THE 'FALL OF MONTSEGUR', CATHARS BURNT TO DEATH

Today, The Grandma has been reading about a community that fascinates her, the Cathars, who lived in Occitania until they were massacred by the Catholic Church and the French forces.

On a day like today in 1244, over 200 Cathars who refused to recant, burnt to death after the Fall of Montsegur.

The Siege of Montsegur was a nine-month siege of the Cathar-held Château de Montsegur by French royal forces starting in May 1243.

After the castle surrendered, about 210 perfecti and unrepentant credentes were burned in a bonfire on 16 March 1244.

Although the Albigensian Crusade had been concluded with the Treaty of Paris-Meaux in 1229, local resistance continued. The Cathar Church was still able to operate and oppose the Inquisition that pervaded the Languedoc.

In 1233, the Cathar Bishop Guilhabert de Castres asked Raymond de Pereille for permission to make Montsegur the seat and head (domicilium et caput) of the Cathar Church.

As a haven for Cathars, Montsegur gained symbolic and strategic importance in the resistance fight against the Catholic Church and the French forces in subsequent years.

In 1241, Raymond VII made a token attempt to capture Montsegur, primarily to impress the King and the Catholic Church of his allegiance. At that time Montsegur housed about 500 people.

More information: Cathar

In the context of Occitan resistance and possibly linked to Raymond's efforts to free himself from the chains of the Paris Treaty, two representatives of the Inquisition, William Arnald and Stephen de Saint-Thibéry, as well as their companions and retinue were murdered by about fifty men from Montsegur and dispossessed faidits at Avignonet on 28 May 1242. This event led to the decision to send a royal military expedition to eliminate the stronghold.

In May 1243, the seneschal Hugues des Arcis led the military command of about 10,000 royal troops against the castle that was held by about 100 fighters and was home to perfecti, who as pacifists did not participate in combat, and civilian refugees.

Many of these refugees were Cathar credentes who lived in huts and caves outside the castle on the mountain. The initial strategy was to besiege the castle in expectation that water and supplies would run out, a strategy that had worked well for the crusaders before.

However, the defenders were well supplied and able to keep their support lines open, being supported by many of the local population; some reinforcements even arrived. Thus eventually it was decided to attack the place directly, a difficult task due to its well protected location high on a massive limestone rock.

More information: Learn Religions

After many failures, Basque mercenaries were able to secure a location on the eastern side of the summit across a depression which allowed the construction of a catapult. This forced refugees that were living outside the walls of the castle to move inside, making living conditions difficult. Apparently by treachery, a passage was found to get access to the barbican which was conquered in March 1244.

The catapult was now moved closer and the living situation inside deteriorated under the day-and-night bombardment. When an attempt by the garrison failed to dislodge the invaders from the barbican, the defenders gave the signal that they had decided to negotiate for surrender.

Surrender conditions were quickly decided on: All the people in the castle were allowed to leave except those who would not renounce their Cathar faith, primarily the perfecti. A two-week truce was declared. The last two weeks were spent praying and fasting. A number of defenders decided to join the about 190 perfecti and received their consolamentum bringing the total number of Cathar believers destined to burn to between 210 and 215.

On 16 March, led by Bishop Bertrand Marty, the group left the castle and went down to the place where the wood for the pyre had been erected. No stakes were needed: they mounted the pyre and perished voluntarily in the flames.

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The remainder of the defenders, including those who had participated in the murder of the inquisitors, were allowed to leave, among them Raymond de Pereille who was later, like others, subjected to the Inquisition.

It has been claimed that three or four perfecti survived; they left the castle by a secret route to recover a treasure of the Cathars that had been buried in a nearby forest in the weeks prior to the surrender. The treasure not only contained material valuables but also documents and possibly relics. Nothing about its whereabouts is known.

Catharism continued in the Languedoc for many decades, but it had lost its organization, and, under the pressure of the Inquisition, adherents if not captured moved to other places, such as Catalonia and Italy, where conditions were less oppressive.

Montsegur Castle was destroyed; today’s ruins are a remnant of the French border fortress of a later time.

At the base of the mountain, in the Prat dels Cremats, Occitan for Field of the Burnt, a modern stone commemorates the death of the victims; it is inscribed Als catars, als martirs del pur amor crestian. 16 de març 1244, in Occitan for To the Cathars, to the martyrs of pure christian love. 16 March 1244.

More information: Château Marcel

 When genocide is committed,
it must be seen.
People must look at it with open eyes,
not minimize its impact.

Nadia Murad

'AS WE WERE SAYING YESTERDAY...", THE STONES RETURN

Fray Luis de León

Today, The Grandma has meet The Stones again in Sant Boi. It has been a wonderful reencounter after six months of being separated. The family stayed in Hogwarts when The Grandma travelled to Barcelona to continue her work with The Watsons.

First, MJ has been talking about the new health rules about COVID19 and later, The Grandma has been talking about how to create and construct little compositions.

The family want to restart the classes again as soon as possible to continue studying English and working in the possibility of do a Cambridge Exam. It is difficult and nowadays we do not know anything about it but they are going to work with this objective on the horizon because they are The Stones and they do not give up.

Finally, The Grandma has explained two stories, one about the Capuchins in Sant Boi de Llobregat and another about Fray Luis de León, one of the most incredible Castilian writers of the 16C.

More information: Writing

Luis de León (Belmonte, Cuenca, 1527-Madrigal de las Altas Torres, Castile, 23 August 1591), was a Castillan lyric poet, Augustinian friar, theologian and academic, active during the Spanish Golden Age.

Luis de León was born in Belmonte, in the Province of Cuenca, in 1527 or 1528. His parents were Lope de León and Inés de Varela, and they had five children. His father practiced law, and it was due to his profession that the family moved to Madrid in 1534, and later to Valladolid.

Luis obtained a very thorough and extensive education, and was devoted to the interpretation and translation of religious texts and ideas. He was proficient in Greek, Hebrew, and Latin.

He entered the University of Salamanca at the age of fourteen, in 1541, to study Canon Law under the care of his uncle Francisco. At some point between 1541 and 1543, Thompson states that it was about 5-6 months after beginning his studies, while other authors often claim it was 1543, Luis abandoned his studies and instead entered the Order of the Hermits of St. Augustine.

Fray Luis de León's Writings

After a novitiate of uncertain duration he joined the Priory of San Pedro on 29 January 1544. The first record of León as a student of theology is in the matriculation book at the University of Salamanca for 1546-7.

In 1552, Fray Luis graduated with a bachelor's degree in theology from the University of Toledo and continued his education as a student of Hebrew and Biblical interpretation at the University of Alcalá de Henares.

In 1561, he began translating the Song of Songs (Cantar de los Cantares) into Spanish for his cousin, Isabel Osorio, a nun in Salamanca who could not read the Latin text, and wrote an accompanying commentary. This was León's first major translation of a biblical text, and was probably inspired by a commentary his contemporary Arias Montano had lent to him when he passed through Salamanca in 1561.

Translation of biblical texts into Spanish had been banned by the Council of Trent, so there was a certain risk in this undertaking. The manuscript, however, was popular amongst his friends, who copied it and circulated it privately. However, the translations formed part of the accusations levelled against León when he was denounced to the Inquisition in 1572.

Because of the controversial nature of the text, it was not published until 1798.

Having returned to Salamanca the previous year, in 1560 he graduated from the University of Salamanca as a licentiate (7 May) and Master of Theology (30 June), and in the following year he won the election to the Chair of St Thomas, a chair in Theology, at the same university, Salamanca was unusual in that all Chairs were subject to an election for the position. This was a minor Chair, with a limited four-year tenure.

More information: Multimedia English I & II

In 1565, he won the Chair of St Durandus, to which he was re-elected in 1569, he lost it in 1573 because he was in prison while the elections took place. In 1566 he was named administrator of the Augustinian College of San Guillermo in Salamanca, and in 1567 he took on the position of vice rector of the University. In 1571 he attained the Chair of Sacred Letters as well.

While at the university, he translated classical and biblical literature and wrote on religious themes. He was widely known for his works.

In 1571 Dominican professors Bartolomé de Medina and Castro put forth seventeen propositions to the Inquisition documenting Fray Luis' allegedly heretical opinions. His translation into Spanish and commentary of the Song of Solomon (Canto de Salomón) was the biggest evidence presented for their case against him. Another charge touched on his criticizing the text of the Vulgate.

As a result, he was imprisoned at Valladolid from 27 March 1572 until December 1576, fell ill and remained in bad health throughout his imprisonment. Though he suffered greatly from his isolation and less than desirable conditions, Fray Luis continued to actively write and study during his confinement.

At the end of 1576, the tables turned, and on 11 December Fray Luis was cleared of all charges and released from prison with an admonishment to be more careful and reserved in his publications and speech. He returned to Salamanca on 30 December in triumph.

Tradition has it that he began his university lecture on 29 January 1577, his first after returning from four years' imprisonment, with the words Dicebamus hesterna die (As we were saying yesterday...).

He died at the age of 64 on 23 August 1591, in Madrigal de las Altas Torres, Ávila, and is buried in Salamanca in the Priory of San Agustín. Ten days before his death he was elected Vicar General of the Augustinian Order.

More information: The Order of Friar Minor Capuchin in Sant Ramon

There is a lack of words in the language

for the feelings of the soul.

Fray Luis de León

GALILEO GALILEI TO TRIAL AGAINST THE INQUISITION

Galileo Galilei

February, 13 1633. Galileo Galilei arrives in Rome for his trial before the Inquisition. This trial changes the History. It is a fight between a man and a great power, a fight between reason, logic and knowledge against Inquisition.

February, 13 2019. The History repeats. A new fight between democratic ideas and dark forces, which want to keep their power over population, economy and politic power, is happening.

The Grandma wants to talk about the great figure of Galileo Galilei, a man who changed the line of the History. Before talking about Galileo, The Grandma has studied a new lesson of her Intermediate Language Practice (Grammar 3).

More information: Present Time 2

The Galileo affair, in Italian Il processo a Galileo Galilei, was a sequence of events, beginning around 1610, culminating with the trial and condemnation of Galileo Galilei by the Roman Catholic Inquisition in 1633 for his support of heliocentrism.

In 1610, Galileo published his Sidereus Nuncius, describing the surprising observations that he had made with the new telescope, namely the phases of Venus and the Galilean moons of Jupiter. With these observations he promoted the heliocentric theory of Nicolaus Copernicus, published in De revolutionibus orbium coelestium in 1543.

More information: Famous Trials

Galileo's initial discoveries were met with opposition within the Catholic Church, and in 1616 the Inquisition declared heliocentrism to be formally heretical.

Galileo with some students

Heliocentric books were banned and Galileo was ordered to refrain from holding, teaching or defending heliocentric ideas.

Galileo went on to propose a theory of tides in 1616, and of comets in 1619; he argued that the tides were evidence for the motion of the Earth. In 1632 Galileo, now an old man, published his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, which implicitly defended heliocentrism, and was immensely popular. Responding to mounting controversy over theology, astronomy and philosophy, the Roman Inquisition tried Galileo in 1633 and found him vehemently suspect of heresy, sentencing him to indefinite imprisonment. Galileo was kept under house arrest until his death in 1642.

Galileo's contributions caused difficulties for theologians and natural philosophers of the time, as they contradicted scientific and philosophical ideas based on those of Aristotle and Ptolemy and closely associated with the Catholic Church. In particular, Galileo's observations of the phases of Venus, which showed it to circle the Sun, and the observation of moons orbiting Jupiter, contradicted the geocentric model of Ptolemy, which was backed and accepted by the Roman Catholic Church, and supported the Copernican model advanced by Galileo.

More information: UCLA

Tommaso Caccini, a Dominican friar, appears to have made the first dangerous attack on Galileo. Caccini arrived at the Inquisition's offices in Rome to denounce Galileo for his Copernicanism and various other alleged heresies supposedly being spread by his pupils.

On February 19, 1616, the Inquisition asked a commission of theologians, known as qualifiers, about the propositions of the heliocentric view of the universe.

The papal Congregation of the Index preferred a stricter prohibition, and so with the Pope's approval, on March 5 the Congregation banned all books advocating the Copernican system, which it called the false Pythagorean doctrine, altogether contrary to Holy Scripture.

The Trial of Galileo

With the loss of many of his defenders in Rome because of Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, in 1633 Galileo was ordered to stand trial on suspicion of heresy for holding as true the false doctrine taught by some that the sun is the center of the world.

Galileo was interrogated while threatened with physical torture. Galileo was found guilty, and the sentence of the Inquisition, issued on 22 June 1633, was in three essential parts:

-Galileo was found vehemently suspect of heresy, namely of having held the opinions that the Sun lies motionless at the center of the universe, that the Earth is not at its centre and moves, and that one may hold and defend an opinion as probable after it has been declared contrary to Holy Scripture. He was required to abjure, curse, and detest those opinions.

-He was sentenced to formal imprisonment at the pleasure of the Inquisition. On the following day this was commuted to house arrest, which he remained under for the rest of his life.

-His offending Dialogue was banned; and in an action not announced at the trial, publication of any of his works was forbidden, including any he might write in the future.

According to popular legend, after his abjuration Galileo allegedly muttered the rebellious phrase Eppur si muove (and yet it moves), but there is no evidence that he actually said this or anything similar.

After a period with the friendly Archbishop Piccolomini in Siena, Galileo was allowed to return to his villa at Arcetri near Florence, where he spent the rest of his life, until his death in 1642, under house arrest. He continued his work on mechanics, and in 1638 he published a scientific book in Holland.

Download Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems-G.Galilei

The sun, with all those planets revolving around it 

and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes 

as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.

Galileo Galilei