the murder, which grew to be a magnificent church with a splendid convent, through the offerings of the innumerable pilgrims who flocked thither. The authenticity of the martyr's sanctity was proved when, in 1340, eighty-seven years after death, the body was translated to a tomb of marvellous workmanship, and was found in a perfect state of preservation; and when the sepulchre was opened in 1736 it was still found uncorrupted, with wounds corresponding exactly to those described in the annals.[1]
The enthusiasm excited by the career of San Piero was turned to practical account by the organization in most of the Italian cities of Crocesegnati, composed of the principal cavaliers, who swore to defend and assist the inquisitors at peril of their lives, and to devote person and property to the extermination of heretics, for which service they received plenary remission of all their sins. These associations were wont to assemble on the feast of San Piero in the Dominican churches, which were the seats of the Inquisition, and hold aloft their drawn swords during the reading of the Gospel, in testimony of their readiness to crush heresy with force. They continued to exist until the last century, and Frà Pier-Tommaso Campana, who was inquisitor at Crema, relates with pride how, in 1738, he presided over such a ceremony in Milan. The Crocesegnati, moreover, furnished material support to the in-
- ↑ Ripoll I. 212.—Campana, op. cit. 126, 149, 151, 257, 259, 262-3.—Jac. de Vorag. Legenda Aurea s. v.—Mag. Bull. Roman. I. 94.-Wadding Annal. ann. 1291, No. 24.—Juan de Mata, Santoral de los dos Santos, Barcelona, 1637, fol. 28.-Gualvaneo Flamma, Opusc. (Muratori, S. R. I. XII. 1035). Frà Tommaso's disgrace was not perpetual. We shall meet him hereafter as inquisitor, alternately protecting and persecuting the Spiritual Franciscans. If the accounts of the latter be true, his death in 1306 was a visitation of God for the frightful cruelties inflicted upon them (Hist. Tribulationum, ap. Archiv für Litteratur- und Kirchengeschichte, 1886, p. 326). The question of the Stigmata was always a burning one between the two Or- ders. The Dominicans at first refused to accept the miracle until forced to submit by energetic papal measures (Chron. Glassberger ann. 1237—Analecta Franciscana II. 58, Quaracchi, 1887), and when at length they claimed the same honor for St. Catharine of Siena the Franciscans were equally incredulous. In 1473, at Trapani, the two Orders preached against each other on this subject with so much violence as to raise great disorders between their respective partisans among the laity, until the Viceroy of Sicily was obliged to interfere (La Mantia, L'Inquisizione in Sicilia, Torino, 1886, p. 17); and, as already mentioned, Sixtus IV., in 1475, prohibited the ascription of the Stigmata to St. Catharine.
