Course description

This course examines one of the most notorious (and commonly misunderstood) phenomena of medieval Europe: the persecution and inquisition of heresy. While its core focus is on the period from c.1000 to c.1450, it begins by looking back to the early Christian Church for the origins of heresy in the West, situating later anxieties surrounding heresy and other perceived 'outsider' groups in relation to the development of the Latin Church and western European society more broadly. It will consider what terms like 'heretic' actually meant in their medieval context, and ask from whose perspective many of our sources for medieval heresy are derived. Other topics of inquiry include: orthodoxy and heterodoxy; the birth of 'popular' heresy; the significance of literacy; dualism; crusades against heretics; inquisition; gender and women; religious persecution; and the power of the medieval Latin Church. This course may not run if there are fewer than 20 enrolments.

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