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One of the most important weapons in the armoury of the Church during its struggle with heresy in the later Middle Ages was the militant and outward-looking piety of the lay faithful. There were two main ways in which the Church could employ the religious zeal of the laity in the defence of the faith, especially during the critical battle with catharism in the thirteenth century. One was the issue of crusade indulgences and privileges to all who took up arms in, or otherwise contributed to, the struggle against the heretics and their protectors (in technical terms, their fautors). The crusading army which such a move could create was a powerful and relatively inexpensive instrument, but it had its disadvantages. The crusade against the Albigensians showed that it was very difficult to control in the field, while that against the Hussites demonstrated that its failure had serious effects on the enthusiasm of the faithful. The second way of employing lay piety was the establishment of permanent religious organisations, orders and confraternities, which would be at the service of the papal inquisition against heresy. In contrast to the temporary legal obligation of thecrucesignatus, membership of such an organisation expressed a permanent commitment to the defence of the faith, a commitment rewarded onlyin articulo mortisby the grant of the plenary indulgence. My intention here is to examine some political aspects of both the use of the crusade indulgence, together with its associated privileges, and the functioning of anti-heretical orders and confraternities in Italy, mainly in the thirteenth century. Events in Italy deserve study for two reasons.
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