Cheese And The Worms Analysis

Cheese and the Worms shows religious conflicts in the sixteenth-century through the court records of a small town miller who used different books to come up with his own view on religion. The fact that a man from a small town with very little education could use his very limited resources to become a target of the Catholic Church shows how much the Church was fighting to hold onto its power and influence. The book draws its information from the inquisition court records, which included the testimony of Menocchio’s fellow villagers and his own interactions with the inquisitors. The book begins with a background of the miller’s life and shows how Menocchio’s heretical views were discussed with almost everyone whom he could get to have a conversation
He was sentenced to life in prison not put to death like other more educated and influential heretics; he was simply not as significant of a threat. The fact that he spent his time in prison acting like he was reformed also would affect his later execution. The Church and its’ Inquisitors did not like being lied to and Menocchio reverting back to his old ways clearly shows that prison had no real impact on him. With Menocchio and others breaking off from the Catholic Church, there are lots of elements that impact their decisions. The one that stands out particularly for him and others seems to be the corruption in the Catholic Church. The power of the Pope, Cardinals, and other high ranking clergy was used to bring profit for themselves. They lived extravagant lifestyles while the poor barely managed to scrape by. All the while the very doctrine they were teaching said that they should be charitable and help their brothers and sisters in
The Inquisition took very good records in regard to the testimonies and interrogations it performed. The information presented is solid, however, there are some things that simply can’t be known now. Having the complete collection of Menocchio’s books would have been huge for answering where he drew ideas and ways of thinking from. Knowing what Menocchio’s writings were would also have been helpful in connecting things. Although since the Inquisition did not take note of everything he had they obviously did not find some things important, would historians today feel the same? The fact that he was able to openly speak the way he did and have the level of acceptance in his community leads into questions of how Catholic the rest of the Village really was. Were there other heretics hiding in his small village who simply did not want to draw attention to themselves by reporting Menocchio to the Inquisition? What influenced them to wait so long before reporting him and what factors caused him to finally be reported in the