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Crime and Forgiveness - Christianizing Execution in Medieval Europe (Hardcover)
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Crime and Forgiveness - Christianizing Execution in Medieval Europe (Hardcover)
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A provocative analysis of how Christianity helped legitimize the
death penalty in early modern Europe, then throughout the Christian
world, by turning execution into a great cathartic public ritual
and the condemned into a Christ-like figure who accepts death to
save humanity. The public execution of criminals has been a common
practice ever since ancient times. In this wide-ranging
investigation of the death penalty in Europe from the fourteenth to
the eighteenth century, noted Italian historian Adriano Prosperi
identifies a crucial period when legal concepts of vengeance and
justice merged with Christian beliefs in repentance and
forgiveness. Crime and Forgiveness begins with late antiquity but
comes into sharp focus in fourteenth-century Italy, with the work
of the Confraternities of Mercy, which offered Christian comfort to
the condemned and were for centuries responsible for burying the
dead. Under the brotherhoods' influence, the ritual of public
execution became Christianized, and the doomed person became a
symbol of the fallen human condition. Because the time of death was
known, this "ideal" sinner could be comforted and prepared for the
next life through confession and repentance. In return, the
community bearing witness to the execution offered forgiveness and
a Christian burial. No longer facing eternal condemnation, the
criminal in turn publicly forgave the executioner, and the death
provided a moral lesson to the community. Over time, as the
practice of Christian comfort spread across Europe, it offered
political authorities an opportunity to legitimize the death
penalty and encode into law the right to kill and exact vengeance.
But the contradictions created by Christianity's central role in
executions did not dissipate, and squaring the emotions and values
surrounding state-sanctioned executions was not simple, then or
now.
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