#people are getting tortured. there are swords embedded in the doors of cathedrals. etc

[an-ruraiocht]

the reluctance to acknowledge christianity in a lot of medieval-set fiction/fantasy means we're missing out on a lot of stories of bishops trying to assassinate each other

[janusfranc15]

Ooh. That sounds Fun.

(Tbh there is ONE Fantasy example of this I’m aware of, and it���s Dragon Age.

You even get to decide who’s The Next Pope. Choices include: Murder Assassin who has Pet hairless.. rabbits? and is both Menacing and Very Idealistic (ie wants a lot of positive reforms, which will cause people to start screaming, crying, throwing up) Girlboss Courtly Intrigue Wizard who is regardless a bit conservative but causes changes via simply Being A Wizard Pope. Equivalent irl would kind-of be having a Jewish Pope?? Sort of? and a Pious semi-Traditionalist who reads smutty Literature and wants a mildly Protestant Reformation. They are all Women.)

the reluctance to acknowledge christianity in a lot of medieval-set fiction/fantasy means we're missing out on a lot of stories of bishops trying to assassinate each other

[an-ruraiocht]

in 1211 bishop robert ii of waterford sent armed men to the cathedral where bishop malachy of lismore was conferring holy orders. they dragged malachy out of the cathedral, stripped him, chained him up, and locked him in prison to be tortured

at first people didn't know robert ii was involved so at a gathering of bishops they were like "damn this is terrible we should excommunicate whoever did that" and he was like "yeah agreed... so sad... how could this happen..."

then after seven weeks of torture malachy escapes from prison and tells the papal judges that in fact it was robert ii who did this. he denies it so there's a full enquiry etc. he's got no evidence of his innocence so he commissions one of his clerics to assassinate malachy instead. however malachy ducks at the last minute and the sword gets embedded in the door of the cathedral instead (drama!)

the cleric gets excommunicated and robert ii is banned from communicating with him but does so anyway because apparently this man would not stop. finally he gets excommunicated too

dunno what happened to malachy after that, i just learned all this five minutes ago

the reluctance to acknowledge christianity in a lot of medieval-set fiction/fantasy means we're missing out on a lot of stories of bishops trying to assassinate each other