luke and the book of Acts of the Apostles, which would mean Luke contributed over a quarter of the
text of the New Testament, more than any other author. Prominent figures in early Christianity such as Jerome and
Eusebius later reaffirmed his authorship, although the fragile evidence of the identity of the author of the works
has led to discussion in scholarly circles, both secular and religious.
The New Testament mentions Luke briefly a few times, and the Pauline epistle to the Colossians refers to
him as a doctor (from Latin for teacher); thus he is thought to have been both a physician and a disciple of Paul.
Christians since the faith's early years have regarded him as a saint. He is believed to have been a martyr,
reportedly as having been hanged from an olive tree, though some believe otherwise.
The Roman Catholic Church and other major denominations venerate him as Saint Luke the Evangelist and
as a patron saint of artists, physicians, surgeons, students and butchers; his feast day takes place on 18 October.
Christian tradition, starting from the 8th century, states that he was the first icon painter. He is said to
have painted pictures of the Virgin Mary and Child, in particular the Hodegetria image in Constantinople (now
lost). Starting from the 11th century a number of painted images were venerated as his autograph works, including
for example, the Black Madonna of Częstochowa and Our Lady of Vladimir. He was also said to have painted Saints
Peter and Paul, and to have illustrated a gospel book with a full cycle of miniatures.
Late medieval Guilds of St Luke in the cities of Late Medieval Europe, especially Flanders, or the
"Accademia di San Luca" (Academy of Saint Luke) in Rome—imitated in many other European cities during the
16th century—gathered together and protected painters. The tradition that Luke painted icons of Mary and Jesus
has been common, particularly in Eastern Orthodoxy. The tradition also has support from the Saint Thomas
Christians of India who claim to still have one of the Theotokos icons that Saint Luke painted and which St. Thomas
brought to India.[535]
A number of Egyptian or Levantine harlot saints figure in the Church’s calendar alongside Mary Magdalene.
Mary the Egyptian is depicted next to her as black in a window of the church of St Merri in Paris and their

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iconography is sometimes very similar. Mary came to Alexandria in the hope of earning her fare to Jerusalem,
where she wished to venerate the true Cross. With this end in view she prostituted herself to sailors for 17 years
before retiring to the desert to live a life of penitence as a hermit, clad in nothing but her hair and progressively
blackened by the sun. After 47 years of solitude, now with very short, white hair, she met Zosimos, and asked him
to return the following year and bury her, which he did, with the help of a friendly lion. Mary the Jewess or
Prophetess was an important alchemist in the Egyptian tradition of Isis. Zosimos, writing c. AD 300, was a major
successor and probably a contemporary of Mary’s who developed her work. According to Saillens, the Black Virgin
of Orleans was known as Ste Marie l’Egyptienne. Robert Graves calls her the patron saint of lovers and associates
her with Walsingham (qv) and Compostela (qv). Her feast (2 April) is also that of the Patient st. Theodasia, whose
statue is in the chapel of St Genevieve in St Germain des Pres.[536]
St. Catherine, another frequent companion of the Black Virgin, was for centuries one of the most popular
saint in the calendar, whose fame was brought to the west by returning crusaders. A native of Alexandria in its 3rd
century Gnostic apogee, royal, beautiful, rich and learned, she was, according to Everyman’s Book of Saints,
courted by the emperor Maximian. She refused his advances and confounded a multitude of scholars assembled
by him to overcome her scruples. Enraged, he had her broken on a wheel, scourged and beheaded, at which milk
flowed from her veins.
The name ‘Catherine’ is generally derived from the Greek root,cathar , meaning pure, which may have
earned her a certain popularityamong Gnostic sympathisers. While she was in prison, she was fed by a dove and
received a vision of Christ, which may, as in the case of her namesake from siena, have culminated in a mystical
marriage. Her body, hidden by angels, was discovered on Mount Sinaic. 800 where the famous monastery, home
of many texts from the early days of Christianity and also, reputedly, of a Black Virgin, was dedicated to her.[537]
There can be few people in the world interested in the poetry myth who have not been profoundly
affected by Robert Graves’s inspired book The White Goddess. His work Mammon and the Black Goddess is less
known. In it he states (p. 162): ‘Provencal and Sicilian ‘Black Virgins’ are so named because they derive from an
ancient tradition of Wisdom and Blackness.’ He sees in her, over and above her role as ultimate inspirer of poets,
the symbol of a new relationship between the sexes:
The Black Goddess is so far hardly more than a word of hope whispered among the few who have served
their apprenticeship to the White Goddess. She promises a new pacific bond between men and women… in which
the patriarchal marriage bond will fade away… the Black goddess has experienced good and evil, love and hate,
truth and falsehood in the person of her sisters… she will lead man back to that sure instinct of love which he long
ago forfeited by intellectual pride.
It is paradoxical that os old an image should be seen to represent such a new and radical departure. But
then it is strange, too, that the Black Virgins which have been with us so long and in such great numbers, so often
hidden and rediscovered, should now for the first time become widely recognized as a separate category within
the iconography of the Virgin in the west. ‘We are living’, wrote Jung (The Undiscovered self, pp. 110f.), ‘in what
the Greeks called the Kairos –the right time for a “metamorphosis of the gods”, i.e. of the fundamental principles
of symbols.’ If this is the right time or high time for us to discover the Black Virgin, how can we know what she is
trying to say to us?[538]
There is no written account of the intentions of a carver or painter of the ancient Black Virgins. Theological
references to them are scant, though St Bernardtook the blackness as a symbol of humility. We can only infer
from the silence that, for some unknown reason, the Church was reluctant to comment officially on the
phenomenon save in simplistic terms. It is, however, no longer shocking to suggest that the images respresent a
continuation of pagan goddess worship and that some may have once been idols consecrated to Isis or other

481
deities. It is also undeniable that a remarkably high proportion of Madonnas over 200 years old, that are credited
with miraculous powers, are black, as are the traditional patronesses of nations, provinces and cities.
For those who are able to make a leap of faith, our Black Virgin in the west has much in common
symbolically with the other great goddess figures of the world. In her subterranean darkness she could be
compared with the terrifying maw of death, Kali. The circles of wax dedicated to her at Moulins, Marsat and
elsewhere remind us that in our end is our beginning and vice versa, of the uroboric prison of Maya and Karma, the
measure of whose round dance we must tread. She is also the ancient wisdom of Isis Maat, the secret of eternal
life that is the gold at the end of the alchemical process, as well as the initial blackness. In short, she is the spirit of
evolutionary consciousness that lies hidden in matter. But evolution rejects the close circle for the open spiral;
new planets do swim into our ken, and things are not always as they have been. [539]

Fig. 1.).Louise Marie Thérèse, the Black Nun of Moret is rumoured to be the daughter of Maria Teresa of Spain,
wife of Louis XIV of France. Apparently the Queen had an affair with her African attendant, Nabo,
Fig. 2.). Queen Sophia Charlotte was queen consort of the United Kingdom and wife to King George III of Britain
direct descendant of the Sousa family, a black branch of the Portuguese Royal House
Fig. 3.). Empress Menen Queen of Queens of Judah (aethiopia) Beloved Wife of Emperor Haile Selassie I King of
Kings and Lord of Lords of Ethiopia
Fig. 4.).St. Ifigenia Painting A Female Friendly, Fiery Nubian Saint
720: Id like to state here that you must pay attention to the types of dolls you will be witnessing. Head attire
adjusts amongst them, so does facial expression and poster. The child maintains different statuses as well.
Collectively the black Madonna permeates all the colors of existance into the world. This is part of the red,green,
blue application which prisms all colors and things into existence. She represents the combination of all human
races and all activity of humans whether that be past, present or future. This is both for male and female. Which
means that some of dolls will hold androgynous energy, some of them are warrior women. This mentality of
defense, suspicion and manipulation is involved in the symbol of the single mother. As Im pretty sure America has
the largest concentration of African blooded single mothers in the world. The defense and her perception of
concluding that everything is against her is the single mother drive that enforces her own security for her and her
child. When we adjust our thinking to a cave man circumstance. We must understand that at any given moment
the male may leave the cave and not show back up, for whatever reason. So she must be prepared for any and
everything coming from the earth or men.

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Fig. 5.). The Black Madonna of Montserrat. Also, the Holy Grail was said to be kept safe at the castle of
Munsalvaesche (mons salvationis) or Montsalvat (Montserrat)
Fig. 6.). Black Madonna Notre Dame du Pilier, Chartres (France).
Fig. 7.). Enthroned Virgin and Child, 1130–40, French; Made in Burgundy; Birch with paint.

Fig. 8.). Black Madonna of Czestochowa, graces the south wall of St. Stanislaus Kostka Catholic Church.
Fig. 9.). Dusseldorf, Germany, Image of Grace of the Black Mother of God of Benrath
Fig. 10.). Depiction of the Virgin Mary in the Gates of Dawn, a holy site drawing pilgrams from all over Europe,
Vilnius, Lithuania

483
Fig. 11.). Tindari Madonna Bruna: restoration work in the 1990s found a medieval statue with later additions. Nigra
sum sed formosa, meaning "I am black but beautiful" (from the Song of Songs, 1:5), is inscribed round a newer
base.
Fig. 12.). A baroque copy of the statue of Our Lady of Loreto
Fig. 13.). Artist unknown The Black Madonna of Anjony Statue (c. 1400s)

Fig. 14.). The Black Virgin of Meymac, 12thC France French and Italian Virgins were nicknamed 'The Egyptian' for
centuries.
Fig. 15.). Black Madonna Southern France
Fig. 16.). Artist unknown The Black Madonna of Anjony Statue (c. 1400s)

484
Fig. 17.). Unknown
Fig. 18.). Black Madonnas in Belgium. Legend says that she was brought here by a crusader, though art historians
date her to the end of the 15th century
Fig. 19.). Our Lady of Peñafrancia Venerated in the Bicol Region of the Philippines.

Fig. 20.). Black Madonna of Einselden, Switzerland

Fig. 21.).Black Madonna of Guingamp. Original sculpture dates to no later than 17th century.
Fig. 22.).Byzantine Icons Holy Virgin Mary The icon of the Mother of God of Three Hands

485
Fig. 23.). Spain Unspoilt - Black Madonna
Fig. 24.). Altötting, Germany. Our Dear Lady of Altötting (Unsere liebe Frau von Altötting)
Fig. 25.). Black Madonna of Loreto, Italy

Fig. 26.). Black Virgin of Notre Dame de Beaune FRANCE. Black Madonna
Fig. 27.). Black Madonna, Basilica of Notre Dame de la Daurade in Toulouse. Ceramic altar by Gaston Virebent .
Fig. 28.). The Original Miraculous Image of Nuestra Señora Virgen de Regla, Patrona de Opon by Don Lemoin

486
Fig. 29.). Cologne Germany The Black Mother of God St Mary in the Kupfergasse Mother of Mercy 1600
Fig. 30.). Black Madonna, Women's Island in Lake Chiem (Fraueninsel im Chiemsee), Bavaria, Germany
Fig. 31.).The miraculous Madonna of Tindari, Sicily

Fig. 32.). LADY of AFRICA, Notre Dame d’Afrique

Fig. 33.). Madone noire, Le Puy, France
Fig. 34.). Most Holy Mary Crowned One of the Poor (Maria Santissima L'Incoronata dei Poveri) In her sanctuary12
km outside of the city, in the region PugliaApulia, at least 11th century if not much older, natural wood.

487
Fig. 35.). Our Lady, the original 'Black Madonna', enshrined at the Abbey of Einsiedeln
Fig. 36.). Our Lady of Goshiv. In 1736 the monastery received from its founders the wonder working icon of the
Mother of God.
Fig. 37.). Le Puy Black Madonna As Virgin and Mother she incorporated the two faces of the ancient triple goddess
(Virgin, Matron, Crone) which were least threatening to the church

Fig. 38.). Prague The Black Madonna under the Chain

Fig. 39.). Praga, Stare Miasto, figura Czarnej Madonny
Fig. 40.). Our Lady of Guidance, Manila

488
Fig. 41.). Sainte Sara la Kali in the South of France, they elaborately dress her on festival day, May 28th.
Fig. 42.). Our Lady of Loreto refers to the Holy House of Loreto, the house in which Mary was born, and where the
Annunciation occurred
Fig. 43.). A Visit to Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage in Antipolo

Fig. 44.). The Black Madonna of Chartres, “Our Lady of the Pillar,” France (1508; commissioned copy of silver
original c. 13th century)
Fig. 45.). The Black Madonna of Oropa In her sanctuary near Biella and the source of the river Oropa, age
uncertain, 132 cm, painted wood. black madonna statue Virtual Babaji Vishwananda Black Madonna Statue
Fig. 46.). The Black Madonna in Barcelona

489
Fig. 47.). The Black Madonna of Pescasseroli, Italy in the St. Peter and St. Paul Abbey
Fig. 48.). The icon of the Mother of God of Kazan of Chimeevo, Russia.
Fig. 49.). The Black Virgin given in the Chadaraita given by Louis XI

Fig. 50.). The Madonna della Salute 12th century Wood Santa Maria della Salute, Venice
Fig. 51.). The Black Virgin is on display in the Cathedral of Jerez
Fig. 52.). The Black Virgin of Prague

490
Fig. 53.). Black Madonna in Candelaria
Fig. 54.). Puigcerda, Spain, Mother of God of the Sacristy
Fig. 55.). Austria black madonna HEILIGENLEITHENCopy made in Einsiedeln around 1650.

Fig. 56.). A visit to the restored shrine of Our Lady of Caversham

Fig. 57.). La Mesopanditissa (Madonna della Salute Venezia).
Fig. 58.). Jacobi de Ancharano (alias de Teramo), Litigatio Christi cum Belial, verdeutscht BSB Cgm 48 ([S.l.] 1461)

491
Fig. 59.). The Black Madonna of Loreto Near Ancona on the Adriatic Sea. A modern copy of the original statue, lost
in a fire in 1921
Fig. 60.). Vassiviere, Our lady of Vassiviere
Fig. 61.). Toute Sainte Koukouzelisa Saint Monastère de la Grande Lavra

Fig. 62.). THURET FRANCE (Auvergne, Puy de Dôme) The Virgin Warrior of the Crusades. In the 13th century the
seventh Crusade was preached in the Sanctuary of the Black Virgin of Le Puy en Velay in the presence of the King
Louis IX
Fig. 63.). Our Lady of Good Deliverance, Neuilly near Paris, 14th C. variation on 11th C. original
Fig. 64.). The Black Virgin of Meymac, 12thC France

492
Fig. 65.). The Black Virgin of Saint Victor, Marseille
Fig. 66.). The Black Madonna, Our Lady of Dublin In the church of the Carmelite order
Fig. 67.). The Black Madonna statue and church of Notre Dame de Marsat

Fig. 68.). Sant Llorenc de Morunys Mare de Deu dels Colls Mother of God of the Mountain Pass
Fig. 69.). San Zeno, placed inside the basilica di San Zeno, Verona, Italy
Fig. 70.). Romanesque Madonna of Chastreix, Puy de Dome, France Photo Francis Debaisieux

493
Fig. 71.). Pena de Francia La Virgen Morena (the dark skinned Virgin), La Morenita,
Fig. 72.). Our Lady of the Rosary and the Rule (Bacolod, Negros Occidental)
Fig. 73.). Our Lady of Tindari, Italy, the Ethiopian, about 7th century

Fig. 74.). A RUSSIAN ICON OF THE MOTHER OF GOD OF TENDER EMOTION (UMILENIE), CIRCA
Fig. 75.). Our Lady of Mariazell
Fig. 76.). Our Lady of Nuria, Queen of the Pyrenees, Spain, 12th century

494
Fig. 77.). Our Dear Lady of Regula (Onze Lieve Vrouw van Regula) Brugge In the Church
Fig. 78.). Our Lady of Candelaria
Fig. 79.). La Madonna del Soccorso di SAN SEVERO Puglia

Fig. 80.). Notre Dame de Liesse à la basilique de Saint Quentin dans l'Aisne
Fig. 81.). Notre Dame de Belloc, Église Saint Jean de Dorres, Dorres (Pyrénées Orientales) Photo by Dennis Aubrey
Fig. 82.). Monte Civita Italy The Black Madonna Most Holy Mary of Civita Most holy Mary della civita

495
Fig. 83.). The miracle-working icon of the Smolensk Mother of God.
Fig. 84.). Madonna del Sacro Monte di Viggiano Monte viggiano, Italy, The Black Madonna of the Sacred Mount
Viggiano
Fig. 85.). La Vierge Noire de l'église de Saint Gervazy

Fig. 86.). Lord,BlackMadonna, Sanctuary of Lord del hort Mother of God of Lord 970
Fig. 87.). Devotion to Lady of Piat
Fig. 88.). Black Madon Icon, church of Guadalupe, Spain. legend, carved during 1st century

496
Fig. 89.). Klagenfurt Kapuzinerkirche Schwarze Madonna
Fig. 90.). in the Chapel of the Black Virgin inside the Cathedral Our Lady of the Annunciation (Notre Dame de
l'Annontiation) , 11th century,
Fig. 91.). In church of Molompize, N D de Molompize, 15 C, Virgin of wood, naked Child covered in stucco and
painted black.

Fig. 92.). Halle Madonna

Fig. 93.). Finestret, France, The Black Madonna
Fig. 94.). Virgin and the Child (Limoges, about 1250)

497
Fig. 95.). Black Christ Child with Black Ethiopian Madonna
Fig. 96.). Black Virgin of the Recollects, Mother of Mercy, Belgium
Fig. 97.). Black Virgin of Città di Castello (Italy) In the crypt of the Cathedral

Fig. 98.). Black Madonna, Our Dear Lady in Kötschach

Fig. 99.). Black Madonna of Vassivière ( Puy de Dôme)
Fig. 100.). Black Madonna of St. Meinrad Archabbey

498
Fig. 101.). Black Madonna painted in the late nineteenth century by an unknown artist.
Fig. 102.). Unknown
Fig. 103.). A statue of Our Lady of Einsiedeln in a mandorla in the church of the Dominican

Fig. 104.). Madonna and Child St. Pierre de Chaillot Paris

Fig. 105.). our lady of the abandoned ones
Fig. 106.). Saint Romain d’Ay, la vierge noire

499
Fig. 107.). The Holy Icon of Panagia Tricherousa – Holy Monastery of Hilandariou Mount Athos.
Fig. 108.). Our Lady of Deliverance (Senegal)
Fig. 109.). Thuir, France, The Virgin of the Victory

Fig. 110.). Marija Bistrica

Fig. 111.). Vierge noire de Graville (Le Havre) The Black Madonna Statue
Fig. 112.). Image of the Virgin of Candelaria, in the Basilica of Candelaria (Tenerife).

500
Fig. 113.). One of three of Turkey's surviving icons of the Theotokos on the island of Heybeliada at the Theological
School of Halki
Fig. 114.). Nossa Senhora Aparecida
Fig. 115.). A baroque Loreto Madonna in the parish church of Gutau in Austria.Source

Fig. 116.). Aurillac France Our Lady of the Snows

Fig. 117.). Austria Vienna Black Madonna
Fig. 118.). Black Madonna Notre Dame de Confession, Marseille (France).

501
Fig. 119.). Basilica del Pilar, Basilica-Cathedral of Our Lady of the Pillar, Zaragoza, Black Madonna
Fig. 120.). The Black Madonna without Vestments and Crown in Pescasseroli, Italy
Fig. 121.). Virgen de Regla, patrona de Chipiona

Fig. 122.). Madonna della Tempesta, Santuario,Tolentino (MC)

Fig. 123.). magen de la Virgen de Atocha en su nicho, Venezuela
Fig. 124.). Notre Dame du Palais, Toulouse A Black Virgin

502
 Could Sarah the Black One be a Diana of Ephesus imported from the East? This is hardly likely. The fact
that she is worshipped in an underground chapel, just like the Black Madonna of the cathedral of Chartres, instead
calls for a comparison to the Celtic legends of fairies finding a haven in caves and otherwild places.
Starting in the 10th century, a Black Madonna, the Boueno Mero Negro, was worshipped in the crypt of
Saint Victor in Marseilles (France). During Candlemas, this blackened Madonna receives a parade of pilgrims
carrying green wax candles. If carefully preserved throughout the year, these candles, it is said, will protect the
home from lightning. The same kind of procession with ordinary candles takes place during the Feast of
Assumption on August 15, in the very middle of the dog days, a time when it was again necessary to exorcise the
threat of storms.

Fig. 125.).Toledo, Spain Taken by my sister

Fig. 126.).Toledo, Spain Taken by my sister
Fig. 127.).Toledo, Spain Taken by my sister
The Black Madonna of Montserrat in Spain or that of Rocamadour in the Lot region of france is the focus of
a syncretic worship in which the pagan rite runs parallel to Christian practices. A true heiress of the fairies, the
Black Madonna was earlier confused with wild woman sometimes known as Sarassine. As it happens, French
folklore peddles quite a few legends about Saracens and Sarrasines; because they have allegedly left trace of their
presence in places that were never reached by the Arab invasions, we have to accept that they are mythical
creatures rather than people from the East. On the level of the medieval imaginal realm, then, we must distinguish
the Saracen in whom reappears the fantasy figures of fairies and revenants from the Muslim who reflects
completely different historical realities. In fact, when the literary texts of the Middle Ages bring up Arab
civilization, it is usually in the guise of a mythical and purely imaginary world rather than representational of any
historical or social truth. In this context the Saracen (male and female) is first and foremost a being from the
Otherworld who is marked by his or her inclusion in the dark world of ghosts. This beings survival in Christianity is
testified to by Sarah and all the other Black Madonnas. [540]
Imges of black madonnas may be our most palpable evidence of the persisting memory of the primordial
dark mother of Africa on the continent of Europe, continent, historically associated with the motion of a white
race. After researching images of black madonnas of Italy for a previous book, I discovered that France had many
more than did Italy, that there were black madonnas in spain, Switzerland, Austria, former Czechslovakia, Bulgaria,
Germany, Poland, lands of former Soviet Russia, former Yugoslavia and elsewhere in Europe as well as images of
black madonnas and other dark women divinities throughout the world. Images, we are coming to realize, are
“legitimate systems of signs with which we are provided in order to describe the world.”[541]

503
 In eastern Europe, the black Madonna of Czestochowa is the most well known dark woman divinity. Judy
Matthews visited the black Madonna of Czestochowa at the Jasna Gora Monastery in 1998. “The guide said that
she’d actually brown, not black (interesting, yes?) and it’s because she was a Palestinian (not Jewish, not Israeli,
but a Palestinian) woman, so she d naturally be olive skinned. It was quite an amazing experience seeing the icon
surrounded by believers; they blow trumpets when they unveil her and the energy is very intense. After the icon
was broken during a robbery in th 15th century, the restorers left several slashes on her cheek as a reminder they
had given her wounds of Christ…the Mother cult is so strong in Poland.”
There are many byzantine black madonnas in Italy. In Rome, for example, Madonna del Conforto in S.
Maria Nova dated the 5th or 6th century CE; l’Icona dell’Hodigitria dated 8th century CE in the Pantheon, a favorite
meeting place of Italian feminisits. In Puglia, byzantine dark madonnas are everywhere. The very dark mother in
Carpignano Salentino dated the 10th century symbolizes the significant amalgam in the salentine peninsula of
ancient beliefs and contemporary radical politics.[542]
Rene Descartes, conventionally regarded as the philosopher of masculinist rationalism, brought thanks in
1624 to the black Madonna of Loreto for “having illuminated his philosophic method.” Galileo Galilei, founder of
the scientific method, visited the dark mother in 1618 and again in 1624. So did Robert Montesquieu,
enlightenment philosopher considered to have been concerned to eradicate “superstition.” Michel Montaigne,
French philosopher of “scepticisim,” visitied the dark mother in 1680.
Thinking about these visitors to the black Madonna of Loreto, it seems to me that black madonnas imply a
theory of knowledge based on scientific method and scepticism, both grounded on ultimate belief in the
harmonious universe of the dark mother. Black madonna’s also suggest an epistemology of realism (the ultimate
object of faith is really there). The world view embodied in black madonnas has inspired great art, musicial
masterpieces, and classical works of literature. Caravaggio, powerful realist painter of Italy visited the black
Madonna of Loreto, as did great musical composers Wolfgang Mozart and Johannes Brahms, and Miguel
Cervantes, author of Don Quixote, major classic of Spain. The visit list to the black Madonna of Loreto leads me to
meditate on the unverbalized beliefs in the dark mother of earlier philosophers, artists, musical composers, and
writers beliefs that may not be accessible to our fractured 20th century western world view.
In Spain she is called Mare de Deu, in FranceVierge Noire, and in Italy la Madonna near mother of god,
black virgin, and black Madonna. She had international, national, local, and hidden sanctuaries. At her
international and national sanctuary in Loreto, Italy, 12 masses in English are available to visitors from the United
States, the United Kingdom, the Philippines, and Japan (a guided tour in Japanese is also offered). Twelve masses
in spanish, and 19 in portugese, accommodate not only Iberian but central and south American pilgrims.
International and national pilgrimages to black madonnas at Loreto in Italy, Czestochawz in Poland, Einsiedeln in
Switzerland, and Montserrat in Spain, draw multitudes.
I have tried to categorize black madonnas by country, but black madonnas, and saints associated with
them, are not easily contained with national boundaries. The black Madonna of Monserrat Spain, and saint
Teresa, whom I call saint of dark others, refer to the prehistory and history of Africa and of west Asia, as well as to
the prehistory and history of Spain, whose modern empire stretched across Europe and the new world for 300
years. Not containable in ethnic categories, the image of the black Madonna of Montserrat outside Barcelona,
Spain, for example, is described by an art historian as “a Gothic princess of striking beauty and tenderness.” Gothic
she may be, but she is ebony black and popularly called “la Moreneta,” the little black woman. The title of the
book about her in the Montserrat museum remembers the woman n the Song of Songs. Nigra sum. I am
Black.[543]

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 Marie Durand Lefebvre, exploring legends and stories of black madonnas, said she was led to Africa and
the “Orient” (that curious word that up until recently included Egypt). Classical Graeco Roman writers, she notes
described Isis, Cybele, diana, Hera and Dionysus as black; European icons of black madonnas were often made of
black basalt imported from Egypt. A black Madonna foundin Holland has been traced to Syria. Crusaders did not
mention the color of mother images in the holy lands, according to Durand Lefebvre, because “they may all have
been black.” Exploring the connection between the ancient dark mother and sibyls, she found that a sibyl often
became a benefactress saint. Analyzing the similarity between Christian pilgrimages to black madonnas and
Islamic pilgrimages to the black rock at Meca, Lefebvre noted that black madonnas of Christianity and the black
rock of Islam are popularly considered intermediaries between humans and god.[544]
The Statue of Liberty (Liberty Enlightening the World; French: La Liberté éclairant le monde) is a colossal
neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor in New York City, in the United States. The copper
statue, a gift from the people of France to the people of the United States, was designed by French sculptor
Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi and built by Gustave Eiffel. The statue was dedicated on October 28, 1886.
The Statue of Liberty is a figure of a robed woman representing Libertas, a Roman goddess. She holds a torch
above her head, and in her left arm carries a tabula ansata inscribed in Roman numerals with "JULY IV
MDCCLXXVI" (July 4, 1776), the date of the U.S. Declaration of Independence. A broken chain lies at her feet. The
statue became an icon of freedom and of the United States, and was a welcoming sight to immigrants arriving
from abroad.
Bartholdi was inspired by a French law professor and politician, Édouard René de Laboulaye, who is said to
have commented in 1865 that any monument raised to U.S. independence would properly be a joint project of the
French and American peoples. Because of the post war instability in France, work on the statue did not commence
until the early 1870s. In 1875, Laboulaye proposed that the French finance the statue and the U.S. provide the site
and build the pedestal. Bartholdi completed the head and the torch bearing arm before the statue was fully
designed, and these pieces were exhibited for publicity at international expositions.
The torch bearing arm was displayed at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876, and in Madison
Square Park in Manhattan from 1876 to 1882. Fundraising proved difficult, especially for the Americans, and by
1885 work on the pedestal was threatened by lack of funds. Publisher Joseph Pulitzer, of the New York World,
started a drive for donations to finish the project and attracted more than 120,000 contributors, most of whom
gave less than a dollar. The statue was built in France, shipped overseas in crates, and assembled on the completed
pedestal on what was then called Bedloe's Island. The statue's completion was marked by New York's first ticker
tape parade and a dedication ceremony presided over by President Grover Cleveland.
The statue was administered by the United States Lighthouse Board until 1901 and then by the
Department of War; since 1933 it has been maintained by the National Park Service. Public access to the balcony
around the torch has been barred for safety since 1916.[545]
Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi (French: [fʁedeʁik oɡyst baʁtɔldi]; 2 August 1834 – 4 October 1904) was a
French sculptor who is best known for designing Liberty Enlightening the World, commonly known as the Statue of
Liberty.[546]
The torch is a symbol of enlightenment. The Statue of Liberty's torch lights the way to freedom showing us
the path to Liberty. Even the Statue's official name represents her most important symbol "Liberty Enlightening the
World". The Statue's current replacement torch, added in 1986, is a copper flame covered in 24K gold. It is
reflective of the sun's rays in daytime and lighted by 16 floodlights at night. The original torch was removed in
1984 and is currently inside the lobby of the monument.(Bonus)

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Fig. 128.). Statue of Liberty
Fig. 129.). Miniature of the Queen of Sheba from a manuscript of the Bellifortis by Konrad Kyeser, early 15th
century. Göttingen Niedersächsische Staats und Universitätsbibliothek
720: Ms Liberty Enlightening the World is a Black Madonna. She is the largest Black Madonna to ever exist, to my
knowledge. She is made of copper, which is brown. To seal the deal copper alchemically is the metal for the planet
venus. To overtly seal the deal I was born on the same day as the man who designed the Statue of Liberty. When
it comes to tribal Africa there are many links to France. The most notable is Mount Afrique located In France. The
metaphysics here is, when the Merovingian Empire collapsed. The Frankish empire rose with King Dagobert bring
Egyptian sciences most like to France from Ireland by way of Scotland. It’s a long shot, but a good assumption. Not
to foget that Our Lady Liberty has chains at her feet which may be commemorating the African slave trade. Ive
seen white women in the stauts of slavery in paintings but never in chains.
The woman individually with child is a strong sign of independence and defiance with in the same notion.
It could also be a sign of bad decision making skills, in which now good decision skills have to be made in order to
survive. Shes had to teach herself by trial and error in order to survive. She chose a weak male who wanst a lover
and now she is in the search of strength and dominance at its highest level. She is prepared to submit to the witch
hunter who can extract the witch out of her without her agreeing. She doesn’t want to make decisions anymore.
She wants decisions to be made for her, that way if something fucks up you take the fault and she remains perfect
in her continuance of talking shit which will further emasculate you and thicken the line of sex which allows her to
not be dominated. Dominate your woman men and do it for America, Our Lady Liberty demands the pussy gets
sucked, fucked and loved on. When you submit to a woman in essence you have cut your cock off. I almost forgot
to mention that the Statue of Liberty is facing South East, from her location she is facing Africa.

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 Important early studies of dark images in France were done by Marie Durand Lefebvre (1937), Emile
Saillens (1945), and Jacques Huynen (1972). The first notable study of the origin and meaning of the Black
Madonnas in English appears to have been presented by Leonard Moss at a meeting of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science on December 28, 1952. Moss broke the images into three categories: (1) dark
brown or black Madonnas with physiognomy and skin pigmentation matching that of the indigenous population;
(2) various art forms that have turned black as a result of certain physical factors such as deterioration of lead
based pigments, accumulated smoke from the use of votive candles, and accumulation of grime over the ages, and
(3) residual category with no ready explanation.

List of Black Madonnas

Africa
• Algeria, Algiers: "Our Lady of Africa"
• Senegal, Popenguine: "Notre Dame de la Délivrance",
• South Africa, Soweto: "The Black Madonna",
Asia
The Philippines
• Antipolo, Rizal: Nuestra Señora de la Paz y Buen Viaje de Antipolo (Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage of
Antipolo)
• Ermita, City of Manila: Nuestra Señora de Guia (Our Lady of Guidance)
• Lapu Lapu, Cebu: Nuestra Señora de la Regla (Our Lady of the Rule)
• Naga, Camarines Sur: Nuestra Señora de Peñafrancia (Our Lady of Peñafrancia)
• Piat, Cagayan: Nuestra Señora de la Visitación de Piat (Our Lady of Piat)
Europe
Belgium
• Brugge, "Our Lady of Regla"
• Brussels : "De Zwerte Lieve Vrouwo", St. Catherine Church
• Halle (Flemish Brabant) : Sint Martinusbasiliek
• Liège: La Vierge Noire d'Outremeuse,
• Lier: Onze lieve vrouw ter Gratien
• Scherpenheuvel Zichem: Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel
• Tournai: Our Lady of Flanders in Tournai Cathedral
• Verviers: "Black Virgin of the Recollects", Notre Dame des Récollets Church,
• Walcourt: (Notre Dames de Walcourt)
Croatia
• Marija Bistrica: Our Lady of Bistrica, Queen of Croatia
Czech Republic
• Brno: Assumption of Virgin Mary Minor Basilica, St Thomas's Abbey, Brno
• Prague: The Madonna of Breznice; The Black Madonna in the Church Our Lady Under the Chain; The Black
Madonna on the House of the Black Madonna.
France
• Aix en Provence, (Bouches du Rhône): Notre Dame des Graces, Cathédrale Saint Sauveur d'Aix
• Arconsat: (Notre Dame des Champs)
• Aurillac, (Cantal): Notre Dame des Neiges

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• Beaune: Our Lady of Beaune
• Besançon: Our Lady de Gray
• Besse et Saint Anastaise,(Puy de Dôme): Saint André Church, Notre Dame de Vassivière
• Bourg en Bresse,(Ain): 13th century
• Chartres,(Eure et Loir): crypt of the Cathedral of Chartres, Notre Dame de Sous Terre
• Clermont Ferrand, (Puy de Dôme)
• Cusset: the Black Virgin of Cusset
• Dijon, (Côte d'Or)
• Douvres la Délivrande, Basilique Notre Dame de la Délivrande, "Notre Dame de la Délivrande"
• Dunkerque, (Nord) : Chapelle des Dunes
• Guingamp, (Côtes d'Armor): Basilica of Notre Dame de Bon Secours.
• La Chapelle Geneste, (Haute Loire: Notre Dame de La Chapelle Geneste
• Laon,(Aisne): Notre Dame Cathedral, statue of 1848
• Le Havre,(Seine Maritime): statue near the Graville Abbey (Abbaye de Graville)
• Le Puy en Velay: In 1254 when passing through on his return from the Holy Land Saint Louis IX of France
gave the cathedral an ebony image of the Blessed Virgin clothed in gold brocade (Notre Dame du Puy). It
was destroyed during the Revolution, but replaced at the Restoration with a copy that continues to be
venerated.
• Liesse Notre Dame, (Aisne): Notre Dame de Liesse, statue destroyed in 1793, copy of 1857
• Marseille,(Bouches du Rhône): Notre Dame de Confession,[17] Abbey of St. Victor ; Notre Dame
d'Huveaune, Saint Giniez Church
• Mauriac, Cantal: Notre Dame des Miracles
• Mende, (Lozère) : Cathedral (Basilique cathédrale Notre Dame et Saint Privat de Mende)
• Menton, (Alpes Maritimes): St. Michel Church
• Meymac Abbey, (Corrèze)
• Molompize: Notre Dame de Vauclair
• Mont Saint Michel: Notre Dame du Mont Tombe
• Myans, (Savoie)
• Quimper,(Finistère): Eglise de Guéodet, nommée encore Notre Dame de la Cité
• Riom,(Puy de Dôme): Notre Dame du Marthuret
• Rocamadour, (Lot): Our Lady of Rocamadour
• Sainte Marie (Réunion) : Black Virgin River Rains (fr)
• Saintes Maries de la Mer (Camarque) Avignon: Annual Gypsy festival celebrating Sara, the patron saint of
Gypsys
• Soissons (Aisne): statue of the 12th century
• Tarascon, (Bouches du Rhône): Notre Dame du Château
• Thuret,(Puy de Dôme)
• Toulouse: The basilica Notre Dame de la Daurade in Toulouse, France had housed the shrine of a Black
Madonna. The original icon was stolen in the fifteenth century, and its first replacement was burned by
Revolutionaries in 1799 on the Place du Capitole. The icon presented today is an 1807 copy of the fifteenth
century Madonna. Blackened by the hosts of candles, the second Madonna was known from the sixteenth
century as Our Lady La Noire.[26]
• Tournemire, Château d'Anjony, Our Lady of Anjony

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 • Vaison la Romaine, (Vaucluse): statue on a hill
• Vichy, (Allier): Saint Blaise Church
Germany
• Altötting (Bavaria): Gnadenkapelle (Chapel of the Miraculous Image)
• Beilstein (Rhineland Palatinate): Karmeliterkirche St. Joseph
• Bielefeld (North Rhine Westphalia)
• Düsseldorf Benrath (North Rhine Westphalia): Pfarrkirche St. Cäcilia
• Hirschberg an der Bergstraße (Baden Württemberg): Wallfahrtskirche St. Johannes Baptist
• Schloss Hohenstein, Upper Franconia (Bavaria)
• Köln (Nord Rhein Westfalen): St. Maria in der Kupfergasse
• Ludwigshafen Oggersheim (Rhineland Palatinate): Schloss und Wallfahrtskirche Mariä Himmelfahrt
(Ludwigshafen)
• Mainau (Baden Württemberg): Schlosskirche St. Marien
• Munich (Bavaria): Theatine Church; St. Boniface's Abbey
• Rastatt (Baden Württemberg): Einsiedelner Kapelle
• Regensburg (Bavaria): Regensburg Cathedral
• Remagen (Rhineland Palatinate): Kapelle Schwarze Madonna
• Spabrücken (Rhineland Palatinate)
• Stetten ob Lontal, Niederstotzingen (Baden Württemberg)
• Windhausen in Boppard Herschwiesen (Rhineland Palatinate)
• Wipperfürth (North Rhine Westphalia): St. Johannes, Kreuzberg
• Wuppertal Beyenburg (North Rhine Westphalia)
Hungary
• Szeged: Saint Nicholas Serbian Orthodox Church, Szeged
St. Matthew's Church
Ireland
• Dublin (Leinster): Our Lady of Dublin in Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church
Italy
• Biella (Piedmont): Black Virgin of Oropa, sanctuary of Oropa
• Canneto Valley near Settefrati (Lazio): Madonna di Canneto
• Casale Monferrato (Piedmont): Our Lady of Crea. In the hillside Sanctuary at Crea (Santuario di Crea), a
cedar wood figure, said to be one of three Black Virgins brought to Italy from the Holy Land c. 345 by St.
Eusebius.
• Castelmonte, Prepotto (Friuli Venezia Giulia)
• Loreto (Marche): Basilica della Santa Casa
• Naples (Campania): Santuario Basilica SS Carmine Maggiore
• Positano (Campania): Located in the church of Santa Maria Assunta, the story of how it got there—sailors
shouting "Posa, posa!" ("Put it down, put it down!")—gave the town its name.
• San Severo (Apulia): "La Madonna del Soccorso" (The Madonna of Succor), St. Severinus Abbot and Saint
Severus Bishop Faeto. Statue in gold garments, object of a major three day festival that attracts over
350,000 people to this small town. The infant Jesus is white.
• Seminara (Calabria): Maria Santissima dei poveri
• Tindari (Sicily): Our Lady of Tindari

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 • Venice (Veneto): Madonna della Salute, Santa Maria della Salute
• Viggiano (Basilicata)
Kosovo
• Vitina Letnica: Church of the Black Madonna, where Mother Teresa is believed to have heard her calling.
Lithuania
• Vilnius: Our Lady of the Gate of Dawn
Luxembourg
• Esch sur Sûre
• Luxembourg: Luxembourg Grund
Macedonia
• Kališta, Monastery: Madonna icon in the Nativity of Our Most Holy Mother of God church
• Ohrid, Church: Madonna with the child
Malta
• Ħamrun: Our Lady of Atoċja, a medieval painting brought to Malta by a merchant in the year 1630,
depicting a statue found in Atocha, a parish in Madrid, Spain, and widely known as Il Madonna tas Samra.
(This can mean 'tanned Madonna', 'brown Madonna', or 'Madonna of Samaria'.)
Poland
• Częstochowa: Our Lady of Czestochowa
o In the United States, the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa, in Doylestown, Pennsylvania
houses a reproduction of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa. a second shrine to Our Lady of
Częstochowa is located near Eureka, Missouri.
Portugal
• Nazaré (Oeste Subregion): Nossa Senhora da Nazaré; see: the legend of Nazaré
Romania
• Ghighiu: Maica Domnului Siriaca Manastirea Ghighiu
• Cacica: Madona Neagra Biserica Cacica
• Bucuresti: Madona Neagra Biserica Dichiu
Russia
• Kostroma (Kostroma Oblast): Theotokos of St. Theodore also known as Our Lady of St. Theodore
(Федоровская Богоматерь), in Theophany Monastery
Our Lady of Wladimir 12th century. Russia
Serbia
• Apatin (Vojvodina): Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Church
Slovenia
• Koprivna, Črna na Koroškem: St. Anne's Church, Koprivna—the altar of Black Madonna
Spain
• Andújar (Province of Jaén): Nuestra Señora de la Cabeza (Our Lady of Cabeza), named after the mountain,
Cerro de la Cabeza or Cerro de Cabezo.
• Chipiona (Province of Cádiz): La Virgen de Regla or Nuestra Señora de Regla (Our Lady of Regla or the
Virgin of Regla), considered by some as the custodian of the Rule of Saint Augustine
• Coria (Province of Cáceres): Virgen de Argeme (Our Lady of Argeme)
• El Puerto de Santa María (Province of Cádiz): Virgen de los Milagros (The Virgin of the Miracles)
• Guadalupe (Province of Cáceres): Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe (Our Lady of Guadalupe, Extremadura)

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 • Jerez de la Frontera (Province of Cádiz): Nuestra Señora de la Merced (Our Lady Of Mercy)
• Madrid (Community of Madrid): Nuestra Señora de Atocha (Our Lady of Atocha)
• Lluc, Majorca (Balearic Islands): Mare de Déu de Lluc (Our Lady of Lluc), Lluc Monastery
• Monistrol de Montserrat (Catalonia): Mare de Déu de Montserrat (Virgin of Montserrat) or "La Moreneta"
in the Benedictine abbey of Santa Maria de Montserrat
• Ponferrada (Province of León): Virgen de la Encina (Our Lady of the Holm Oak)
• Salamanca (Province of Salamanca): Virgen de la Peña de Francia (The Virgin of France's Rock, named after
the local mountain called Peña de Francia)
• Santiago de Compostela (Galicia): ...
• Tenerife (Canary Islands): Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria (Virgin of Candelaria), or "La Morenita"
• Toledo (Province of Toledo): Virgen Morena (Dark Virgin), statue of La Esclavitud de Nuestra Señora del
Sagrario in the Cathedral of Toledo (Catedral Primada de Santa María) (The Enslavement of Our Lady of the
Tabernacle)
• Torreciudad (Huesca): Our Lady of Torreciudad etc.
Switzerland
• Einsiedeln (Canton of Schwyz): Our Lady of the Hermits
• Sonogno, Valle Verzasca (Canton of Ticino): Santa Maria Loretana
• Uetikon upon Lake (Canton of Zürich): Catholic Church Saint Francis of Assisi
• Metzerlen Mariastein (Canton of Solothurn): Mariastein Abbey
• Ascona (Canton of Ticino): Black Chapel
• Lugano (Canton of Ticino): Chiesa di Santa Maria di Loreto
Turkey
• Three icons portraying the Theotokos with black skin survived in Turkey to the present day, one of which is
housed in the church of Halki theological seminary.
Ukraine
• Tsarytsya Karpat (Hoshiv Monastery): The Queen of the Carpathian Land
United Kingdom
• St Mary Willesden (Our Lady of Willesden): The original Shrine of Our Lady of Willesden. Website
The Americas
Brazil
• Aparecida,(São Paulo): Our Lady of Aparecida or Our Lady Appeared (Nossa Senhora Aparecida or Nossa
Senhora da Conceição Aparecida) in the Basilica of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida
Chile
• Andacollo,(Elqui Province): La Virgen Morena (Spanish for The Brunette Virgin)
Costa Rica
• Cartago,(Cartago Province): Basílica de Nuestra Señora de los Ángeles (Our Lady of the Angels Basilica)
Cuba
• Regla,(Havana Province): Nuestra Señora de Regla (Spanish for Our Lady of Regla)
Trinidad and Tobago
 Siparia: La Divina Pastora[547]

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Fig. 458.). Oil painting on canvas, Sibylla Aegyptia, Italian School, 18th century. A woman reading a book and
holding a scroll in her left hand.
Fig. 459.). Johan Boeckhorst Portrait of the Libyan Sibyl, Symbol of the South Wind Netherlands (1630) Oil on panel
Noordelijk Scheepvaartmuseum
Fig. 460.). Libyan Sybil by Guidoccio Cozzarelli 1482

Fig. 461.). Pope Francis and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI kneals in pray together in front of the Black Madonna
Fig. 462.). Our Lady of the Gate of Dawn (Lithuanian: Aušros Vartų Dievo Motina, Polish: Matka Boska
Ostrobramska, Belarusian: Маці Божая Вастрабрамская) is the prominent painting of the Blessed Virgin Mary
venerated by the faithful in the Chapel of the Gate of Dawn in Vilnius, Lithuania.Ostrabrama prayer

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Fig. 463.). Pope John Paul II bows Black jesus
Fig. 464.). Pope John Paul II visited Angola, bends the knee in submission and prays to the Black Jesus

The Black Saints

St. Benedict the Moor
The face of St. Benedict the Moor (d. 1589) likewise shone with a celestial light, especially when he was in
chapel. As the son of African slaves, hwe was granted his freedom and joined the Franciscan Order at Palermo,
where he was employed as a cook. It was quietly whispered about that Angels were seen assisting him in the
kitchen and that, moreover, food seemed to multiply miraculously under his hands. He has been chosen as patron
by the blacks of North America and is regarded as the protector of the town Palermo. Saint Benedict: Black
Celebrity Healer, Chef and possibly Lion Tamer. [548]
Saint Benedict, known as Benedetto il Moro or Benedict the Moor, was born to two black African slaves in
Messina, Sicily in 1524. He was also variously called niger, which means black, and ethiops, which means Sub
Saharan African. If I know the Sicilians, they probably called him “Chinese” half the time, too – they’re pretty vague
that way.
Sicily was ruled by the Spanish in those days, who engaged in slave trading. When Southern Europe had
been ruled by the Africans, they had white European slaves, so I think the Spanish were keen to turn the tables on
them. Much of Spain was governed by the Africans for 800 years, and the Spanish had a very difficult and long war
when they eventually rose up against them to regain their independence.

513
 Benedetto and his parents were freed at his birth because of their “loyal service,” but they stayed –
loyally! – on the same estate, working for meagre wages. Benedetto had a little brother and two younger sisters.
The children worked alongside their parents and received no schooling. Benedetto never learned to read or write.
Benedetto was noticed as a caring and generous boy from an early age. He always shared food and what little he
had with those less fortunate than himself.

Fig. 465.). St. Benedict the Moor (1526 1589)

Fig. 466.). St. Benedict the Moor Catholic Church
When he was 21 years old, he suffered a racist attack while out in town. His attackers shouted insults and
generally showed themselves to be very small minded. Meanwhile Benedetto’s dignity and restraint attracted the
admiration of a great many onlookers. Among them were some monks from the Hermitage of Santa Domenica in
Caronia, close to where he lived, who invited him to join them.
The idea of living in a hermitage is that you sneak off and shun society, of course. With Benedetto around,
the place was flooded with visitors begging him to perform a miracle for them. He performed some feats of
miraculous healing, apparently, which only encouraged more visitors. The place ended up like this:
I’m pretty sure this bloke can’t actually perform miracles/ The other hermits got so fed up with their hermitage not
being hermitty any more that they kicked him out.
Luckily he fell in with some religious hermits who lived on Monte Pellegrino on the outskirts of Palermo,
who invited him to join them. Surely that would be remote enough for him to get away from his fans?
Portrait of Saint Benedetto. Monte Pellegrino means “Pilgrim Mountain” and it seems to have been swarming with
religious hermits back in medieval times. Saint Rosalia dashed up there as a little girl in the 12th century and hung
out in caves. Benedetto lived up there with his band of cave dwelling hermits for 20 years. Nowadays it is covered
in flowering shrubs and inhabited by birds and lots of little darting lizards, but back then there were bears and
lions. It was not a camp site for the faint hearted.
Apparently even the lions didn’t deter Benedetto’s fan club, which consisted of all kinds of big cheeses in
the Catholic church who trekked up there to ask his advice before making important decisions. Benedetto
eventually became the leader of his little mountain band.
Portrait of a lion.
In 1564, when Benedetto was 50 years old, the pope ordered that independent hermits had to join an
existing order of friars. Benedetto took his band of holy mountaineers to the Franciscan Friary of St Mary of Jesus

514
in Palermo. Since he was illiterate, and a layman rather than a priest, he was sent to work in the kitchens. Since so
many people still came to him for spiritual guidance however – not just from the friary, but famous and important
outsiders, too – he was promoted to being Master of the Novices and then Guardian of the community.
He was very good at making predictions, apparently. Benedetto predicted that plague would come to
Palermo in 1624, exactly 100 years after his birth. He said that the bones of Saint Rosalia would be found up on
Monte Pellegrino, where she had lived her life as a religious hermit just as he had lived the first half of his life, and
that when the city gave her bones a Christian burial, she would stop the plague and be made patron saint of
Palermo. Portrait of Saint Rosalia, making the camping in a cave on a lion infested mountainside lifestyle look like a
bed of roses
This prediction came true, and this is why the little statue of Saint Benedetto in my photos was placed in
the grotto of Saint Rosalia on Monte Pellegrino. Benedetto also correctly predicted the exact day and time that he
himself was going to die: April 4th, 1589. His body is still in the Friary, displayed very creepily in a Snow White style
glass coffin. On 4th April each year, the coffin coffin is taken out in a religious procession in his honour around
town. Saint Benedetto’s actual body in its glass coffin… like Snow White! except not.

Fig. 467.). Saint Benedetto’s actual body in its glass coffin

Many citizens of Palermo make pilgrimages up Monte Pellegrino in September. Whilst making offerings
and saying prayers to Saint Rosalia herself, the patron saint of Palermo, they also remember Saint Benedetto, who
gave so many people spiritual guidance in the past.[549]
720: Saint Benedict The Moor, I think is the only black incorruptible saint. I could be wrong. His story is linked to
African Americans and also the experiences of racism. He is also the patron saint over black celebrities who may
be given the catholic sceiences because of the echelon of existance they now live on. It is very clear by now that
the church knows a thing or two about time and the secrets to existence that is nowt being shared wit the world.
But, in totality this mentality of restricting secrets form the masses predates the church by a millennia. So they are
basically playing by “the rules”. He is the saint of African Americans and also the city Palermo, Italy.

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Fig. 468.). Linaioli Tabernacle St John the Evangelist c. 1433 Tempera on panel Museo di San Marco, Florence
Fig. 469.). St Nicholas of Zarazsk, Kirillo Belozersky Monastery (16th Century)St Nicholas of Zarazsk, Kirillo
Belozersky Monastery
Fig. 470.). Andrei Rublev ~ Saint John Chrysostom, 1408

Fig. 471.). St Flour Black Christ

Fig. 472.). Saint Martin de Porres Statue from the Dominican church of Nuestra Señora de Atocha in Madrid
Fig. 473.). St Peter 17th century

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Fig. 474.). Master of the Gereon Altar Marienaltar aus St. GereonGermany (c. 1420 30)
Fig. 475.). Caspar the Black King of Germany (Moorish Man)
Fig. 476.). Saint Angus (Oengus, Aengus) of Keld, Hermit, Abbot, Bishop (died 824)

Fig. 477.). Didn’t believe this could get any darker version of the Gero Cross. 965–970,
Fig. 478.). The Black Christ of Portobelo
Fig. 479.). (ITALY) SaInt Calocerus (AKA Calogero) a 2nd Century Christian martyr.

517
Fig. 480.). Saint Francis of Assisi An Exorcist of Demons
Fig. 481.). Saint Andrew

Fig. 482.). A Russian icon of St. Vsevolod Of Pskov, Central Russia, 18th century.
Fig. 483.). Real Constantine with St. helen. 27 February c. 272 AD – 22 May 337 AD, also known as Constantine I or
Saint Constantine, Roman Emperor from 306 to 337 AD.

518
Fig. 484.). Prester John Il prete Ianni, Re d'Ethiopia. Priest John (Prester John) continued for centuries what still
capture the imagination throughout Europe. Until the eighteenth century in Europe you find Heroic portraits of
him.

519
Prester John (Latin: Presbyter Johannes) is a legendary Christian patriarch and king popular in European chronicles
and tradition from the 12th through the 17th centuries. He was said to rule over a Nestorian (Church of the East)
Christian nation lost amid the Muslims and pagans of the Orient, in which the Patriarch of the Saint Thomas
Christians resided. The accounts are varied collections of medieval popular fantasy, depicting Prester John as a
descendant of the Three Magi, ruling a kingdom full of riches, marvels, and strange creatures.
At first, Prester John was imagined to reside in India; tales of the Nestorian Christians' evangelistic success
there and of Thomas the Apostle's subcontinental travels as documented in works like the Acts of Thomas
probably provided the first seeds of the legend. After the coming of the Mongols to the Western world, accounts
placed the king in Central Asia, and eventually Portuguese explorers convinced themselves that they had found
him in Ethiopia.
Prester John had been considered the ruler of India since the legend's beginnings, but "India" was a vague
concept to the Europeans. Writers often spoke of the "Three Indias", and lacking any real knowledge of the Indian
Ocean, they sometimes considered Ethiopia one of the three. Westerners knew that Ethiopia was a powerful
Christian nation, but contact had been sporadic since the rise of Islam. No Prester John was to be found in Asia, so
European imagination moved him around the blurry frontiers of "India" until it found an appropriately powerful
kingdom for him in Ethiopia. Evidence has suggested that locating Prester John's kingdom in Ethiopia entered the
collective consciousness around 1250.
Marco Polo had discussed Ethiopia as a magnificent Christian land and Orthodox Christians had a legend
that the nation would one day rise up and invade Arabia, but they did not place Prester John there. Then in 1306,
30 Ethiopian ambassadors from Emperor Wedem Arad came to Europe, and Prester John was mentioned as the
patriarch of their church in a record of their visit. Another description of an African Prester John is in the Mirabilia
Descripta of Dominican missionary Jordanus, around 1329. In discussing the "Third India", Jordanus records a
number of fanciful stories about the land and its king, whom he says Europeans call Prester John.[550]

Fig. 485.). St Basil, from triptych with Christ, St Basil the Great and St Blaise triptych painting icon 19thC Russia.
The Trustees of the British Museum
Fig. 486.). The Life of Saint Cyprian of Carthage
Fig. 486A.). Nahum was a minor prophet whose prophecy is recorded in the Hebrew Bible.

520
Fig. 487.). Grunewald, Matthias (1470c. 1528) Meeting of St. Erasmus and St. Maurice (Alte Pinakothek, Munich)
St Maurice, pictured with St. Elmo, was a black patron saint of the Holy Roman Empire, who was the Knight
Commander of the famous Roman Theban Legion
A companion Black Virgins, is St. Maurice (Maurus=Moorish,black; Maurs=Mars) to whom one prays to be
delivered from unwanted parents.[551]

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 St. Columba of Cordoba, the great centre of eastern Jewry in Arabic Spain, was a nun beheaded by the
Moors in 853. Her feast day, 17 September, coincides with that of St. Hildegard of Bingen, ‘the Sibyl of the Rhine,
who corresponded at length with St. Bernard. The following day belongs to st. Thomas of Villeneuve of Villanova,
who curiously has a second feast on 22 September. That is also the feast of St. Maurice (who has his individual
feast on 21 July, the day before the Magdalen) and his companions, including Ursu (‘bear’) and Victor. Mauric, a
Manichaean from Egypt, held the spear of Longinus until his dying breath to keep it from the Emperor Maximian.
The spear of destiny is the masculine complement to the Holy Grail. Following Maurices example 6,666 legionaries
died with him,without offering resistance. Thomas of Villeneuve, with whose Sisters the Black Virgin of Paris
resides, cares especially for lostchildren and was bishop of the grail city of Valencia. His views on the encounter of
the Magdalen with the risen Christ are identical to those of St. Bernard. He shares his first feast with St.
Methodius of TYre (city of King Hiram, master mason of the Tmple) or of Olympus (abode of the gods), who wrote
a hymn to Christ as bridegroom of the Church. 19 September sees the feast of St. Jauarius of the famous liquefying
holy blood, once preserved at Monte Vergine (qv), which is the pride of Naples (qv), fief of the Anjou dynasty. The
2 following days belong respectively to the wild huntsman St. Eustace, patron of Madrid, whose relics are at St.
Denis, and St. Maura, a dark lady from Troyes. 21 September is, however, better known as the feast of St.
Matthew, author of Christs genealogy.[552]
The dove (colombe), the symbol of both Venus and the Holy Spirit, is the bird which brought La sainte
ampoule, the vessel that contained the oil used to anoint the Kings of France. In astronomy the constellation
Columba flies just ahead of the ship Argo. Joseph is chosen by Mary among a host of suitors, when a dove flies
from his rod and lands on his head.[553]

Fig. 488.). 16th century depiction of a dark skinned King Solomon from Vologda, Russia
Fig. 489.). Coburg Moor - Germany The black nobility of medieval Europe, including Germany. Whites overthrew
the black rulers of Europe around 1848
Fig. 490.). Georges Lallemand; formerly attributed to Claude Vignon Adoration of the Magi France (1630)

522
Fig. 491.). St. Augustine of Hippo 354-430 a.d.
Fig. 492.). Russian Orthodox icon of the Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian, 18th century (Iconostasis of
Transfiguration Church, Kizhi Monastery, Karelia, Russia)
Fig. 493.). Saint Angus (Oengus, Aengus) of Keld, Hermit, Abbot, Bishop (died 824)

Fig. 494.). Artist unknown. In the style of Adrei Rublev, 1360-1427 Theophanese the Greek, born 1330s died 1405
Fig. 495.). Andre Brustolon Black Warrior Italy (c. 1715)
Fig. 496.). Very Rare image of Henry II (972 1024) King of Italy and Germany also Holy Roman Emperor during the
time of the Ottonian Dynasty. From the Sacramentary of Henry II (1002 1014)

523
Fig. 497.). Philip II, 21 May 1527 – 13 September 1598 was King of Spain 2nd Philip to Castille, 1st to Aragon and Fi
the fourth to Navarre, from 1556 and of Portugal from 1581 as Philip I.
Fig. 498.). Frederick I Barbarossa (1122 – 10 June 1190) was a German Holy Roman Emperor. He was elected King
of Germany at Frankfurt on 4 March 1152 King of Italy in Pavia in 1155, and finally crowned Roman Emperor by
Pope Adrian IV
Fig. 499.). John VIII, Palaiologos (1392-1448), Moorish Emperor of the Byzantine Empire

Fig. 500.). 18th century Russian Icon of the Prophet Elijah (Ahlayah)
Fig. 501.). The Festival of San Calogero

524
Fig. 502.). Seventh ecumenical council Nicea

525
Fig. 503.). The council of nicea

526
 The tradition recorded by Orderic Vital contains a composite of both pagan and Christian elements. A
Christian patina covers the most authentically pagan motifs, and this Christianization of the myth is obvious. The
appearance of the tormented sinners brings to mind a kind of ambulant purgatory in which the guilty souls are
forced to suffer punishment for their earthly crimes.
Yet this Christian dimension is not strong enough to erase the pagan substratum. The presence of dark
skinned “Ethiopians” exposes the actual appearance of fairylike, demonic creatures of a mythical blackness. They
are in fact the incarnation of revenant, a medieval literary or hagiographic representation of beings of the
Otherworld.[554]
A revenant is a visible ghost or animated corpse that is believed to have revived from death to haunt the
living. The word revenant is derived from the Latin word reveniens, "returning" (see also the related French verb
revenir, meaning "to come back").
Many stories were documented by English historians in the Middle Ages. William of Newburgh wrote
during the 1190s, "It would not be easy to believe that the corpses of the dead should sally (I know not by what
agency) from their graves, and should wander about to the terror or destruction of the living, and again return to
the tomb, which of its own accord spontaneously opened to receive them, did not frequent examples, occurring in
our own times, suffice to establish this fact, to the truth of which there is abundant testimony."
William of Newburgh
William of Newburgh (1136?–1198?) wrote of a number of cases "...as a warning to posterity." He says these
stories were very common and that "were I to write down all the instances of this kind which I have ascertained to
have befallen in our times, the undertaking would be beyond measure laborious and troublesome."
One story involves a man of "evil conduct" absconding from justice, who fled from York and made the ill fated
choice to get married. Becoming jealous of his wife, he hid in the rafters of his bedroom and caught her in an act of
infidelity with a local young man, but then accidentally fell to the floor mortally wounding himself, and died a few
days later. As Newburgh describes:
A Christian burial, indeed, he received, though unworthy of it; but it did not much benefit him: for issuing,
by the handiwork of Satan, from his grave at night time, and pursued by a pack of dogs with horrible barkings, he
wandered through the courts and around the houses while all men made fast their doors, and did not dare to go
abroad on any errand whatever from the beginning of the night until the sunrise, for fear of meeting and being
beaten black and blue by this vagrant monster.
A number of the townspeople were killed by the monster and so:
Thereupon snatching up a spade of but indifferent sharpness of edge, and hastening to the cemetery, they began
to dig; and whilst they were thinking that they would have to dig to a greater depth, they suddenly, before much of
the earth had been removed, laid bare the corpse, swollen to an enormous corpulence, with its countenance
beyond measure turgid and suffused with blood; while the napkin in which it had been wrapped appeared nearly
torn to pieces. The young men, however, spurred on by wrath, feared not, and inflicted a wound upon the
senseless carcass, out of which incontinently flowed such a stream of blood, that it might have been taken for a
leech filled with the blood of many persons. Then, dragging it beyond the village, they speedily constructed a
funeral pile; and upon one of them saying that the pestilential body would not burn unless its heart were torn out,
the other laid open its side by repeated blows of the blunted spade, and, thrusting in his hand, dragged out the
accursed heart. This being torn piecemeal, and the body now consigned to the flames...

527
 In another story Newburgh tells of a woman whose husband recently died. The husband revives from the
dead and comes to visit her at night in her bedchamber and he "...not only terrified her on awaking, but nearly
crushed her by the insupportable weight of his body." This happens for three nights, and the revenant then
repeats these nocturnal visits with other nearby family and neighbours and "...thus become a like serious
nuisance," eventually extending his walks in the broad daylight around the village. Eventually the problem was
solved by the bishop of Lincoln who wrote a letter of absolution, upon which the man's tomb was opened wherein
it was seen his body was still there, the letter was placed on his chest, and the tomb re interred and sealed.
Abbot of Burton
The English Abbot of Burton tells the story of two runaway peasants from about 1090 who died suddenly
of unknown causes and were buried, but:
the very same day in which they were interred they appeared at evening, while the sun was still up,
carrying on their shoulders the wooden coffins in which they had been buried. The whole following night they
walked through the paths and fields of the village, now in the shape of men carrying wooden coffins on their
shoulders, now in the likeness of bears or dogs or other animals. They spoke to the other peasants, banging on the
walls of their houses and shouting "Move quickly, move! Get going! Come!" The villagers became sick and started
dying, but eventually the bodies of the revenants were exhumed, their heads cut off, and their hearts removed,
which ended the spread of the sickness.
Walter Map
The chronicler Walter Map, a Welshman writing during the 12th century, tells of a "wicked man" in
Hereford who revived from the dead and wandered the streets of his village at night calling out the names of those
who would die of sickness within three days. The response by bishop Gilbert Foliot was "Dig up the body and cut
off the head with a spade, sprinkle it with holy water and re inter it".[555]

The Arch Angels

Fig. 504.). Saint Raphael Church @ Calaca, Batangas

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Fig. 505.). St. Raphael the Archangel (Tridentine Rite), the Healer of God, Patron of Travellers and Fishermen.
Image featured is the famed San Rafael of Calaca, Batangas. St. Raphael The Archangel, pray for us!

529
Fig. 506.). San Rafael Arcangel statue w Kordoba, Hiszpania
Fig. 507.). Arcángel URIEL

Fig. 508.). Archangel Gabriel in Budapest Gyorgy Zala (sculptor) – György Zala plaque in Budapest.
Fig. 509.). The Synaxis of the Archangel Gabriel is celebrated on the day after the Annunciation, and a second time
on July 13. It was instituted in the ninth century, perhaps to celebrate the dedication of a church at
Constantinople. Originally, the Feast was observed on October 16.
Fig. 510.). Statue of the Arch Angel Gabriel

530
Fig. 511.). Archangel Michael, protector of Kiev, Ukraine, Independence Square

531
Fig. 512.). The Archangel Michael couldn’t find facts on the statue but it appears to stand somewhat maybe 10 feet
tall.

Fig. 513.). The Archangel Azrael (Azrael might be one of the names of the Archangel of Death1
Fig. 514.). Statue of Lucifer Cathédrale Saint Paul Liège

532
 The BeJewelled Saints

Fig. 515.). Relic of St. Deodatus in Rheinau by Paul Koudounaris

Fig. 516.). St. Friedrich at the Benedictine abbey in Melk

Fig. 517.). Dr Paul Koudounaris – St. Luciana Patronage: The blind; martyrs; Perugia, Italy; Mtarfa, Malta;
epidemics; salesmen, Syracuse, Italy, throat infections, writers

533
Fig. 518.). Dr. Paul Koudounaris – St. Valentine, Hand (Bad Schussenried, Germany)
Fig. 519.). St Maximus in Bürglen, Switzerland, a patron of the poor

Fig. 520.). The decorated skeleton of St. Pancratius (Wil, Switzlerand)

534
Fig. 521.). St. Justina Gutenzell, Germany martyr from the Roman Catacombs (Katakombenheilige)
Fig. 522.). St. Gratien by Toby De Silva

Fig. 523.). Saint Munditia (Mundita) is venerated as a Christian martyr. Her relics are found in a side altar at St.
Peter's Church in Munich
Fig. 524.). Jeweled Skeleton, the bones of St. Clemens, Church of Saints Peter and Paul

535
Fig. 525.). St. Felix, pictured here, arrived in Sursee, Switzerland, in 1761,
Fig. 526.). Dr Paul Koudounaris – St. Valerius

The Catacomb Church’s

In the Roman Campagna there were 43 cemeteries, catacombs, or cubicula, whose names are recorded in
inscriptions, in martrologies, and in the Pontifical Registers used by Anastasius, since republished, with additions,
in various forms, ad repeated in substance by Baronius in his Annals, and Panvinius in his treatist on the
Cemeteries. Aringhi reckons the number at 56, and from the account of Signor de Rossi it appears that the number
is now reckoned at about 60. Th number of general cemeteries is not so large.
The original entrances to the Catacombs were in many instances by subterranean roads or corridors,
sometimes called streets. These corridors, which served as entrances to and passages in the burialplaces, were
originally old arenaria or sand pit roads, from which the Pozzolana sand had been extracted; when this bed of sand
is extracted, the entrance is usually closed. The soft bed of Pzzolana sand was, however, not generally used for
interments, but the harder bed under it, called “tufa granulare.” The different horizontal layers or beds or tufa var
very much in hardness and also in thickness. There are hundreds of miles of old sand pit corridors now ready for
use as burial places of cemeteries, and useless for any other purpose. The use of these would be infinitely
preferable to the recent Roman practice of throwing the bodies of all persons, whose families cannot affod to buy
a piece of land in perpetuity, into a pit, in the same manner as the ancient Romans did the bodies of their slaves.
The galleries in the Campagna are said to extend altogether to between 800 and 900 miles, and the
number of bodies interred in them to have been between 6 and 7 milliions. These are the calculations of Padre
marchi, but the grounds on which they rest are not very satisfactory; there seems to have been a good deal of
conjecture. There is no doubt, however, that they are of enormous extent, and must have contained a very large
number of bodies.
There are 380 pits provided in the burial ground of S. Lorenzo, one of which was opened every night. All
the bodies brought for the interment hat day or night were thrown into it, after being first stripped to the skin by
the officials; and then hot lime was thrown upon them, that they might be thoroughly decayed before the year
536
came round. The mouth of the pit was closed with lime grouting, so that no effluvium could escape, and this
covering was not broken until the pit was wanted to be used again. This custom appears absolutely horrible to
English people, but habit had made the Romans callous to it. It has now quite recently been discounted, but this
custom of using the pits was still in use in 1860.
That the arenaria were considered as burying places in the time of Nero is evident from his exclamation of
horror at the idea of being taken there alive for the purpose of concealment. The arenaria or sand pits are also
mentioned by Cicero in his Oration for Cluentius, where he says that the young Asinius, a citizen of noble family,
was inveigled into one of them and murdered. THis shews they were in use before the Christian era, and there is
every reason to believe that they have been in use ever since limemortar came into use, which is believed to have
been 2 or 3 centureis before that period. The celebrated Pozzolana sand makes the best mortar in the world, from
its gritty nature. THis valuable sand is found to any extent nearly all over the Campagna or Rome, in horizontal
beds or layers between the beds f tufa; some of the tufa itself, which is sandstone, may be scraped into this sand,
but it is easier to take it as ready provided by nature. People once accustomed to the use of this sand cannot do
without it, and hundreds of carts filled with it may be seen daily traversing the Campagna, conveying it either to
Rome, or to Ostia, or to Porto, for exportation. The horizontal layers or beds of this sand are not usually more than
6 feet thick, although they extend at a certain level over the whole surface of the country. It is therefore
excavated in horizontal coridors, with various branches, extending for many miles, undermining the whole surface
of the soil, but not in large or deep pits, so that the name of sand pit is rather deceitful to English people, who
commonly imagine it to be always a large and deep pit to which these roads lead only; this is not always the case,
the roads themselves being excavated in the layer of sand, and frequently themselves the sand pits, Sometimes
there are different layers of sand at different levels, and in some cases there may be 2 sandpit roads one over the
other, with the bed of hard tufa between tthm.
We are told in the Acta Sanctorum that one of the punishments inflicted on the Christiansby Emperor
Maximinus in the 6th persecution, A.D. 235, was digging sand and stone. The martyrs Ciriacus ad Sisnnus are
especially metioned as ordered to be strictly guarded, and compelled to dig sand and to carry it on their own
shoulders.
Some of the catacombs were evidently made under tombs by the side of the road, and in that of S. Calixtus
there are remains of the tomb on the surface of the ground. The burial chapels of the fourth century commonly
found over a catacomb probably replace earlier tombs. The chuch of S. Urban is now considred to have been a
family tomb of the 1st century, made into a church long afterwards.
Many inscriptions are preserved relationg to the preservation of a tomb with the land belonging to it in
perpetuity, and they frequently mention the number of feet along the road and in the field. Thei size varies
enormously. Horace mentions one that was 1,000 ft. by 300ft. The inscription of one dugup in the Via Labicana
gives 1,800 ft. by 500ft.; another was only 24 ft. by 15ft., and another 16ft. square. In the case of one of the larger
tombs belingoing to a family that became Christian, it was easy for them to make a catacomb under it and allow
their fellow Christians to be buried there, or to sell portions of the large space for separate vaults. Many vaults of
16ft. square might be made in the space of 1,800 ft. long by 500 ft. wide, as the one on the Via Labicana. If the
adjoining fielamily, the catacomb might be extended as far as the family property itself extended. THis is the most
probably explanation of the praedium of the Lady Lucina and other Christian martyrs. They were heiresses to
whom such a tomb and meadow belonged. When the space was limited, 3 or 4 stories were excavated in
succession, one under the other, as we see many instances.
The measurements of Michele de Rossi coincide with this in a remarkable manner. He finds the area of
each separate catacomb to be respectively 100, 125, 150, 180, and 250 ft. None of these spaces are at all too large

537
for the area commoly left round a tomb of importance, and the family propert of this areawould extend to any
depth. Each cemetery was complete in itself, but sometimes connected with others by subterranean roads.
The catacomb of SS. SATURNINUS and THRASO, the entrance to which is in the gardnes of the Villa
Gangalani, about a mile from Rome, on the Via Salaria, is stated in a bull of Pope Nicholas IV., A.D. 1290, to have
formed part of the great catacomb of S. Priscilla, the entrance to which is about a quarter of a mile farther from
Rome on the same road. On descending into that of S. Saturninus by a steep flight of steps of modern appearance,
but Perhaps restored only, we soon pass under the road and hear carriages passingover head; we then continue to
descend to the depther of about 50 feet, divided into 5 corridos, only 4 of which can at present be seen; but we
pass the entranceto the 5th on one of the staircases, and see the opening to it. The 2 lower corridors of the
catacomb have tombs or cubicula on the sides; a few of these are painted, and the vault of the corridor in from of
them also. All these paintings seem to be of the 4th century, or later. [556]
The moastery and church of S. Prassede were entirely built of rebuilt in the time of Paschal I., probably
among other objects, in order to receive these relics. It was an offshoot from, and closely connected with, the
monastery and church of S. Pudentiana, the sister of S. Praxedes andin the crypt of that church also a large number
of relics from the Catacombs were re interred. It is probably that the whole of those which then remained in the
catacomb of S. Priscilla, were removed for safety to these 2 churches. Inscriptions in one church state that
3,000martyrs are interred under the altar, and 2,300 in the other. Bosio and Aringhi have a chapter on this
subject, and give the inscriptions. The well in the church of S. Pudentiana probably represents the original well in
the catacomb, as in other instances the Miracle Play repeated every year gradually led the representation to be
mistaken for the original, without an intention to deceive in the first instance; and then, after ages of ignorance, it
is difficult to make people see the real meaning.
It appears that in the 5th and 6th centuries, when the extramural catacombs were going out of use, a large
burial ground was formed in the locality where the church of S. Bibiana was built, and this was another place to
which large quantities of the bones from the Catacombs were transferred. It is mentioned by Cameraris and
Manlius, and is thus described: “Coemeterium ad Usum Pileatum, ad Sanctam Bibianam.” The bones of the
martyrs in the Julian persecution, Flavianus and Fabianus, are said to have been intered here; this is mentioned in
the acts of martyrdom of S. Bibiana, who was herself buried here, with her mother, Dafrosa, and her sister,
Demetria, all martyrs in the same persecution. Inscriptions in the church record that their bodies were found here
in the time of Simplicius, and re interred by Honorius III. And Urban VIII. Their relics were put into a sarcophagus
under the high altar in 1626, and statues made by Bernini. Another inscription states that 5,266 bodies of martyrs
were interred here, exclusive of women and children. These were translated from the catacomb SS. Peter and
Marcellinus. It is stated on another inscription that the holy martyrs, Simplicius, Faustina, and Beatrix, are also
interred here, with 4,257 bodies of saints, besides women and children.
The martyrs Abdon and Sennen are said to have been buried in a leaden coffin by Quirinus, the sub
deacon, in his own house, near amphitheatre, in the time of Claudius, and to have been removed, in that of
Constantine, to the catacomb of S. Pontianus, where the paintings of them now remain; but these are of the 8th
century. Other instances of second interments of martyrs within the city are mentioned, but all on very doubtful
authority, as to the identification of these relics, or the proofs of their being those of martyrs.[557]

538
Fig. 527.). Roman catholic church in Poland

Fig. 528.). The spine-tingling Sedlec Ossuary in the Czech Republic is estimated to hold the remains of
between 40,000 and 70,000 people, many of whom died in the plague in 1318 and during the Hussite Wars in the
15th century.
Fig. 529.). Ossuary Chapel, Alcantarilha, Portugal.
539
Fig. 530.). The Sedlec Ossuary is a small Roman Catholic chapel, located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints,
part of the former Sedlec Abbey in Sedlec, a suburb of Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic.

Fig. 531.). The Ossuary Chapel of San Martino Della Battaglia in Italy

540
Fig. 532.). Schwarzenberg Coat of Arms, In Bones
Fig. 533.). Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini, or Our Lady of the Conception of the Capuchins, is a
church in Rome, Italy, commissioned in 1626 by Pope Urban VIII

Fig. 534.). Bone pillar, Catacombs of Paris

Fig. 535.). San Bernardino alle Ossa is a church in Milan, northern Italy, best known for its ossuary, a small side
chapel decorated with numerous human skulls and bones. In 1210, when an adjacent cemetery ran out of space, a
room was built to hold bones.

541
Fig. 536.). Capuchin Monks mummified in the Crypt; Brno, Czech Republic
Fig. 537.). The Catacombs of Paris are underground ossuaries in Paris, France, which hold the remains of more than
six million people in a small part of a tunnel network built to consolidate Paris' ancient stone mines.

Fig. 538.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo)

Fig. 539.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) 1
Fig. 540.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) 2

Mummified infant: Incredibly, they would often keep the body of an infant and, once it was mummified, they
would dress the baby's body and keep it as a memento. It was the equivalent of the modern day taxidermy of a
treasured pet.

542
Fig. 541.). The Sedlec Ossuary is a small gothic church in Kutna Hora, Czech Republic
Fig. 542.). Capela dos Ossos, Evora, Portugal

Fig. 543.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo )1

Fig. 544.). Catacombs of the Capuchins (Catacombe dei Cappuccini) (Palermo) 2

543
Fig. 545.). San Pietro in Vincol. Solferino, Italy. The Ossuary Chapel of Solferino.

544
Fig. 546.). Skulls in Lima Catacombs (Rímac, Peru)
Fig. 547.). Our Lady of the Conception of the Capuchins and Santa Maria della Concezione.

Fig. 548.). Convento de SanFrancisco is the Spanish name for Saint Francis Monastery located in Lima, Peru
Fig. 549.). Monk praying in the Catacombs of Rome, 1897

545
Fig. 550.). Our Lady of the Conception of the Capuchins and Santa Maria della Concezione.
Fig. 551.).The Chapel of Bones (Capela dos Ossos), Campo Maior, Portugal

Fig. 552.). The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo are burial catacombs in Palermo, Sicily, southern Italy, underneath
the Capuchin Monastery.
Fig. 553.). The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo are burial catacombs in Palermo, Sicily, southern Italy.

Fig. 554.). La Chiesa dei Morti, The Church of the Dead, is located in Urbania in Italy. Inside lies the Cemetery of the
Mummies, which was built in 1833.
Fig. 555.). Catacombs of Paris Prayer Room

546
Fig. 556.). The Chapel of Bones (Capela dos Ossos), Campo Maior, Portugal

Martyrs
William Tyndale (/ˈtɪndəl/; sometimes spelled Tynsdale, Tindall, Tindill, Tyndall; c. 1494 – c. 6 October
1536) was an English scholar who became a leading figure in Protestant reform in the years leading up to his
execution. He is well known for his translation of the Bible into English. He was influenced by the work of
Desiderius Erasmus, who made the Greek New Testament available in Europe, and by Martin Luther. A number of
partial translations had been made from the seventh century onward, but the spread of Wycliffe's Bible in the late
14th century led to the death penalty for anyone found in unlicensed possession of Scripture in English—though
translations were available in all other major European languages.
Tyndale's translation was the first English Bible to draw directly from Hebrew and Greek texts, the first
English translation to place God's name [Jehovah] in its rightful place, the first English translation to take
advantage of the printing press, and first of the new English Bibles of the Reformation. It was taken to be a direct
challenge to the hegemony of both the Roman Catholic Church and the laws of England maintaining the church's
position. In 1530, Tyndale also wrote The Practyse of Prelates, opposing Henry VIII's annulment of his own
marriage on the grounds that it contravened Scripture.
Reuchlin's Hebrew grammar was published in 1506. Tyndale worked in an age in which Greek was available
to the European scholarly community for the first time in centuries. Erasmus compiled and edited Greek Scriptures
following the Fall of Constantinople in 1453. Constantinople's fall helped to fuel the Renaissance and led to the
dispersion of Greek speaking intellectuals and texts into a Europe which previously had no access to them.

547
 Fig. 557.). William Tyndale, Protestant reformer and Bible translator. Portrait from Foxe's Book of Martyrs.

A copy of Tyndale's The Obedience of a Christian Man fell into the hands of Henry VIII, providing the king
with the rationale to break the Church in England from the Roman Catholic Church in 1534. In 1535, Tyndale was
arrested and jailed in the castle of Vilvoorde (Filford) outside Brussels for over a year. In 1536, he was convicted of
heresy and executed by strangulation, after which his body was burnt at the stake. His dying prayer was that the
King of England's eyes would be opened; this seemed to find its fulfilment just two years later with Henry's
authorisation of the Great Bible for the Church of England, which was largely Tyndale's own work missing sections
supplemented with translations by Miles Coverdale. Hence, the Tyndale Bible, as it was known, continued to play a
key role in spreading Reformation ideas across the English speaking world and, eventually, to the British Empire.
In 1611, the 54 scholars who produced the King James Bible drew significantly from Tyndale, as well as
from translations that descended from his. One estimate suggests that the New Testament in the King James
Version is 83% Tyndale's and the Old Testament 76%. His translation of the Bible was the first to be printed in
English, and became a model for subsequent English translations; in 2002, Tyndale was placed at number 26 in the
BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons.[558]

548
Fig. 558.). Bernat Martorell - Martyrdom of Saint Eulalia
Fig. 559.). Saint Dionysius, detail from The Crucifixion of the Parliament of Paris
Saint Eulalia (Aulaire, Aulazia, Olalla, Eulària) (c. 290–12 February 303), co-patron saint of Barcelona, was a
13-year-old Roman Christian virgin who suffered martyrdom in Barcelona during the persecution of Christians in
the reign of emperor Diocletian (although the Sequence of Saint Eulalia mentions the "pagan king" Maximian).
There is some dispute as to whether she is the same person as Saint Eulalia of Mérida, whose story is similar.
For refusing to recant her Christianity, the Romans subjected her to thirteen tortures; including:
• Putting her into a barrel with knives (or glass) stuck into it and rolling it down a street (according to
tradition, the one now called Baixada de Santa Eulalia "Saint Eulalia's descent").
• Cutting off her breasts
• Crucifixion on an X-shaped cross. She is depicted with this cross, the instrument of her martyrdom.
• Finally, decapitation.(Bonus)

Fig. 560.). Martyrdom of Saints Cosmas and Damian with their Three Brothers
Fig. 561.). All Martyrs Da Costa Hours Illuminated by Simon Bening ca. 1515

549
Fig. 562.). Martyrdom of Saint Hippolytus

720: There are supposedly 1000’s of martyrs but who knows. I know they have millions of bones in the
catacombs, that obvious. So theres some type of evidendce supporting the possibility. In all reality, I think this is
the highest form of serenity. To not care about the stage of life or death. To invite death with no fear. This is the
highest form of self esteem and personal confidence. To know that you will be in a greater place when you die
then this plague ridden hell hole. The key word here is to Know. In actuality they didn’t know where they were
going after death. But their decisions and mind made them think they did.
One of the phrases that’s loosely used in America and apart of our culture is “6 Million ways to
die………choose one”. It is safe to say that the atrocities recorded in Foxes Martytology and in other doctrines are
the basis of where this phrase comes from. The styles of murder were so numerous you minus well say murder
itssef developed into an whole art form. All types of methods were used from boiling with led, frying slowiy on a
pan, hanging upside down on the cross. There are many other forms of slaughter recorded on how this took place.
The majority of the martyrs come out of Roman history not necessarily medieval eventhough they are there.
Some of these stories are so out of synch with our current perception of life that they get shunned because it will
make Europeans look extremely insane. But to the majority, the bone churches will send the same message.
They say during the Medieval times a tomb was found that led them into the already built catacombs. I
want to see the action on how these things are built whicc stretch over 500 miles. Who in the hell dugup all that
dirt? The peasants? Why are you keeping the rottenbodies underground standing up. This is all energy that is
going on here. This is the basis to the fear they impose on other people in the planet. These bones and stories run
throught their cultura systems and emanate in their auras and you sense the horror and are intimidated because
you have not accustomed yourself to such atrocities. The children of today don’t need to witness this type of
activity because the energy is based in the stories they learn, which adjust the thinking.

550
Fig. 563.). Stefan Lochner Martyrdom of the Apostles. 1435

551
Fig. 564.). 552 The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian by Piero Del Pollaiuolo 1475
Fig. 565.). The Martyrdom of Saint Barbara, ca. 1510

Fig. 566.). The Execution of St. Catherine, ca.1409,

Saint Tupac Amaru Shakur (born Lesane Parish Crooks; June 16, 1971 – September 13, 1996), also known by his
stage names 2Pac and Makaveli. Feast Day: April 4th Attributes: The Paisley Bandana, The .45 Cal, The Hawk, The
Horn, Ink, Male Jewelry, The Pit Bull, The Panther, Hennessy Patronage: Penitentary Inmates, Single Mothers,
Young criminals, Hip Hop, Rap, aborted babies, black families, Los Angeles, The Underground Railroad, black
orphans, prostitutes, drug effected families.
552
Fig. 567.). Master of the Holy Kinship, Cologne The Torture of the Maccabean Brothers before 1517

553
 Alchemy, Astrology & Aliens

Fig. 568.). Python (from: Alchemical and Rosicrucian Compendium), ca 1760. Artist: German master

554
Fig. 569.). Johann Homann map (1730) of the decadent medieval German mythological utopia of
Schlaraffenland

555
Fig. 570.). Biserica Manastirii, or Church of the Dominican Monastery, in the town of Sighisoara, Romania.
Fig. 571.). 1561 celestial phenomenon over Nuremberg
Fig. 572.). Astronomical calendar, by Nicholas of Lynn, ca. 1324 Sacred Geometry

Fig. 573.). Masolino da Panicale Fondazione della Europe di Santa Maria Maggiore a Roma circa 1428
Fig. 574.). Carlo Crivelli 1430 1495 and is called The Annunciation with Saint Emidius 1486
Fig. 575.). The Madonna with Saint Giovannino It was painted in the 15th century by Domenico Ghirlandaio 1449
1494

556
Fig. 576.). Barthélémy l’Anglais’ Livre des propriétés des choses, c. 1230
Fig. 577.). Augustin De Civitate Dei contra Paganos (c. 1475). Augustin explains the Creation to Epicurus.
Fig. 578.). Black Sun (Sol Niger) setting on the outskirts of a city from ‘Splendor Solis’ (The Splendour of the Sun) a
German illuminated alchemical treatise. (1582)

Fig. 579.). Alchemical and hermetic emblems 41 80

Fig. 580.). Alchemical and hermetic emblems
Fig. 581.). Adam McLean’s Gallery of Astrological, Astronomical and Cosmological images

557
Fig. 582.). The first recorded Crop Circle of the world dates back to 1678
Fig. 583.). Maximized and updated photo of original
The Mowing Devil: or, Strange News out of Hartford shire is the title of an English woodcut pamphlet
published in 1678. The pamphlet tells of a farmer in Hertfordshire who, refusing to pay the price demanded by a
labourer to mow his field, swore that he would rather that the Devil mowed it instead.
According to the pamphlet, that night his field appeared to be in flame. The next morning, the field was
found to be perfectly mowed, “that no mortal man was able to do the like”.
This pamphlet, and the accompanying illustration, is often cited by crop circle researchers as among the
first recorded cases of crop circles. Crop circle researcher Jim Schnabel does not consider it to be a historical
precedent because it describes the stalks as being cut, while modern crop circles involve the corn being bent
(Bonus)

558
Fig. 584.). Sophia (Gnosticism)
Fig. 585.). A bloodletting chart from 1493

Fig. 586.). 11th 14th century T O Map of the Earth

Fig. 587.). The Hermaphrodite Heinrich Khunrath

559
Fig. 588.). Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, from the Secret Symbols of the Rosicrucians, German School, 1785
Fig. 589.). Tree of Battles Honore Bouvet 1470

Fig. 591.).

560
Fig. 590.).

561
 This book belongs to none but me
For there’s my name inside to see
To steal this book, if you should try
It’s by the throat that you’ll hang high.
And ravens then will gather ‘bout
To find your eyes and pull them out.
And when you’re screaming, “oh, oh, oh!”
Remember you deserve this woe.

Whoe’er this book

To make his own doth plot,
The fires of Hell
And brimstone be his lot.

Who folds a leafe downe

ye divel toaste browne,
Who makes marke or blotte
ye divel roaste hot,
Who stealeth thisse boke,
ye divel shall cook

For him that stealeth, or borroweth and returneth not, this book from its owner, let it change into a serpent in his
hand & rend him. Let him be struck with palsy, & all his members blasted. Let him languish in pain crying aloud for
mercy, & let there be no surcease to his agony till he sing in dissolution. Let bookworms gnaw his entrails in token
of the Worm that dieth not, & when at last he goeth to his final punishment, let the flames of Hell consume him
for ever.

Thys boke is one, And Godes kors ys anoder;They take the ton, God gefe them the toder.

[This book is one (thing),

And God’s curse is another;
They that take the one,
God gives them the other.]

This book belongs to Christ Church, Canterbury [...] may whoever destroys this title, or by gift or sale or lon or
exchange or theft or by any other device knowingly alienates this book from the aforesaid Christ Church incur in
his life the malediction of Jesus Christ and of the most glorious Virgin His Mother, and of Blessed Thomas, Martyr.
Should however it please Christ [...] may his soul be saved in the Day of Judgment.

Wher so ever y be come over all

I belonge to the Chapell of gunvylle hall;
He shal be cursed by the grate sentens
That felonsly faryth and berith me thens.

562
 And whether he bere me in 563uro or sekke,
For me he shall be hanged by the nekke,
(I am so well beknown of 563urope563 men)
But I be restored theder agen

[Wherever I might end up over all,

I belong to the Chapel of Gonville Hall;
He that feloniously ferries me and bears me from thence
Shall be cursed by this great sentence:
Whether he bears me in a pouch or sack,
On account of me he shall be hanged by the neck,
(I’m too well known by many men [to not be noticed])
Unless I be returned there again.]

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen. In the one thousand two hundred twenty ninth
year from the incarnation of our Lord, Peter, of all monks the least significant, gave this book to the [Benedictine
monastery of the] most blessed martyr, St. Quentin. If anyone should steal it, let him know that on the Day of
Judgment the most sainted martyr himself will be the accuser against him before the face of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Should anyone by craft of any device whatever abstract this book from this place may his soul suffer, in retribution
for what he has done, and may his name be erased from the book of the living and not recorded among the
Blessed.

563
 Outro
This outro has to be short for unspoken reasons. I hope you learned something, I hope you feel fulfilled
and well fed. I didn’t know many of the things I learned as I took the executioner as my host through a time period
that is connected to us all culturally and the information was kept far away intentionally. The Metaphysics to it all
is that Europeans have made the entire planet European so we minus well understand what European is.
It is very obvious that there are many levels of illusion to this existence. The picture is imposed as if there
is no real bottom line or finite answer with anything. That’s bullshit because if that was the case we wouldn’t have
cars and planes all over the planet within the span of 200 years when we were tryin to start fire with a rock for
supposedly more than 5000’s years. The chronology of human history is wrong. The chronology of the worlds
history is wrong. The major problem is that humans collectively have a problem with being wrong, stating what is
wrong or taking the challenge to defeat the wrong. Which in essece may mean the human is a born demon that is
comforted with and invites the wrong.
When we observe the activity of infants. They will take a toy out of another childs hand, they will slap
another child upside the head, they will play in and throw their feces and not to forget the classic case of them
urinating on you while changing their diaper. At all this you are to laugh and jeer and call it cute. The baby does
not recognize the scent of the shit it plays in nor the health hazards he may face, nor does he care of consequence.
The human must be beat for the instillation of morals. The children must be beat to be happy, as was said in the
easter section. We must understand that there is a hell/demon/death dynamic interwoven into our everyday
activities. These are the gateways for your car accidents, divorces, diseases and the like. This world may have
always been violent and then again it may not had been depends on what books you want to read.
At the end of the day there are too many issues that we humans are facing right now. Since I was born Ive
always had a premonition that it had something to do with western culture. The system that we live in today is
proof that there is. The obesity is sky rocket, the diseases and the cancers are sky rocket, the food is shit and
nobody knows where in the hell its really coming from. Its all backwards. Everyday somebodies flashing their
privateparts somewhere, female teachers are havin liaisions with the students. Its nuts. The root of it is here, in
the medieval and that’s everything from lead poisoning to shooting black people up because your brains are
programmed to look at black people as some type of ghost/animal.
Will things ever change or is this the natural order of things. Nobody knows time will tell us all. Will
humans with indigenous backgrounds deal with the reality dynamics that cuacasians have been enforced to face
for aeons? Or will our current system devolve because of what I like to call the indigenous backfire. Is it all a big
trick for white people to stay superior by giving the rest of the world a system 100-200 years older than theirs
while the elite remain ahead. Is there an elite? Were the demons in the paintings aliens? Where they real? Whats
the game that’s being played here? Because I smell shit stacked dinosaur high. No being should have to pay or
strive to live on a planet that it was born on. But if that’s the case what do we say about animals. The fly could be
minding its business and before he knows it, hes in the frogs mouth being devoured. Is work the nemesis of man.
Is the definition of work the same as the definition of hell. As all work puts one in danger to complete. What is the
point of air and what is the point of the people breathing it when were all going to corrode anyway. This my friend
may be the true definition of the Black Madonna to not care about shit because were not supposed to. The
element of work distorts love. Love is how women rule, this is only if the man can bring it out of her by properly
loving her which can be a complex task in todays world or just leaving her alone to enforce her to love the world.
When a woman is at home with the family she is cultured and a Madonna. When a woman is “out at night”, only

564
time the planet Venus can be seen she is considered worldly. I guess that’s what type of woman they needed to
take over the world.
I think its important for me to explain the alchemy of the black madonnas. The black madonnas yes are
symbols of black women and a baby. This blackness is created from the materials used to make the doll. That
would be certain types of wood, black glass, acrylic and stone. The ones that are painted obviously have specific
ingredients added to the paint in order to give strength to the ambiance of the statue. They will deny this, but I
know whats occurring. Nonetheless, I know you noticed the Madonnas were also of different sizes. The majority
of them small, sorta like little babies of the big momma Liberty Enlightening the World. The statue of liberty is
obviously a direct example of this alchemy I refer to, as she is made of copper. There could be a specific, unique
process to cure the Black Madonna before presentation or releasing to the public. Understand that there are Black
Madonnas in the private collections of the extreme elite. Why, the alchemy on dolls? Why, so many? The Black
Madonnas and the Arch Angels are considered to be intermediaries of the extreme intelligence (God). So the
catholic devotees look at the priest, bishop and pope as intermediaries to God. While the priest, bishop and pope
use the black madonnas and Arch Angels. Ive been in a lot of museums and churches. I have never witnessed the
power that emanates off of these dolls. I will say that the Barbie of America indirectly represents her position.
Dolls are apart of every civilization. It is an element of caricaturizing different aspects of the human existence and
standard social thinking patterns.
The scholars are confused about the mass energy the Black Madonna has imposed on the planet as of
recent. There are many reasons for this as she will appear in all facets of life and in all races & cultures. You must
understand that yes she is filled with love. This is why she is back, your current world and social interactions with
eachother are based on hate. The languages you humans use are based on hate and death. Everything on this
planet needs nurturing and love to grow. It is true that violence and disagreements will come. There is a time and
place for everything. But in essence humans live in excess. The Woman/Black Madonna I think has intentionally
taken a hiatus only so this materialized world could be structured. Then she planeed to take it back. The Black
Madonna psychologically, I believe is the Unconscious Suggestion of all women. The Mind programming that all
women regardless of race or age are connected through. Women collectively have an unspoken agreeance that
they operate by. I know this because socially feminisim has been shoved down everybodies throats and I cut off
the catalyst of this (media) 15 years ago. When Im in public an Im doing romantic things to my woman, other
women look at us as if we are in violations of the times. We are. We aren’t witches created from unknown
sources sort of like whats going on now and days when you view the bullshit on TV.
The hatred that is the modern form of communication is directly seen in the numbers of deaths relative to
breast cancer, ovarian cancer, testicular cancer and prostate cancer. These cancers and many other ailments of
the body inclusive with erectile dysfunction come from sexual neglect and agitation of opposite gender acception.
Humans will always do what they want. Humans do not agree and never will. Therefore this existence will forever
remain in limbo. It will always be questionable. Another possibility of the Black Madonna could be the African
tribal woman that had the first albino and was casted out of Africa into Europe.
The porn and the demonizing of sex has also brought back the full force of the Black Madonna. Her
daughters are being human trafficked, lied to about sex, ignored by their mothers, left abandoned by their men
and their souls scream from these scenarios. Women are not to be fucked, unless they desire this. All degrees of
positivity and negativity must be represented. In essence women are fruits of love and needed to be handled with
sensitive care or her value will drop. Because of this material, business, literal world a womans value and quality
has plummeted next to nothing, due to the fact that the family household is no longer desired. Its just to much
work.

565
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569
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364. Source: Barbara w. Tuchman, The Calamitous 15th Century: A Distant Mirror, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. 1978 pg.
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366. Source: William Andrews, Medieval Punishments An Illistrated History of Torture; Skyhorse publishing;
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367. Source: A HANGMAN’S DIARY – The Journal of Master Franz Schmidt, Public Executioner of Nuremberg,
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Pg 133

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370. Source: Johannes Nohl; The Black Death: A Chronicle of the Plague: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. 1926; pg.
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371. Source: Montague Summers; The History of Witchcraft: University Books Inc., 1956; New Hyde Park, New
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372. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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373. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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374. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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375. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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376. Source: David Nirenberg: Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages;
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377. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
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378. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judensau
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380. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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382. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood libel
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385. Elizabeth Pepper & John Wilcock: Magical and Mystical sites; Europe & The British Isles Harper Row &
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386. Elizabeth Pepper & John Wilcock: Magical and Mystical sites; Europe & The British Isles Harper Row &
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387. Source: Montague Summers; The Werewolf: University Books Inc., 1966; New Hyde Park, New York; pg. PG
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389. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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390. Source: David Nirenberg:Communities of Violence, Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages; Princeton
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396. Source: Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum: Dark Mother African Origins and Godmothers; 2001, Authors Choice
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400. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 74 75
401. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 83
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428. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 51 52
429. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 81
430. Source: Jeffrey Burton Russell; Witchcraft in The Middle Ages: Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York
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431. Source: Jeffrey Burton Russell; Witchcraft in The Middle Ages: Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York
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432. Source: Charles Mackay; Extraordinary Popular Delusions & The Madness of Crowds; LL.D.; London:
Richard Bentley, New Burlington Street; 1841; Three Rivers Press, New York, New York,Pg 497 – 499
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434. Source: Montague Summers; The Geography of Witchcraft: University Books Inc., 1965; New Hyde Park,
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435. Source: Phillipe Walter: Christian Mythology: Revelations of Pagan Origins: Inner Traditions 2006; pg. 129
436. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 52 53
437. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 55 58
438. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 62 63
439. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 66
440. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 53
441. Source: Ruth Mazo Karras, Sexuality in Medieval Europe: Doing Unto Others, Routledge 2005; pg. 137
442. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 62 63
443. Source: Frances and Joseph: Gies Marriage and Family in the Middle Ages, Harper & Row Publishers, 1987,
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444. Source: Montague Summers; The Werewolf: University Books Inc., 1966; New Hyde Park, New York; pg.
PG17
445. Source: Hecker, Justus Friedrich Karl, 1795 1850; The Dancing Mania of the Middle Ages; GORDON PRESS
pg. 14 15
446. Source: Jeffrey Burton Russel; A History of Witchcraft ©1980 Thams and Hudson Ltd, London pg. 79
447. Source: Jeffrey Burton Russel; A History of Witchcraft ©1980 Thams and Hudson Ltd, London pg. 79
448. SOURCE: Reay Tannahill, Sex in History, Scarborough House; 1992 pg. 272
449. Source: Barbara w. Tuchman, The Calamitous 15th Century: A Distant Mirror, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. 1978 pg.
211
450. Source: Barbara w. Tuchman, The Calamitous 15th Century: A Distant Mirror, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. 1978 pg.
214

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452. SOURCE: Reay Tannahill, Sex in History, Scarborough House; 1992 pg. 325
453. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 246
454. Source: Kieckhefer, Richard; European Witch Trials: Their Foundations in Popular and Learned culture,
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455. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch hunt
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458. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 246
459. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 99
460. Source: Jeffrey Burton Russell; Witchcraft in The Middle Ages: Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York
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461. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 123 124
462. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 46 47
463. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 96 98
464. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 63 65
465. Source: J.F. Coss, The Romish Inquisition; The Menace Publishing Company; 1914, pg. 44 45
466. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 65 67
467. Source: J.F. Coss, The Romish Inquisition; The Menace Publishing Company; 1914, pg. 17 18
468. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 70 71
469. Source: Montague Summers; The Geography of Witchcraft: University Books Inc., 1965; New Hyde Park,
New York; pg. 378 379
470. Source: Montague Summers; The Geography of Witchcraft: University Books Inc., 1965; New Hyde Park,
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471. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 81
472. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 82 83
473. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 84 85
474. Source: Cecil Roth:The Spanish Inquisition, W.W. Norton & Company; New York, 1964 pg. 86 87
475. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 78
476. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 137
477. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 25 27
478. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 65 67
479. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 236 237
480. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 158
481. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 161
482. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 169
483. Source: George Ryley Scott; A History of Torture; Bracken books; 1994, pg. 172 176
484. Source: J.F. Coss, The Romish Inquisition; The Menace Publishing Company; 1914, pg. 32
485. Source: J.F. Coss, The Romish Inquisition; The Menace Publishing Company; 1914, pg.8
486. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazen bull
487. Source: J.F. Coss, The Romish Inquisition; The Menace Publishing Company; 1914, pg. 33
488. Source: J.F. Coss, The Romish Inquisition; The Menace Publishing Company; 1914, pg. 35

582
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490. Source: Daniel P. Mannix; The History of Torture; Dell Publishing Co. Inc.; 1964: pg. 132
491. Source: Phillipe Walter: Christian Mythology: Revelations of Pagan Origins: Inner Traditions 2006; pg. 67
492. Source: Ronald Sheridan & Anne Ross Gargoyles & Grotesques: Paganism in the Medieval Church : 1975
United States by New York Graphic Society Ltd, Boston Massachusetts; pg. 7 8
493. Source: Ruth Mazo Karras, Sexuality in Medieval Europe: Doing Unto Others, Routledge 2005; pg. 15
494. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
Batsford Ltd; 1986, 1993 London: pg. 11
495. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
Batsford Ltd; 1986, 1993 London: pg. 14
496. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
Batsford Ltd; 1986, 1993 London: pg. 18
497. Source: Ronald Sheridan & Anne Ross Gargoyles & Grotesques: Paganism in the Medieval Church : 1975
United States by New York Graphic Society Ltd, Boston Massachusetts; pg. 7 8
498. Source: Ronald Sheridan & Anne Ross Gargoyles & Grotesques: Paganism in the Medieval Church : 1975
United States by New York Graphic Society Ltd, Boston Massachusetts; pg. 18 19
499. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
Batsford Ltd; 1986, 1993 London: pg. 104
500. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
Batsford Ltd; 1986, 1993 London: pg. 102
501. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 124
502. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 128
503. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 129
504. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 130
505. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 131
506. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 132
507. JOYCE E. SALISBURY, THE BEAST WITHIN – ANIMALS IN THE MIDDLE AGES 2ND EDITION; Routledge: 1994
Pg 133
508. Source: Montague Summers, The Vampire in Europe; University Books. Inc, pg.94 96
509. Source: Montague Summers, The Vampire in Europe; University Books. Inc, pg.94 96
510. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynocephaly
511. Source: Phillipe Walter: Christian Mythology: Revelations of Pagan Origins: Inner Traditions 2006; pg. 159
512. Source: http://johnmckay.blogspot.com/2009/05/strange case of teutobochus king of 25.html
513. Source: Jeffrey Burton Russell; Witchcraft in The Middle Ages: Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York
1972; Pg 108
514. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headless men

583
515. http://bestiary.ca/beasts/beast262.htm
516. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yale (mythical creature)
517. Orr, James, M.A., D.D. General Editor. “Entry for ‘BASILISK’”. “International Standard Bible Encyclopedia”.
1915.
518. Source: E.P Evans; The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals, William Heinemann
Limited; 1906, pg. 10
519. Source: E.P Evans; The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals, William Heinemann
Limited; 1906, pg. 11 12
520. Source: E.P Evans; The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals, William Heinemann
Limited; 1906, pg.162 164
521. Text: La Nature, Vol. 11 (1883), 319 320, Images: La Nature, ibid.; Gaspar Schott, Magia Univeralis, Book II
(1659); Franz van der Wyngaert, “La lecture du grimoire” (early 17th c.) Source:
http://imaginaryinstruments.org/the cat piano katzenklavier piano de chats/
522. Source: Marian Roalfe Cox; An Introduction to FolkLore: London David Nutt; 1904 pg. 32
523. Source: Anthony Weir & James Jerman; Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on Medieval Churches; B.T.
Batsford Ltd; 1986, 1993 London: pg. 76
524. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 5 6
525. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 8 9
526. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg.14 15
527. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 21
528. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 28
529. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 42 43
530. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 46 48
531. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 55
532. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 56 57
533. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 98-99
534. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 120
535. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luke the Evangelist
536. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 120 121
537. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 122 23
538. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 126 127
539. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 110 131
540. Source: Phillipe Walter: Christian Mythology: Revelations of Pagan Origins: Inner Traditions 2006; pg. 156
157
541. Source: Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum: Dark Mother African Origins and Godmothers; 2001, Authors Choice
Press; pg 115
542. Source: Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum: Dark Mother African Origins and Godmothers; 2001, Authors Choice
Press; pg 118
543. Source: Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum: Dark Mother African Origins and Godmothers; 2001, Authors Choice
Press; pg 127 129
544. Source: Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum: Dark Mother African Origins and Godmothers; 2001, Authors Choice
Press; pg 136
545. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statue of Liberty

584
546. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric Auguste Bartholdi
547. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black Madonna
548. Source: Joan Carrol Cruz: Mysteries, Marvels & Miracles in the lives of the Saints; Tan Books, 1997 North
Carolina pg. 166
549. https://siciliangodmother.com/2014/11/27/saint benedict black saint celebrity healer and possibly lion
tamer/
550. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prester John
551. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 55
552. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 114 115
553. Source: Ean Begg: The Cult of The Black Virgin; penguin Group; Arkana; 1985 pg. 116
554. Source: Phillipe Walter: Christian Mythology: Revelations of Pagan Origins: Inner Traditions 2006; pg. 58
555. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenant
556. Source: John Henry Parker; The Archaeology of Rome; James Parker and Co. Oxford, London; Pg. 40 44
557. Source: John Henry Parker; The Archaeology of Rome; James Parker and Co. Oxford, London; 1877 pg 123
125
558. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William Tyndale
(Bonus) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary (elephant)

(Bonus) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Christopher
(Bonus) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eulalia_of_Barcelona

(Bonus) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mowing Devil

585