There seems to be a very popular misconception that, in Europe during the Middle Ages, fanatical Christians went around crucifying anyone they suspected of heresy. This trope of medieval Christian crucifixions seems to be especially common in television shows with anti-religious agendas, where the writers are eager to portray medieval Christians in the worst possible light.
It’s easy to see how this misconception might have arisen. After all, medieval Christians did talk a lot about crucifixion because of the crucifixion of Jesus and they do have a well-earned reputation for dealing harshly with those accused of heresy. In historical reality, though, crucifixion was never used as a form of punishment by Christians in Europe during the Middle Ages.
The portrayal of a medieval Christian crucifixion in Vikings
First, let’s talk about some of the places where this misconception shows up. Modern television shows ostensibly set in medieval Europe certainly give the impression that crucifixion was an extremely common punishment for people accused of heresy. For instance, in the History Channel drama series Vikings, season two, episode two (“Eye for an Eye”), which originally aired on 20 March 2014, there is a scene in which an English monk named Athelstan, who has gone to Scandinavia and abandoned Christianity, returns to Britain.
Upon his return, he is captured by English soldiers. Under the orders of the bishop of Wessex, he is scourged, given a crown of thorns, and crucified as punishment for his apostasy. He is only saved at the last minute when King Ecbert of Wessex intervenes on his behalf and orders him taken down from the cross alive.
Michael Hirst, the creator of the show, claimed in an interview with a writer for The Huffington Post in April 2013 that the crucifixion of Athelstan was based on historical evidence:
“First of all, I was doing my reading and discovered that there were at least two monks that had been written of who had been captured by Vikings and taken back to Scandinavia. In fact one of them, later on, was captured by the Saxons raiding back in England and they crucified him as an apostate. So I knew that I had an interesting character, but also interesting because, I realized that he was a way through for our audience into the Vikings’ world.”
Unfortunately, Hirst says absolutely nothing about where he supposedly read this and I highly doubt that such an event ever actually happened. If a former monk was ever really crucified for apostasy, this would be truly an extraordinarily strange and unique occurrence, for reasons I shall explain shortly.
ABOVE: Screenshot of Athelstan being crucified in Vikings, season two, episode two (“Eye for an Eye”)
Cursed takes medieval Christian crucifixions to a whole new level
Unfortunately, the trope of medieval Christians crucifying people didn’t stop with Vikings. In the new Netflix fantasy drama series Cursed, which premiered on 17 July 2020, the main villains are an order of fanatical Christian monks known as the “Red Paladins,” who are hellbent on the complete annihilation of all members of a fantasy race known as “the fey.” They regard the fey as demons and regularly execute them by nailing them to wooden crosses and burning them alive.
Cursed gets at least a million other things wrong in its portrayal of medieval Christians; the whole thing about them crucifying people is just one of the many inaccuracies that stood out to me. I realize that Cursed is a fantasy show and that the creators have artistic license. I don’t have any problem with the fact that the main villains of the series are religious zealots either, since, after all, there are real people who have committed terrible crimes in the name of religion. What really annoys me, though, is how the series portrays medieval Christianity solely in the form of a cartoonishly evil caricature and refuses to entertain even the slightest degree of nuance.
Every single Christian character in the show is portrayed as a totally irredeemable evil monster with no capacity for human compassion or mercy whatsoever. Father Cardin, the leader of the Red Paladins, repeatedly deplores mercy, characterizing it as a weakness that is incompatible with faith in God. The Red Paladins are described by the main character Gawain as so evil that the only way to deal with them is by killing them all.
The show also repeatedly emphasizes that the Red Paladins aren’t just some small rogue faction of unusually fanatical zealots; instead, they are portrayed as a massive, highly organized army who are supported wholeheartedly by the church and who take their orders directly from the Pope himself, who is portrayed as even more fanatical and despicable than Father Cardin. Also, for some reason, even though they are committing blatant genocide in broad daylight with little secrecy, no one in the general public seems to care and there do not seem to be any Christian factions opposing them.
ABOVE: Screenshot of Father Cardin, the leader of the Red Paladins, standing in front of the crosses on which members of the fey race are being crucified and burned, from Cursed, season one, episode one
There’s no nuance, no qualification, no complexity, and no humanity in the show’s portrayal of Christians; the unambiguous message of the show is that all Christians—or at least all Catholics—are inherently genocidal monsters and that the world will not be safe as long as they exist.
Of course, the show is based on a comic book co-authored by Frank Miller, who is well known for his anti-religious bigotries. As I talk about in this article from November 2019, the film 300, which is based on one of his comic books, bizarrely portrays the Spartan ephors—who were, in historical reality, elected political leaders—as hideously deformed, corrupt, inbred priests with a love for all kinds of sexual perversions. The narrator describes them as “worthless remnants of a time before Sparta’s ascent from darkness, remnants of a senseless tradition.” Likewise, Miller’s graphic novel Holy Terror has been widely criticized as gratuitously Islamophobic.
I think that Cursed’s portrayal of the Red Paladins as an official wing of the Catholic Church committing blatant genocide against peaceful subjects in broad daylight with little-to-no opposition is pretty unrealistic. There are more realistic and frankly more interesting ways they could have portrayed them. For instance, they could have portrayed them as:
- an extremist Christian religious hate group like the Ku Klux Klan, whose members conduct acts of terrorism illegally, in disguise, and mostly under cover of darkness, often with the tacit approval of the local authorities
- an authoritarian Christian regime that ruthlessly persecutes the culture and religion of the fey and seeks to convert them to Christianity, but is not just rounding them all up and committing blatant mass genocide in broad daylight
- an authoritarian Christian faction who have come to power and are committing systematic genocide against the fey just like in the show, but they face opposition from other Christian factions, which they are trying to suppress, and are doing everything they can to cover up the atrocities they are committing and hide the ongoing genocide from the general public out of fear that the public might turn against them, similar to how the Nazis tried to hide and cover up the Holocaust
All of these possibilities would be far more realistic—and, in my opinion, far more interesting—than the implausible caricature the Red Paladins are in the show.
In any case, let’s leave all that aside and address this whole thing about medieval Christians supposedly crucifying heretics.
ABOVE: Screenshot of Merlin walking among the scorched remains of the crosses used by the Red Paladins to crucify and burn the fey alive, from Cursed, season one, episode two
The historical reality
The historical reality is that Christians in the Middle Ages never used crucifixion as a form of execution. The Roman emperor Constantine I abolished the use of crucifixion in around 337 AD and it never came back. The Roman historian Aurelius Victor (lived c. 320 – c. 390 AD), records in his De Caesaribus 41:4, in my own translation:
“And finally, Constantine received all his enemies with honor and protected their remaining fortunes. He was so pious that he was even the first to abolish the ancient and utterly heinous punishment of the forked gibbet and the breaking of the legs.”
Likewise, the slightly later Christian historian Sozomenos (lived c. 400 – c. 450 AD) records in his Ecclesiastical History 1.8.13, as translated by Chester D. Hartranft:
“He [i.e. Constantine] regarded the cross with peculiar reverence, on account both of the power which it conveyed to him in the battles against his enemies, and also of the divine manner in which the symbol had appeared to him. He took away by law the crucifixion customary among the Romans, from the usage of the courts. He commanded that this divine symbol should always be inscribed and stamped whenever coins and images should be struck, and his images, which exist in this very form, still testify to this order. And indeed he strove in everything, particularly in the enactment of laws, to serve God.”
As it happens, Aurelius Victor and Sozomenos clearly articulate the two main reasons why medieval Christians did not use crucifixion as a method of execution. The first reason, given by Aurelius Victor, is because crucifixion was widely seen as barbarous and inhumane.
As I discuss in this article from July 2020, ancient people were fully aware of how brutal crucifixion was and ancient Christians were perhaps more aware of the horrors of crucifixion than anyone else, since it had been all too often used against them. Throughout the Middle Ages, Christians continued to tell stories about how the Romans had ruthlessly crucified selfless Christian martyrs for their faith. Obviously, Christians weren’t keen on the idea of using the very brutal method of execution that had been used against followers of their religion for hundreds of years.
ABOVE: Illustration of the crucifixion of Jesus from the Syriac Rabbula Gospels, dating to c. 586 AD
In addition to regarding crucifixion as cruel and inhumane, medieval Christians also had a more explicitly religious reason for not using it, which is alluded to by Sozomenos. It is because crucifixion became inextricably associated with the death of Jesus and it became seen as blasphemous to kill anyone in the same manner as the Lord and Savior.
According to a legend that was popular during the Middle Ages, when Saint Peter, the closest of all Jesus’s apostles, was sentenced by the Romans to be crucified, he asked to be crucified upside-down, because he refused to dishonor Christ’s sacrifice by dying in the same manner as him. This is why the upside-down cross, known as the “Cross of Saint Peter,” is still used today as a symbol of the Papacy.
If medieval people thought that even Saint Peter himself was unworthy to die in the same manner as Jesus, could you imagine how they would balk at the idea of executing a heretic in such a manner? The very idea of crucifying someone for heresy would have been seen as an act of the uttermost blasphemy in and of itself.
ABOVE: The Crucifixion of Saint Peter, painted in 1601 by the Italian painter Caravaggio
Medieval Christians executing heretics
This is not to say that medieval Christians were incapable of using extreme brutality against heretics; they really did sometimes burn heretics at the stake, which is undeniably a truly horrific way to execute someone. On the other hand, it is not true that the church relentlessly hunted down anyone even suspected of having the slightest heretical thought so they could burn them alive. There was no real-world equivalent of the Red Paladins from Cursed.
As I discuss in this article from May 2019 debunking popular misconceptions about the Middle Ages, beliefs that the church regarded as heretical were extremely widespread throughout Europe during the Middle Ages. There were enormous, powerful heretical movements that swept across Europe, including the Manichaeans, Arians, Montanists, Pelagians, Donatists, Paulicians, Tondrakians, Bogomils, Arnoldists, Patarines, Cathars, Brethren of the Free Spirit, Dulcinians, Waldensians, Amalricians, Lollards, Hussites, and countless others. In many places during many periods, heterodoxy was more common than orthodoxy.
Heresy was so common and the church’s resources for containing it so limited that, most of the time, the church didn’t even bother trying to prosecute ordinary people who believed heretical things. For instance, if you were some random peasant who privately believed that the doctrine of the Trinity made no sense and that the miracle of transubstantiation was bogus, the church probably wasn’t going to bother trying to prosecute you. Instead, the church focused on prosecuting leaders of heretical movements—people who were openly preaching and promoting ideas that went directly against the teachings of the church.
Even then, the church could only prosecute heretics with the cooperation of secular authorities, there was widespread disagreement among ecclesiastical and secular authorities about what exactly qualified as heresy, and leaders of heretical movements were often able to evade prosecution. Even those who were prosecuted for heresy were often given many opportunities to recant in exchange for a lighter sentence.
Especially when compared to the number of people who held heretical beliefs, the number of people who were actually executed for heresy was remarkably small.
ABOVE: Manuscript illustration from a copy of the Grandes Chroniques de France dated to between c. 1455 and c. 1460 depicting Amalrician leaders being burned at the stake
One more article to defend christianity.
When you check his claims concerning Christianity you soon find out:
He mixes facts with half truths and/or not proven claims.
I am not trying to “defend Christianity”; I am merely correcting a blatant factual error that has been presented in several works of modern television.
There is absolutely no doubt that, throughout history, many Christians have committed terrible atrocities, both against their fellow Christians and against people of other faiths. Indeed, in my article above, I specifically note that medieval Christians were capable “of using extreme brutality against heretics” and that they really did sometimes burn people at the stake; they just didn’t use crucifixion.
I have written many articles criticizing various aspects of Christianity. For instance, here is a post in which I argue that the Exodus never really happened, here is a post in which I argue that King David may not have existed, here is a post in which I describe several books of the Bible as works of fiction, here is a post in which I say some generally unflattering things about early Christian ideas about marriage, here is a post in which I criticize contemporary Christian support for Donald Trump, and here is a post in which I argue that the Shroud of Turin is a medieval hoax.
I see myself as a historian, not a Christian apologist.
Christianity isn’t served by a false sense of history or a fairytale past. Getting as close as possible to the sitz im leben gives a clearer picture of the way theology was constructed and the role faith played – and may still play – throughout the actual course of events.
My comment above is of course a note of appreciation, in case it came across as criticism.
Yet another crazy misconception about Christianity. Thanks for clearing this one up. I had no idea anyone thought this, but I guess anything you can think of, someone believes.
I don’t know why mainstream TV has such a vendetta against Christians, but it’s very annoying.
I don’t think that all “mainstream TV” has a “vendetta” against Christians; it’s only certain shows made by certain people.
Frank Miller, the co-author of the comic book that Cursed is based on, pretty much has a vendetta against every religion. In the article above, I mention his graphic novel Holy Terror, which more-or-less portrays all Muslims as terrorists. 300 is both extremely anti-religious and extremely racist, since all the villains in both the original comic book and the movie based on it are portrayed as dark-skinned; whereas all the heroes are portrayed as light-skinned Europeans.
Thankfully, Miller seems to have really toned down the racism in recent years, but he hasn’t toned down the anti-religious extremism.
I don’t think that Medieval Christians crucifying heretics or pagans is a popular myth or trope. I have never heard of it. The popular believe is medieval Christians burning pagans and Heretics and suspected witches.