Chapter 5 explores a wide range of passages where the Sectarians identify themselves as the present-time victims or potential victims of violence perpetrated by empowered others: Rome and the local Jewish priestly and political authorities. The imagery of the powerful priests in Jerusalem and their leader the Wicked Priest waging a campaign of violence and intimidation against the Sectarians is part of a broader attempt by the disempowered and disenfranchised Sectarians to craft a narrative of victimhood.

This chapter surveys different ways in which ‘heresy’ has been conceptualised by a variety of writers, both within the periods in which it arose and in later centuries. Tracing a number of different inflections to the charge of heresy, the chapter suggests that we might see it not only as constructed by orthodox authority but as a means by which ‘authority’ itself is reaffirmed; and in conclusion suggests some ways through which modern historians might then reconceptualise their search for ‘dissent’ in past times.

The Waldensians began inside the church in the 1170s, were excommunicated, went underground and survived into the sixteenth century. In our efforts to get at their past reality, how far can we penetrate the texts about them produced in the Middle Ages by a persecuting church, during the Reformation and Counter-Reformation by polemicists and in modern times by academics modelling them according to the latest intellectual fashions?

The Nuremberg Laws of 1935 prohibited marriage between people “of German blood” and Jews (including, in practice, “half-Jews”). So-called mixed marriages already in existence were subjected to persecutory measures. This chapter examines the fates of couples in mixed marriages and their “mixed-blood” children, both inside Germany and in Nazi-occupied Europe.

This chapter discusses the emergence of crimes against humanity, the main definitional features, and the most important jurisprudence on crimes against humanity. The chapter reviews historic references, the Nuremberg Charter, and evolution through international jurisprudence. The chapter examines the meaning of ‘widespread or systematic attack directed against a civilian population’, including the controversy over the meaning of ‘civilian’ and the many controversies about the ICC Statute Article 7 requirement of a ‘state or organizational policy’. The chapter reviews the jurisprudence on the prohibited acts (also referred to as ‘inhumane acts’), including murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, forcible transfer, imprisonment, torture, rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilization, other sexual violence, persecution, forced disappearance, apartheid, and other inhumane acts.

Chapter 2 considers the so-called cradle of Christian martyrdom: Second-century Asia Minor. Beginning with an analysis of the economic, political, and social relationships between Christian, Jewish, and Greek social structures in the face of the Roman Empire’s centralization of power, I outline the circumstances of Christian martyrs during the first centuries following Jesus’ death. Using legal statutes alongside letters between Pliny the Younger and the emperor Trajan, I analyze the contours and relative scope and depth of Roman persecution. Through an analysis of the language used by Christian theologians and the period’s popular Acta Martyrum, I consider the way martyrdom was performed in recognition of a separate pax Deorum—agreement with God—that challenged that of the Roman state. I proceed to show how martyrs were interpreted as imitators of Christ’s sacrifice, and the meaning that designation brought to martyrs and their audience. Finally, I highlight the parrhēsia—bold, free speech—demonstrated in martyrdom to articulate the centrality of truth-telling to Christian martyrs, a theme to which I return throughout the book.

Shakespeare and George Peele’s Titus Andronicus (1591–94) stages both the proliferating texts and the religious violence of the early 1590s. These years saw a spate of sectarian libels from persecuted Puritans and Catholics alike. In Titus, the marginalized Andronici likewise launch ephemeral scraps of writing into the sky, texts that join appeals for redress with violent threats. These libels bear an especially close resemblance to those scattered in the streets by the Puritan extremist William Hacket and his accomplices in 1591. But the echoes are also cross-confessional, indicating a broader interest in the “manner” of religiopolitical speech. The play folds its topical allegory into a Tacitean-humanist history of political communication: the rise of the emperor, Saturninus, brings about the end of public oratory. Their speech silenced, the Andronici unleash a flurry of texts that takes the Tacitean story of rhetorical decline into its early modern future. By yoking libels not just to the pursuit of justice but also to factionalism and violence, Titus takes a hard look at the viral and virulent media of the late Elizabethan public sphere.

This chapter offers a survey of religious dissimulation in early modern England, where questions concerning its legitimacy were, owing to the unpredictable course of the English Reformation(s), arguably more pressing than anywhere else in Europe. While most Catholic and Protestant theological authorities condemned dissimulation in principle, the practice must have been widespread and was perceived, at least by those in power, as a political reality that could not simply be ignored. This chapter outlines both ecclesiological and political justifications for tolerating those who dissembled their faith and argues that their ambivalent status and the often unstable practices of policing such religious dissimulation should be considered a central aspect of early modern approaches to the problem of religious toleration. Religious dissimulation was a highly controversial practice, and toleration for inward dissent was never a given. Especially in times of political crisis, church and state authorities frequently resorted to aggressive measures to access the secret beliefs of religious dissenters, which belied the Queen’s alleged refusal to make windows into men’s hearts.

Chapter 5 examines how an essential element of the Refugee Convention definition, namely the ‘well-founded fear of being persecuted’, is applied and interpreted by judicial authorities when appellants flee contemporary armed conflicts. It sets out that only appellants who had experienced past persecution or singling out had their claim examined under the Refugee Convention. The chapter also discusses the finding that although appellate authorities have some awareness of gender norms, these are considered fixed, such that any departure from them is disbelieved and results in a negative risk assessment. Appellate authorities in the EU thus apply a higher standard of proof than warranted in international refugee law. In effect, this has led to a modification of the standard of proof in international refugee law as it is now equated with the assessment of credibility, which itself can be highly gendered. The chapter claims that the practice acts as barrier to the international protection of persons fleeing contemporary armed conflicts. Further, the failure to examine the general conditions of violence in contemporary armed conflicts is contrary to the obligations of states under international law.

Mountain areas have faced a rapid increase in human activities over recent decades, often leading to habitat loss or degradation. The impacts of these activities can affect bird species both directly (e.g., by altering habitat characteristics, impacting migration or disturbing breeding or wintering grounds), and indirectly by inducing physiological responses. We summarize the human activities that take place at high elevation and provide examples of species that are known to be impacted. Hiking and winter sports in particular are common in many mountain regions and there is growing evidence of a range of impacts on year-round resident mountain birds and their food resources. Increasing evidence also suggests that use of, and dependence on, human-derived foods around human settlements affects the trophic ecology of high-altitude birds. Hunting mountain birds is common place in many areas, and we review the evidence that hunting activity, including illegal persecution, has had impacts at the population level. Finally, we assess how direct disturbance and habitat alteration due to renewable energy developments (i.e. wind turbines and hydropower) are affecting mountain bird communities. There are many unknown impacts of human disturbance and we highlight missing information on specific topics that should be investigated in future research.

Chapter 5 studies the life of the Dominican friars on the English Mission from 1661 to 1850, in London where they were at first welcome at court or attached to embassy chapels, at their family seats, or as chaplains attached to recusant families on rural estates. It shows their normally good relations with patrons, but also their insecurity for most of the period in the absence of sufficient residences with a guaranteed income where one friar could succeed another in the local mission. The friars maintained their Dominican idenity through their liturgy, their spiritual reading, their letters, and meetings. As the Industrial Revolution took hold, they were able to gain more support from ordinary lay Catholics in urban parishes, but also required to fund the construction of new churches and schools, while the lack of recuits required them to withdraw from many missions.