Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/320

 gQ^ THE SLAVIC CATHARI. ducing great confusion, during which the Cathari regained their position. Then, in 1360, Innocent YI. conferred on Peter, Bishop of Bosnia, full powers as papal inquisitor, and also ordered a new crusade, which served as a pretext to Louis for a fresh invasion. IS'othing was accomphshed by this ; but in 1365 the Cathari, irri- tated at Tvrtko's efforts to suppress them, drove him and his mother from Bosnia. Louis furnished him with troops, and asked Urban Y. to send two thousand Franciscans to convert the here- tics. After a desperate struggle Tvrtko regained the throne. His brother, Stephen Yuk, who had aided the rebels, fled to Ragusa and embraced CathoHcism, after which, in 1368, he appealed for aid to Urban Y., representing that his heretic brother had disin- herited him on account of his persecuting heretics. Urban accord- ingly urged Louis to protect the orthodox Yuk, and to force Tvrtko to abandon his errors, but nothing came of it. Whether Tvrtko was Catharan or CathoUc does not clearly appear. Prob- ably he was indifferent to all but his personal interests, and was ready to follow whatever policy promised to serve his ambition, and his success shows that. he must have had the support of his subjects, who were nearly all Cathari. Although, in 1368, Urban Y. congratulated Louis of Hungary on the success of his arms, aided by the friars, in bringing into the fold many thousand here- tics and schismatics, Louis himself, in 1372, reported that Chris- tianity was estabhshed in but few places ; in some the two faiths were commingled, but for the most part all the inhabitants were Cathari. It was in vain that Gregory XL endeavored to found Franciscan houses as missionary centres ; the Bosnians would not be weaned from their creed. Had TTtko followed a policy of persecution he could not have accomplished the conquests which, for a brief period, shed lustre on the Bosnian name. He extended his sway over a large part of Servia and over Croatia and Dalma- tia, and when, in 1376, he assumed the title of king, there was no one to dispute it. After his death, in 1391, the magnates asserted virtual independence under a succession of royal puppets— Stephen Dabisa, his young son, under the regency of his widow, Helena, and then Stephen Ostoja. The most powerful man in Bosnia was the Yojvode Hrvoje Yukcic, Avho ruled the north, and next to him was his kinsman Sandalj Hranic who dominated the south. Both of these men were Cathari, and so was the king, Stephen