A four-part history of the Inquisition, a 500-year campaign against heretics by the Roman Catholic Church initiated by Pope Gregory IX. The series benefits from the 1998 release of secret Vatican files.
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Episode 1
EPISODE 1 - Root Out The Heretics. High in the Pyrenees in the southwest of what is now France, in a time when the Church of Rome proclaims itself the one true religion, heresy has taken hold. The Pope sends the Inquisitors of Heretical depravity to exterminate the heresy. Unbelievers are hunted down, condemned and burned. In 1308 the entire village of Montaillou is taken prisoner of the Inquisition. No one is safe - not even the village priest and the chatelaine of its castle. From the secret files - the extraordinary revelations of village life under the Inquisition.
Episode 2
Spain 1468 - A land where Christians, Muslims and Jews have lived in tolerance for centuries. That time is ending. A young King and Queen proclaim themselves Catholic Monarchs and start an Inquisition. Jews who had converted to Christianity are accused of secretly sabotaging the Christian faith. They become the pawns in a game of chess with dire consequences. Thousands perish in a ritual called the act of faith. In Zaragossa, the inquisitor is assassinated - setting off a wave of reprisals. Mothers will die to protect their children - and the highest in the land will pay the ultimate price. It is the beginning of the Spanish empire and a long dark night that will last for centuries.
Episode 3
Italy 1522 - The decadence of a Medici Pope in Rome outrages the devout priest in Germany named Martin Luther. In the face of the Protestant Reformation, a fanatical monk sets out to exterminate the heresy. On his path to power he will create the Roman Inquisition. And he will become the most hated Pope in history. Powerful leaders of the Catholic Church are arrested and imprisoned, accused of reading books banned by the Church. Free-thinking students are silenced. Darkness descends on the centers of learning and Renaissance. The Roman Inquisition leaves a legacy that lasts into the twentieth century.
Episode 4
The secret files of the Inquisition are locked away for centuries. A Spanish priest devotes his life to exposing the brutal records of the Inquisition. Napoleon spreads the ideas of the Enlightenment. He conquers Italy, abolishes the Inquisition and orders its files sent to Paris. Spain's greatest painter, Goya, will depict the Inquisition for the first time - and then run for his life. The kidnapping of a young Jewish boy secretly baptized will be one of the desperate last attempts at exerting the power of the Inquisition. A devoted father fights to get back his son. The boy becomes a symbol for a Pope who is about to lose his dominion on earth.
