PERSECUTED BY THE INQUISITION. 39 interference. They crossed the Adriatic and settled on a desert island off the Achaian coast. Here, lost to view, they for two years enjoyed the only period of peace in their agitated lives ; but at length news of their place of retreat reached home, and forthwith letters were despatched to the nobles and bishops of the mainland accusing them of being Cathari, while Boniface was informed that they did not regard him as pope, but held themselves to be the only true Church. In 1299 he commissioned Peter, Patriarch of Constantinople, to try them, when they were condemned without a hearing, and he ordered Charles II. of Naples, who was overlord of the Morea, to have them expelled, an order which Charles trans- mitted to Isabelle de Villehardouin, Princess of Achaia. Mean- while the local authorities had recognized the falsity of the accu- sations, for the refugees celebrated mass daily and prayed for Boniface as pope, and were willing to eat meat, but this did not relieve them from surveillance and annoyance, one of their princi- pal persecutors being a certain Geronimo, who came to them with some books of Olivi's, and whom they were forced to eject for im- morality, after which he turned accuser and was rewarded with the episcopate.* The pressure became too strong, and the little community grad- ually broke up. An intention to accompany Fra Giovanni da Monte on a mission to Tartary had to be abandoned on account of the excommunication consequent upon the sentence uttered by the Patriarch of Constantinople. Liberato sent two brethren to appeal to Boniface, and then two more, but they were all seized and prevented from reaching him. Then Liberato himself de- parted secretly and reached Perugia, but the sudden death of Boniface (October 11, 1303) frustrated his object. The rest re- turned at various times, Angelo being the last to reach Italy, in 1305. He found his brethren in evil plight. They had been cited by the Dominican inquisitor, Tommaso di A versa, and had obedient- ly presented themselves. At first the result was favorable. After an examination lasting several days, Tommaso pronounced them
- Angel. Clarin. Epist. (Archivfur Litt.- u. Kirchengeschichte, 1885, pp. 522-3,
527-9) .—Hist. Tribulat. (Ibid. 1886, pp. 314-18).— Franz Ehrle (Ibid. 1886, p. 335. Franz Ehrle identifies the refuge of the Spirituals with the island of Trixonia in the Gulf of Corinth (Ibid. 1886, pp. 313-14).
