Proving Woman (29 page)

Even if a cult passed its first hurdle at the diocesan level, and its promoters were successful in stimulating a papal inquiry,
the cross-examination of witnesses could occasionally wobble out of control. Clare of Montefalco (d. 1308), for example, was
believed to possess the instruments of the passion in her heart. This marvel was discovered soon after her death when the
nuns of her community cut the body open in order to remove the entrails for better preservation. The abbess, Sister Johanna,
insisted that the heart be placed in a special casket, where the organ was regarded with great reverence but was also the
source of a seemingly irrepressible curiosity. The curiosity was stimulated by Clare’s oftrepeated assertion that she had
no need of other crosses since she bore the crucifixion in her heart, a comment that the sisters chose to interpret literally.
Taking the initiative, Sister Francescha, attended by several others, cut the heart open, revealing the divinely wrought instruments
of the passion.
¹⁰⁰
The case in favor of Clare’s life and sanctity was sufficiently compelling that the preliminary inquiry, begun in August 1309,
eventuated in the papal inquiry, which opened in September 1318.
¹⁰¹

The somatized miracle revealed in Clare’s heart anticipates the parallel, albeit less spectacular, miracle wrought in Elena
d’Oglio. But the case also shared in some of the attendant difficulties since Clare, too, had suffered ill-health late in
life.
¹⁰²
The sisters of Montefalco, however, took steps to ensure that these circumstances would not constrain the way in which the
miraculous symbols were interpreted. They took the precaution of having a properly notarized public instrument drawn up—in
the presence of the
podest[agrave]
, the bishop’s representative, and a throng of clerics—carefully describing the phenomenon in detail.
¹⁰³
Some of the witnesses in the process also addressed the medical issues directly: thus when Simon, the doctor attending Clare
at her death, was queried as to whether the marvel worked in Clare could have occurred naturally or through an illness, his
assurance that neither nature nor illness could simulate these effects was overheard by a number of witnesses. The same doctor
was also present to attest formally that these marvels, displayed in the presence of the assembly that attended the drafting
of the public instrument, were just as he sawthem after the heart had been initially opened.
¹⁰⁴

Once these potential obstacles had been overcome, the process seemed to be unfolding smoothly, with the various witnesses
dutifully responding to the carefully worded articles of interrogation. And then suddenly, without warning, witness 160, a
certain Franciscan and onetime chaplain to Clare’s community named Thomas Boni of Foligno, attempted to scuttle the bid for
canonization. Thomas’s testimony begins with the assertion that another Franciscan, the late John Pulicinus of Mevania, former
chaplain to Clare’s community during her lifetime and up until the time of her death, had openly opposed the veneration of
the images revealed in Clare’s heart, arguing that nothing should be adored but the cross of Christ. Thomas himself thought
that the forms in Clare’s heart were contrived artificially by a particular sister (he never gives her name) who lived as
a recluse and was capable of doing the most intricate work with her hands. He further attempted to impugn Clare’s reputation
by claiming that she consorted with evil members of the clergy, and by suggesting she was something of a hedonist—eating from
the best dishes, consulting the most elite doctors, and employing the most expensive medications. According to Thomas, Clare
was also prone to falling on the ground—a fact clearly adduced to suggest epilepsy, possession, or both.
¹⁰⁵

The case of Dorothea of Montau offered a different set of challenges to John of Marienwerder, who, as we saw, was not only
confessor to Dorothea but eventual procurator for her cult. The degree of control that John had exercised over Dorothea’s
process was on a continuum with his erstwhile control over Dorothea herself. In fact, Dorothea had ended her life in an anchorhold
attached to the church of Marienwerder from where she would speak to no one without John’s permission. As mentioned above,
it was John who preached a sermon on her merits at her funeral, disclosing for the first time her revelations, the extent
of her austerities, and her reception of the mysterious wounds of love—all of which Dorothea had kept secret from everyone
except John of Marienwerder and her alternate confessor, John’s friend, the canon lawyer John Reyman.
¹⁰⁶
(Fortunately, the deep wounds that often erupted spontaneously all over Dorothea’s body causing immense pain were still in
evidence when the women came to prepare Dorothea’s cadaver for interment.) Through his hitherto exclusive knowledge of the
wounds and their meaning, John of Marienwerder could even be said to have limited control over the somatic aspects of Dorothea’s
cult.

The fact that the papal inquest was opened the year of her death is a testimony to the effectiveness of John’s campaign on
Dorothea’s behalf. It also ensured the presence of certain star witnesses, such as the canonist John Reyman and the bishop
of Pomerania, John Moïnch—both of whom had interrogated Dorothea during her lifetime in order to assure themselves of her
orthodoxy.
¹⁰⁷
But most of Dorothea’s life had been spent in her native town of Danzig, where she lived in relative obscurity.
¹⁰⁸
John Marienwerder had, in fact, been Dorothea’s confessor for only the last three years of her life, corresponding to her
arrival in Marienwerder. Many of the individuals who had known Dorothea in Danzig were still alive and prepared to testify
at her process—testimony that John could not possibly control or even anticipate. And one especially ominous fact did present
itself. When addressing a certain article concerning the various adversities that Dorothea had endured, several witnesses
deposed that Dorothea had formerly been charged with heresy—an occurrence that was widely known among the contingent from
Danzig.
¹⁰⁹
According to her confessor from Danzig, Nicholas of Hohenstein, the bishop’s official for the diocese of W3oc3awek, along
with certain other priests, threatened “to burn her, because they heard from people certain unknown things [
incognita
] told about Dorothea and they believed she erred.”
¹¹⁰
John had made no explicit mention of the charges of heresy in the many lives he wrote on behalf of his holy penitent, except
by way of allusion. In any event, such charges, even if unjustified, could nevertheless serve to damage an individual’s
fama
.
¹¹¹

Both Clare and Dorothea were eventually canonized, although they had to wait until the nineteenth and twentieth centuries,
respectively, for the conferral of this honor.
¹¹²
Despite their eventual successes, these cases demonstrate howthe rigors of interrogation might unearth information that could
immediately bring the process to a grinding halt.

Yet the unwelcome revelations that might surface in the course of an inquest into sanctity are only a symptom of the endemic
problem of adopting the inquisition for purposes of canonization in the first place, and thereby establishing a commonality
of procedure in the determination of saints and heretics alike. Of course, the impulses to exalt and to stigmatize are inevitably
linked as two polarities. Nevertheless, the
inquisitio
constituted a covert bridge that united the two procedures in an unprecedented way, exploiting the natural relation of opposites
and facilitating a series of surprising reversals that could undercut or transform the mission of a given tribunal. Thus efforts
made with a view to the commendation of a saint could result in the condemnation of a heretic.

The celebrated instances of Armannus Punzilupus of Ferrara and Guglielma of Milan, both of which came to a head in the troubled
pontificate of Boniface VIII, demonstrate the potential for slippage between the two kinds of inquisition.
¹¹³
Armannus was a pious layman of Ferrara, who died in 1269.114 A large crowd immediately gathered, and his body wasduly laid
to rest in the cathedral with honor and devotion. Placed in an ancient sarcophagus that was ensconced within a separate chapel,
the body immediately began to work miracles. Between 1269 and 1280, the bishop of Ferrara in collaboration with the canons
launched a total of five separate inquests into the miracles attributed to Armannus’s intervention. 115 But soon these inquiries
attracted the attention of the prior of the Dominican chapter, Aldobrandinus, who, in his capacity as inquisitor of heresy,
was familiar with Armannus. Aldobrandinus not only remembered Armannus as a former heretic but had reason to believe that
he had relapsed into heresy after his abjuration before the inquisitional tribunal. When the canons disobeyed the inquisitor’s
order to have the body disinterred and removed from the church, Aldobrandinus responded with an excommunication of the canons
and an interdict on the cathedral.

The canons appealed to Rome, including in their petition an impressive number of attestations to the piety and exemplary confessional
habits of Armannus by the various eminent priests to whom he had confessed over the years.
¹¹⁶
And at first, the results seemed promising: the case was entrusted to Cardinal Johannes of San Nicolo, who ordered that Aldobrandinus
lift the sentence of excommunication from the canons and the interdict from the cathedral. The inquisitor obeyed but retaliated
by opening a rival inquest into Armannus’s life.
¹¹⁷
The two inquests—one attempting to prove his sanctity and the other bent on his condemnation for heresy—finally converged
in a papal inquiry of 1300. The case is preserved via the papal inquisitors’ summary of the different stages of the proceedings,
a dossier that Carol Lansing has aptly characterized as a veritable
Sic et
Non
on the subject of Armannus’s spiritual allegiance.
¹¹⁸
At length, while acknowledging that certain
acta
had been lost, the papal judges arrived at the verdict that Armannus was indeed a relapsed heretic “even though he exhibited
many miracles.”
¹¹⁹
One can well imagine the consternation of the papal tribunal when confronted by the fact that Armannus seemed possessed of
the one feature that was supposed to be the surest mechanism for determining who was or was not a saint: the presence of miracles
after death. Canon lawhad reposed considerable trust in this distinction. The secret consistory on Peter of Morrone’s case,
occurring five years subsequent to Armannus’s drama, says explicitly that “miracles performed after death are special arguments
of a final [
finalis
] good and holy life.”
¹²⁰
But saint or no saint, in 1301 the canons were ordered to exhume and burn Armannus’s remains.
¹²¹
This did not entirely put an end to the matter for the church: the continuation of miracles caused some Catholic historians
to interpret Armannus’s posthumous thaumaturgical powers as a divine testimony of sanctity that must needs triumph over ecclesiastical
condemnation.
¹²²

Even had Armannus’s faith been vindicated, the fact that he was still associated with Catharism by at least some members of
the laity was an immense liability. As his orthodox critics complain in the course of the papal inquest, his heretical cult
was the cause for rejoicing among Cathars, who were thrilled that one of their own was finally being recognized for his sanctity.
A stream of heretical pilgrims was said to have converged from all over Europe, basking in the orthodox authorities’ unexpected
appreciation. Indeed, certain Cathars were even faking miraculous cures in order to bolster Armannus’s already sufficiently
impressive record.
¹²³

More striking still is the case of Guglielma of Milan, whose orthodox cult provided an even more satisfactory screen for its
heretical twin, and whose case thus deserves particular consideration. The center of the cult, Guglielma (d. ca. 1281), was
and probably will remain something of a mystery. It is not simply that her relative orthodoxy or heterodoxy is perhaps even
more obscure than in the case of Armannus, but her very past is equally impenetrable. Guglielma arrived in Milan around 1260—a
middle-aged woman in her fifties with a son, and reputed to be the daughter of the king of Bohemia. As the example of Elena
d’Oglio suggests, many would-be saints are provided with precisely this kind of exotic background, either by themselves or
by their disciples. What is different in this case, however, is that the tale was true. Yet why she came to Milan is entirely
unknown, as are the specific circumstances she left behind. One can only assume that she sought a life of relative anonymity
and simplicity, which she clearly believed could be found in urban Lombardy.

But her lineage was probably the only flashy aspect of Guglielma’s external life. She lived in a humble but not wildly ascetic
manner, dressed in plain brown robes, performing charitable acts, and surrounded by a circle of admirers. Guglielma had close
associations with the Cistercian monastery of Chiaravalle, to which she left her property when she died. She had expressed
a wish to be buried in the Cistercian church, a wish that could not immediately be satisfied owing to a local political skirmish
with Lodi. When it was possible to move her body from its temporary resting place in the cemetery in Milan several months
later, her reputation for sanctity was sufficiently robust for the simple transferral of a body to become a translation of
relics, while the monks themselves entertained hopes of having her officially canonized.
¹²⁴

The orthodox contingent who venerated Guglielma as a local saint were shadowed by an alternative following led by Andreas
Samarita, a well-to-do citizen of Milan, and his associate, the Humiliata Mayfreda de Pirovano.
¹²⁵
Probably reacting to the malaise generated by Boniface VIII’s troubled pontificate, in conjunction with contemporary Joachimite
inflections, Andreas came to the conclusion that Guglielma was the Holy Ghost incarnate, and won Mayfreda over to this conviction
as well.
¹²⁶
Guglielma’s advent was believed to have inaugurated the Third Age of the Spirit, signaling the end of the corrupt present-day
church and the establishment of a newone in its stead. This new church would be governed by a female pope, who was to be
none other than Mayfreda herself.
¹²⁷
By 1300, rumors of the sect were rife, attracting the attention of the inquisitors. The ensuing inquisitional record is fragmentary:
testimonies for thirty people remain, although there were probably not many more members in the sect. Only one sentence is
meted out in the course of the record, but it is often not difficult to infer the fate of others.
¹²⁸
For instance, a certain Ricadona is introduced as Andreas’s
widow
. In the course of the cross-examination about her beliefs, the inquisitor suddenly loses focus and asks how much wine there
was in the house when Andreas was arrested—an ominous sign with its attendant implications that Andreas did not die a natural
death, and that the family’s property was in jeopardy as a result. All in all, probably four or five of the sectarians were
eventually burned, while a number of the others were made to wear penitential crosses.
¹²⁹