Trial by Ordeal

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30 August 2011

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Trial by Ordeal or Divination

Founded in the belief that God knew the guilt or

innocence of a suspect, he or she was subjected to a, frequently painful and life-threatening, ordeal

The concept of trial by ordeal goes back to the Code of Hammurabi of 3,800 years ago and it came to prominence in the Dark Ages in Europe.

God Decides the Case

The all-wise, all-knowing God was held in awe by people who needed an explanation for the mysteries that surrounded them. The birth of a deformed lamb, the onset of a flood, the failure of a crop could be put down to God’s will. So why not the guilt or innocence of an accused person?

In a paper entitled “Ordeals” (2010) University of Chicago professor Peter T. Leeson writes, “According to this superstition, God condemned the guilty and exonerated the innocent through clergy-conducted physical tests.”

One test was walking on red hot plough shares as illustrated in this 11th century bas relief from Bamberg Cathedral in Germany.

This image depicts Cunigunde, the wife of Holy Roman Emperor Henry II undergoing trial by ordeal.

Rev. Hugo Hoever in his Lives of the Saints says she was accused of scandalous conduct but proved her innocence by being uninjured by the hot iron.

Rituals Put Accused to the Test

Writing for Reason.com Radley Balko describes several favourite ordeals. In one “the accused was to retrieve a stone ring from a pot of boiling water. If his arm emerged unscathed, he was believed to have been protected by God, and proclaimed innocent.”

Britannia.com details another favourite: “…guilt could be tested by the ordeal of fire, where the suspect had to carry a bar of red-hot iron in his hands while he walked nine marked paces. In the unlikely event of no burns appearing on his hand, he was judged innocent. Otherwise, he was promptly hanged.”

And, Benjamin L. Berger writing in the Criminal Law Quarterly, October 20, 2003) explains the water ordeal “…the accused might be bound and lowered into a cold pond. If he floated, his guilt was clear. If he sank, ‘the water was deemed to have ‘received him’ with God’s blessing’, and he was quickly retrieved.”

Were the Ordeals Rigged?

Peter Leeson argues that there is evidence to suggest that priests intervened to influence the results of the ordeal.

In an article in the Boston Globe he says that only the truly innocent would submit to an ordeal because their faith convinced them that God would protect them.

The guilty, of course, also knew with equal conviction that God would not protect them so they would plead guilty, avoid the ordeal, and take their punishment.

Leeson says that clergy colluded by fixing the ordeal to prove God’s intercession. The procedure was carried out, writes Leeson, “under elaborate sets of rules that gave them wide latitude to manipulate the process. Priests knew that only innocent defendants would be willing to plunge their hands in boiling water. So priests could simply rig trials to exonerate defendants who were willing to go through with the ordeal.”

The ordeals often took place at the front of a church so the congregation would get an imperfect view of what was going on. The boiling water would more likely be on the tepid side, the red-hot iron only warmed through. At least, this is Leeson’s theory.

Pope Bans Trials by Ordeal

In 1215, Pope Innocent III ordered priests to stop participation in ordeals by fire and water. The practice was supposed to be replaced by trial by jury, but many European countries adopted torture instead as a way of extracting a confession.

Such brutal methods as pressing continued well into the 19th century, and trial by ordeal continues today.

In a 2007 article IRIN reported “About 50 people in the village of Klay, northwestern Liberia, recently gathered to watch a man apply red-hot metal to the limbs of four youths accused of robbery…None of the youths – ages 16 to 26 – appeared to flinch. They were deemed not guilty.”

Sources

“Ordeals.” Peter T. Leeson, University of Chicago (unpublished)

“Trial by Ordeal.” Radley Balko, Reason.com, February 1, 2010.

“Trial by Ordeal, Injuries & Outlaws.” Britannia.com, undated.

“Peine Forte et Dure: Compelled Jury Trials and Legal Rights in Canada.” Benjamin L. Berger, Criminal Law Quarterly, October 20, 2003.

“Justice, Medieval Style.” Peter Leeson, Boston Globe, January 31, 2010.

“LIBERIA: Trial by Ordeal Makes the Guilty Burn but ‘undermines justice.’ ” IRIN, November 1, 2007.

The Ducking Stool was inflicted only on women and was used in cases of suspected witchcraft and prostitution.

It was also used to punish “scolds,” described by the legal dictionary at duhaime.org as “A troublesome and angry woman who by brawling and wrangling amongst her neighbours breaks the public peace, increases discord, and becomes a public nuisance to the neighbourhood.”

The device was seen as particularly useful in identifying witches, but it was later dispensed with when a new method was invented.

The suspect’s right thumb was tied to a left toe, and she was then pitched into deep water. If she floated this was taken as proof that she rejected the “baptismal water” and was a witch who would then be burned at the stake. If she sank and drowned she was deemed to be innocent.

In the 17th century a Christian bishop called Qirinus was dealt with harshly in what was then Hungary.

The Medieval Sourcebook describes the proceedings: “The cruel pagans cast him into a river with a millstone tied to his neck, and when he had fallen into the waters he was long supported on the surface by a divine miracle, and the waters did not suck him down since the weight of crime did not press upon him.”

The assembled crowd tried to pull the bishop out but he turned down their help. He insisted on being a martyr and died in his watery grave.