The Spanish Inquisition: Difference between revisions
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The Inquisition witnessed very few [[Witch Hunt|witch trials]]; this is not just because they dealt only a small proportion of the peninsula's (minority) urban population at intervals of decades or more - some towns for which there exist records were not visited more than a few times during the entire period of the Inquisition's existence. This ended in latter 16th Century, when the Inquisition ruled that so-called witchcraft did not exist. The Inquisition deemed all self-identified 'witches' insane and denounced the backwardness and unorthodoxy of witch-hunters - the Inquisition was not so much interested in enforcing 'old' Catholicism as it was in promoting the 'new' Catholicism of the Catholic Reformation or Counter-Reformation.
A common misconception is that the Spanish Inquisition was deployed overseas - it was not. There are contemporary, sensationalist, rumours of the Spanish Inquisition burning people left right and centre in the Netherlands during the course of the Reformation and Eighty Years' war. This was however the work of the Dutch Inquisition in the Spanish Netherlands, who were again in many cases using heresy as an excuse to deal with Dutch Nationalists and other politically troublesome individuals.
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Some points about the actual Spanish Inquisition:
* The ''auto de fe'' was actually only [[Come to Gawk|a public penance of heretics]] and didn't actually feature [[Cold-Blooded Torture|torture]] or [[Burn the Witch|burning at the stake]] as commonly depicted -- the last part came later on. However, the two were seen as the same process.
* Historians now estimate that of all trials only two percent may have actually ended with execution. A study of the timeframe 1540 to 1700 found documents for 44,674 cases with roughly 1500 death sentences. Furthermore as trials tended to be lengthy and
* They didn't really burn books and the stuff that was on their banned list was still widely available. Most Golden Age authors ran into them at least once.
* Unusually among the multiple Inquisitions established in different parts of Europe, final authority and control rested with the monarchs rather than the Church hierarchy (even the Pope had limited influence). It quite often functioned as a simple tool of repression, a sort of medieval secret police working for the Crown. This rather ironically means you could argue it was the ''least'' religiously motivated of the Inquisitions, despite its image and reputation.
* The Holy Office of the Inquisition is now known as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Amongst the most recent Prefects of this office was one Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger... currently known as [[The Pope|Pope Benedict XVI]]. In fact, he was Prefect when he was elected Pope.
** Though the Holy Office per se only had direct jurisdiction over the Italian peninsula at most The Holy Office reported directly to the Pope, while the well-known Spanish office, as said above, reported to El Escorial first.
* One of the main reasons for the villain status of the Inquisition: Their host country was
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* The classic film ''[[Man of La Mancha]]'' is the story of [[Don Quixote]] as told by Miguel de Cervantes to a group of inmates while
* One episode of ''[[Monty Python's Flying Circus]]'' has a [[Running Gag]] where a frustrated character would grumble, "I didn't expect some kind of/this kind of/the Spanish Inquisition!" After a "jarring chord," several anachronistic Spanish Inquisitors would burst in and seize control of the skit.
* A ''[[Batman]]'' episode actually plays a version of the famous [[Monty Python]] sketch completely straight.
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* The ''[[Doctor Who]]'' [[Virgin New Adventures|New Adventures]] novel ''Sanctuary''.
* Mentioned in the early books of [[Eric Flint]] and [[David Weber]]'s ''1632'' series, but comes to the fore in ''1634: The Galileo Affair''.
* ''[[Warhammer
** And by extension, the Inquisition is the main organization of [[Exterminatus Now]]. There are also two references to the Monty Python sketch.
* ''[[Warhammer Fantasy]]'', [[Older Than They Think|way before]] Warhammer 40K, had the Witch Hunters, agents who hunted down Chaos activities, unlicensed magic users, mutants, and whatever else they don't like much. Their authority might come from local authorities, the official [[Knight Templar|State Cult]], or simply [[Vigilante|be acting on their own]].
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