Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/307

 HERESY IN BOSNIA. 291 The few Latin prelates and priests and monks were encamped amid a hostile population to whom they were strangers in lan- guage and manners, and the dissoluteness of their lives gave them no opportunity of acquiring a moral influence that might disarm national and race antipathies. Under such circumstances there was nothing to hinder the spread of Catharism, and when the de- vastating wars of the Hungarians came to be dignified as crusades for the extermination of heresy, heresy might well claim to be Identified with patriotism. From the Danube to Macedonia and from the Adriatic to the Euxine, the Catharan Church was well organized, divided into dioceses with their bishops, and actively engaged in mission work. Its most flourishing province was Bos ma, where, at the end of the twelfth century, it counted some ten thousand devoted partisans. Cuhn, the Ban who held it under the suzerainty of Hungary, was a Catharan, and so were his wife and the rest of his family. Even Catholic prelates were suspected not without cause, of leaning secretly to the heretic behef.* The earliest interference with heresy occurs at the end of the twelfth century, when the Archbishop of Spalatro, doubtless un- der impulsion from Innocent, drove out a number of Cathari from Trieste and Spalatro. They found ready refuge in Bosnia, where Cuhn welcomed them. Vulcan, King of Dalmatia, who had de- signs upon Bosnia, in 1199 represented to Innocent the deplorable prevalence of heresy there, and suggested that Emeric, King of Hungary, should be urged to expel the heretics. Innocent there- upon wrote to Emeric, sending him the severe papal decretal against the Patarins of Viterbo as a guide for his action, and or- dering him to cleanse his territories of heresy and to confiscate all heretical property. Culin seems to have taken the initiative bv attacking Hungary, but at the same time he tried to make his peace with Rome by asserting that the alleged heretics were good Catholics. He sent some of them, with two of his prelates, to In- nocent for examination, and asked for legates to investigate the matter on the spot. In 1202 the pope accordingly ordered his chap- lam, Giovanm da Casemario, and the Archbishop of Spalatro, to 'Schmidt, Histoire des Cathares, I.104-9.-Gregor. PP. VII Re<.ist vii 1 1 Batthyaui Legg. Eccles. Hu.g. II. 274, 289-90, 415!l7.-Raynald. 1^^ 03 n7 22.— Innocent. PP. in. Regest. n. 176. u- "nn- i<iUrf,JNo.