The Dominican Inquisition

When the Pope, with a view to crushing the Albigensian and Patarinian heresies, endeavored to establish everywhere in Italy the Dominican Inquisition, the Republic resisted its introduction into Venice. The State charged itself to discover heretics, who when caught were examined by the Patriarch, the Bishop of Castello, or any other Venetian Ordinary. The examining Court was confined to a return of fact. It was called on to state whether the examinee was or was not guilty of heresy. Punishment was reserved to the secular authority. This arrangement did not satisfy the Court of Rome, an Inquisitor was appointed by the Pope, but he required the Doge's exequatur before he could act, and a board was created of three Venetian nobles, to sit as assessors to the Holy Office. Their duty was to guard the rights of Venetian citizens against ecclesiastical encroachment, including the non-interference in religious matters within the colonies, without their presence and their sanction no act of the Holy Office was valid in Venice. The Inquisition in Venice was certainly no sanguinary Office, thanks no doubt in a large degree to the independent attitude of the State, which insisted upon the presence of lay assessors at every trial.