Lateran council (1179)—had scarcely more effect. But on ascending the papal throne, Innocent III. resolved to suppress the Albigenses. At first he tried pacific conversion, and in 1198 and 1199 sent into the affected regions two Cistercian monks, Regnier and Guy, and in 1203 two monks of Fontfroide, Peter of Castelnau and Raoul (Ralph), with whom in 1204 he even associated the Cistercian abbot, Arnaud (Arnold). They had to contend not only with the heretics, the nobles who protected them, and the people who listened to them and venerated them, but also with the bishops of the district, who rejected the extraordinary authority which the pope had conferred upon his legates, the monks. In 1204 Innocent III. suspended the authority of the bishops of the south of France. Peter of Castelnau retaliated by excommunicating Raymond VI., count of Toulouse, as an abettor of heresy (1207), and kindled in the nobles of the south that animosity of which he was the first victim (1209). As soon as he heard of the murder of Peter of Castelnau, the pope ordered the Cistercians to preach the crusade against the Albigenses. This implacable war, which threw the whole of the nobility of the north of France against that of the south, and destroyed the brilliant Provençal civilization, ended, politically, in the treaty of Paris (1229), by which the king of France dispossessed the house of Toulouse of the greater part of its fiefs, and that of Béziers of the whole of its fiefs. The independence of the princes of the south was at an end, but, so far as the heresy was concerned, Albigensianism was not extinguished, in spite of the wholesale massacres of heretics during the war. Raymond VII. of Toulouse and the count of Foix gave asylum to the “faidits” (proscribed), and the people were averse from handing over the bons hommes. The Inquisition, however, operating unremittingly in the south at Toulouse, Albi, Carcassonne and other towns during the whole of the 13th century and a great part of the 14th, succeeded in crushing the heresy. There were indeed some outbursts of rebellion, some fomented by the nobles of Languedoc (1240–1242), and others emanating from the people of the towns, who were embittered by confiscations and religious persecutions (e.g. at Narbonne in 1234 and Toulouse in 1235), but the repressive measures were terrible. In 1245 the royal officers assisting the Inquisition seized the heretical citadel of Montsegur, and 200 Cathari were burned in one day. Moreover, the church decreed severe chastisement against all laymen suspected of sympathy with the heretics (council of Narbonne, 1235; Bull Ad extirpanda, 1252).
Hunted down by the Inquisition and quickly abandoned by the nobles of the district, the Albigenses became more and more scattered, hiding in the forests and mountains, and only meeting surreptitiously. There were some recrudescences of heresy, such as that produced by the preaching (1298–1509) of the Catharist minister, Pierre Authier; the people, too, made some attempts to throw off the yoke of the Inquisition and the French,[1] and insurrections broke out under the leadership of Bernard of Foix, Aimery of Narbonne, and, especially, Bernard Delicieux at the beginning of the 14th century. But at this point vast inquests were set on foot by the Inquisition, which terrorized the district. Precise indications of these are found in the registers of the Inquisitors, Bernard of Caux, Jean de St Pierre, Geoffroy d’Ablis, and others. The sect, moreover, was exhausted and could find no more adepts in a district which, by fair means or foul, had arrived at a state of peace and political and religious unity. After 1330 the records of the Inquisition contain but few proceedings against Catharists. (See also under Cathars.)
Authorities.—See C. Schmidt’s Histoire de la secte des Cathares ou Albigeois (Paris, 1849), which is still the most important work on the subject. The following will be found useful: D. Vaissete, Histoire de Languedoc, vols. iii. iv. vii. viii. (new edition); Ch. Molinier, L’Inquisition dans le Midi de la France (Paris, 1880), and the other works by the same author; L. Tanon, Histoire des tribunaux de l’Inquisition en France (Paris, 1893). Les Albigeois, leurs origines (Paris, 1878), by Douais, should be read with caution. Of the sources, which are very numerous, may be mentioned: the Liber Sententiarum of the Inquisition of Carcassonne, published by Ph. van Limborch at the end of his Historia Inquisitionis (Amsterdam, 1692): other registers of the inquisition analysed at length by Ch. Molinier, op cit., some published in vol. ii. of the Documents pour l’histoire de l’Inquisition (Paris, 1900), by C. Douais; numerous texts concerning the last days of Albigensianism, collected by M. Vidal, “Les derniers ministres albigeois,” in Rev. de quest. histor. (1906). See also the Rituel cathare, ed. by Cunitz (Jena, 1852); the Nouveau Testament en provençal, ed. by Clédat (Paris, 1887); and the very curious Débat d’Yzarn et de Sicart de Figueiras, ed. by P. Meyer (1880). On the ethics of the Catharists, see Jean Guiraud, Questions d’histoire et d’archéologie chrétienne (Paris, 1906); and P. Alphandéry, Les idées morales chez les hétérodoxes latins au début du XIIIᵉ siècle (Paris, 1903). (P. A.)
ALBINO, a biological term (Lat. albus, white), in the usual acceptation, for a pigmentless individual of a normally pigmented race. Among some flowering plants, however, the character has become one of specific rank, and among animals we have in the polar bear and the Greenland hare instances where partial albinism—for in them the eyes are black and other parts may be pigmented—has also become a specific character.
A true or complete albino is altogether devoid of pigment. One result of this among the Vertebrata is that the eyeball is pink in colour, since the cornea, iris and retina being transparent, the red blood contained in the capillaries is unmasked by the absence of pigmentary material. In man, and doubtless also in lower forms, the absence of this pigment produces the well-marked albinotic facies. This is a condition in which the eyelids are brought into a nearly closed position accompanied by blinking movements and a general wrinkling of the skin around the immediate neighbourhood of the eyes. It is the result of the too great intensity of the light incident upon the retina, and which in normal eyeballs is adequately diminished by the absorptive power of the pigmentary material.
In a complete albino not only is all pigment absent in the skin, but also that which is normally present in deeper organs, such as the sympathetic nervous system and in the substantia nigra of the brain. There is some reason to believe that a peculiar condition found in the majority of human albinoes, and known as nystagmus, is correlated with the absence of pigment in the central nervous system. This condition is one marked by unsteadiness—a sort of flickering rolling—of the eyeballs, and it becomes more marked as they endeavour to adjust their accommodation to near objects. It is thought to depend upon some connexion, not yet anatomically demonstrated, between the third cranial nerve and its nucleus in the floor of the iter and the substantia nigra.
In addition to complete albinism, there exist, however, various albinotic conditions in which more or less pigment may be present. Familiar instances of this partial albinism is seen in the domestic breed of Himalayan rabbits. In these animals the eyeball and the fur of the body are unpigmented, but the tips of the ear pinnae and extremities of the fore and hind limbs, together with the tail, are marked by more or less well defined colour. One remarkable feature of these animals is that for a few months after birth they are complete albinoes. Occasionally, however, some are born with a grey colour and a few may be quite black, but ultimately they attain their characteristic coat. There is some reason to believe, as we shall see later, that in spite of the presence of a little pigment and of occasional wholly pigmented young ones, Himalayans must be regarded as true albinoes. Other individual rabbits, but belonging to no particular breed, are similarly marked, but in addition the eyeballs are black. Some domesticated mice are entirely white with the exception that they have black eyeballs; and individuals of this type are known in which there is a reduction of pigment in the eyeballs, and since the colour of the blood is then partially visible these appear of a reddish-black colour. Such cases are interesting as representing the last step in the graded series through which the condition of complete pigmentation passes into that of complete albinism.
There is evidence, as shown by G. M. Allen, that partial albinism is a condition in which pigment is reduced around definite body centres, so that unpigmented areas occur between
- ↑ These they often confounded and a heretic is described as saying: “Clergy and French, they are one and the same thing.”
