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ALBIGENSES

The Albigenses were a sect which spread widely in the south of France and elsewhere about the twelfth century, and which differed in doctrine and practice from the Roman Catholic Church, by which they were subjected to severe persecution. They are said to have been so named from the district of Aibi, where, and about Toulouse, Narbonne, etc, they were numerous. A crusade was begun against them, and Count Raymond VI of Toulouse for tolerating them, in 1209, the army of the cross being called together by Pope Innocent III. The war was carried on with a cruelty which reflected deep disgrace upon the Catholic Church. Beziers, the capital of Raymond's nephew Roger, was taken by storm, and 20,000 of the inhabitants, without distinction of creed, were put to the sword. Simon de Montfort, the military leader of the crusade, was equally severe towards other places in the territory of Raymond and his allies. After the death of Raymond VI, in 1222, his son, Raymond VII, was obliged, notwithstanding his readiness to do penance, to defend his inheritance against the papal legates and Louis VIII of France. When hundreds of thousands had fallen on both sides, a peace was made in 1229, by which Raymond was obliged to cede Narbonne with other territories to Louis IX, and make his son-in-law, a brother of Louis, his heir. The heretics were now delivered up to the proselytising zeal of the Dominicans, and to the courts of the Inquisition, by which means it was brought about that the Albigenses disappeared after the middle of the thirteenth century.
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