Suppression of Paulicians, Bogomils and Cathars
c. 650s–1320s
disputed. The suppression is attested. Genealogical links between the groups are a scholarly hypothesis. Some (R. I. Moore, Pegg) argue the medieval 'Cathar church' was partly an inquisitorial construct.
Byzantine and later Latin authorities treated a chain of dualist-leaning movements as a single 'Manichaean' heresy: Paulicians in Armenia and Anatolia, Bogomils in Bulgaria and Constantinople, and Cathars in Languedoc and Italy. Historians debate how far they were actually connected. Bogomil missionaries at Saint-Félix (1167) are the most concrete link.
Sides
Dissenting movements
Leaders: Constantine-Silvanus, Sergius-Tychicus, Karbeas, Chrysocheir, Bogomil (priest), Basil the Physician, Nicetas (Niquinta), Guilhabert de Castres, Bélibaste (last parfait)
Rejection of church hierarchy and sacraments, rejection of the cross and icons, and (often) a dualism of good and evil creators.
Church and state suppressors
Leaders: Theodora (842–856 campaigns), Basil I (Tephrike 872), Alexios I Komnenos, Innocent III, Simon de Montfort, Dominican inquisitors (Bernard Gui, Jacques Fournier)
They are Manichaean heretics to be converted or eliminated.
Councils and places
- Tephrike (Divriği): the Paulician state 9th
- Philippopolis (Plovdiv): deported Paulicians and Bogomils 8th–17th
- Constantinople (trial and burning of Basil the Bogomil, c. 1100) 11th–12th
- Tarnovo (Council of 1211 and the Synodikon of Tsar Boril) 13th
- Saint-Félix-Lauragais (Cathar council, 1167?) 12th
- Béziers (massacre of 1209) 13th
- Albi (name-giver to the "Albigensians") 12th–13th
- Montségur (fall of 1244) 13th
- Sirmione (last great Italian Cathar refuge, 1276) 13th
- Triumph of Orthodoxy (Constantinople, 843) 9th
- Synod of Verona: decretal Ad abolendam (1184) 12th
- Fourth Lateran Council (1215) 13th
Outcome
The Byzantines destroyed the Paulician state (Tephrike, 872) and deported Paulicians to Thrace. Basil the Bogomil was burned (c. 1100). The Albigensian Crusade (1209–1229) and the Inquisition crushed Catharism, including Béziers in 1209, Montségur in 1244 and Sirmione in 1276.
What happened to the losers
Paulicians in Thrace gradually converted. Some became the Catholic 'Pavlikeni' of Bulgaria. Bogomilism faded after the Ottoman conquest (its Bosnian connection is disputed). The last Cathar parfait, Guillaume Bélibaste, was burned in 1321. Most surviving 'evidence' is inquisitorial.