The Inquisition and Popular Pressure in the Languedoc

Abstract

Heretics adopted different strategies to defend themselves. This article explores how heretics used the formal machinery of the inquisition in South West France. The inquisition was in considerable part under the control of the French Crown, which had an interest in mitigating any too harsh actions by the inquisition. Evidence for this, and for the consensus-building which was a feature of inquisition work after 1305, can be found in Bernard Gui’s Sentences and Practica. The inquisition was a body which could at times be responsive to public pressure.