Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/534

 518 WITCHCRAFT. just ; he was not allowed to know the names of the witnesses, and his functions were restricted to advising his client either to con- fess or to disable the witnesses. If he made difficulties and delays and interjected appeals he was subject to excommunication as a fautor of heresy, and was worse than the witches themselves — of all of which he was to be duly warned when accepting the case.* The consequences of neglecting these salutary precautions are seen in two trials in 1474, at Rivara in Piedmont. A number of witches had been burned, and as usual they had implicated others. The matter had been conducted by Francesco Chiabaudi, a canon regular, commissioned by both the Bishop of Turin and Michele de' Valenti, the Inquisitor of Lombardy. Inexperienced and un- skilled, he had appointed Tommaso Balardi, parish priest of Rivara, to make the preliminary informations in five fresh accusations. The evidence, as usual, was overwhelming; Balardi arrested the culprits and gave them ten days to show cause why they should not be tortured. At the same time, with incredible igno- rance of his duties, he allowed them to select defenders, when they chose their husbands or brothers or sons. In the case of three, these defenders did nothing and the trials were conducted as usual, though the fragmentary documents remaining do not acquaint us with the result. The other two, Guglielmina Ferreri and Mar- gherita Cortina, were more fortunate. They seem to have been rich peasants, and their families retained three able lawyers for their defence. When these were once admitted before the tri- bunal the prosecution went to pieces. Chiabaudi, unacquainted with the privileges of the inquisitorial process, was wholly unable to control them. He allowed them to enter protests against the initial informations for irregularity, and even permitted them, against all precedent, to introduce witnesses for the defence. They had the audacity to summon Balardi himself, and made him testify that the accused were regular in all religious observances ; after which they poured in evidence that the so-called witches were eminently pious and charitable women, and that the rumors against them had only arisen a couple of years before, on the burning of three sisters who were said to have named them in their confessions. Chiabaudi sought refuge in appointing An-
 * Mall. Maleficar. P. in. Q. x., xi.. xxxv. — Prieriat. Lib. m. c. 3.