Account Proper of the Holy Martyrs

Great persecutions of the believers, in the year 1206. A man at London, in England, burned alive for the faith of the Waldenses, in the year 1210; and twenty-four people at Paris, in France, likewise put to death by fire for the same religion.

In the year 1212, about one hundred people called Waldenses are put to death by fire at Strasburg; thirty-nine at Bingen, and eighteen at Mentz.

Account of a cruel inquisition, in the year 1214, over the doctrine of the Waldenses; Conrad of Marpurg, the chief inquisitor, and his way of examining with red-hot iron, as well as with hot and cold water; also the oath which the inquisitors in the bishopric of Utrecht used to put to those who were then called heretics, about the year 1215.

About eighty people called Waldenses, burned for the faith, at Strasburg; also some Christians at Toulouse, about the year 1215.

Gerard de la Motte, a deacon of the Christians called Albi Waldenses, with some of his fellow believers, sacrificed by fire, at Borriens, in the year 1227.

Several papal statutes and ordinances against the Waldenses, related for the year 1229.

Severe persecution, through the Inquisition, in Germany, where very many Waldenses are burned for the faith, in the year 1230.

Three decrees of Emperor Frederick the Second are described one after another, for the year 1230; another severe persecution of the Anabaptist Waldenses, in Germany, in the year 1231.

Nineteen people of the same profession, burned in the bishopric of Toulouse, in the year 1232; also two hundred and twenty-four in a place near Toulouse, in the year 1243; a severe inquisition in the bishopric just named, in the year 1251, which was carried on into the following year as well.

Decree of Pope Urban the Third against the Waldenses and Albigenses in Lombardy and around Genoa, in the year 1262; great persecutions, about the years 1280, 1283, and 1284.

Gerard Sagarellus burned at Parma, in the year 1285; Herman, Andrew, and Guillemette [Wilhelmina], exhumed, in the year 1299. Conclusion.]

The valleys of Albi, the region around Toulouse, indeed all France, England, and other kingdoms, furnish us, during this century, with many martyrs. As to the severity of their tortures, according to the flesh, they were pitiable and most miserable; yet they suffered with good cheer, indeed with joy, because of their sure hope and unshaken confidence in the Lord, as being their shield and exceeding great reward.* [n425-1]

As for the persecutions that took place in this century against the Waldenses and Albigenses, they by far surpass all the other persecutions we read of in the preceding centuries; for it now seemed as though the very furies of hell, so to speak, had broken loose to destroy all believers, indeed almost the whole earth.

In the years 1209 to 1212, 1225, and 1234, indeed throughout the entire thirteenth century, crusades, or so-called holy, voluntary preparations for war, were preached by order of the pope for the extermination of the Waldenses and Albigenses, all over the world, but more particularly in the kingdom of France.

These crusades consisted of great armies of Roman Catholics who volunteered for this so-called holy warfare; each was marked by a white cross on his breast, or one of white cloth sewn on his garment; and from these crosses the armies were called Crusades.

But so that they might conduct themselves the more bravely and fearlessly in exterminating the Albigenses and Waldenses, and indeed might leave none of them alive, but kill them by fire, sword, gallows, and other means, the pope made a most solemn promise. To everyone who in doing this should meet death, or fall by the weapons of the princes who sought to protect the Albigenses and Waldenses, he promised full remission of all their past sins, indeed that they should go straight to heaven.

The effect of this was that countless multitudes flocked together, as it were, to the honor of God and for the rooting out of the so-called heresies, in order to obtain forgiveness of sins and so, by dying, find salvation. Formed into armies under certain chieftains, they marched out and busied themselves with nothing but murdering, burning, laying waste, and tyrannizing among the Waldenses and Albigenses, sparing not even the infant in the cradle. It is impossible to tell how great a multitude of these innocent people perished, and under what severe torments, simply because of their true faith.