In the Middle Ages, a judicial procedure that was used to combat heresy; in early modern times, a formal Roman Catholic judicial institution. Inquisito, a Latin term meaning investigation or inquest, was a legal procedure that involved the assemblage of evidence and the prosecution of a criminal trial. Use of the procedure against the heresies of the Cathari and Waldenses was approved by Pope Gregory IX in 1231. Suspected heretics were arrested, interrogated, and tried; the use of torture was approved by Innocent IV in 1252.
Penalties ranged from prayer and fasting to imprisonment; convicted heretics who refused to recant could be executed by lay authorities. Medieval inquisitors functioned widely in northern Italy and southern France. The Spanish Inquisition was authorized by Sixtus IV in 1478; the pope later tried to limit its powers but was opposed by the Spanish crown. The auto-da-fé, the public ceremony at which sentences were pronounced, was an elaborate celebration, and the grand inquisitor Tomás de Torquemada was responsible for burning about 2,000 heretics at the stake. The Spanish Inquisition was also introduced into Mexico, Peru, Sicily (1517), and the Netherlands (1522), and it was not entirely suppressed in Spain until the early 19th century.
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