Word of the Day: talion

talion (n)

Punishment that fits the crime, as in "an eye for an eye".

"The first question, then, is what is the suitable method of instituting a process on behalf of the faith against witches. In answer to this it must be said that there are three methods allowed by Canon Law. The first is when someone accuses a person before a judge of the crime of heresy, or of protecting heretics, offering to prove it, and to submit himself to the penalty of talion if he fails to prove it. The second method is when someone denounces a person, but does not offer to prove it and is not willing to embroil himself in the matter...."
--Heinrich Kramer and James Sprenger, Malleus Maleficarum, 1487

Heretics and witches. I guess I am the former (by the standards of the time when Malleus Maleficarum was written), and I know someone who calls herself the latter. "Are you a good witch or a bad witch?" It's not always that simple. The witch I know is one of those crazy cat ladies and is pretty benign, though -- except when she makes someone spontaneously combust.

(Talion, by the way, is one of the words that the late David Foster Wallace circled in his dictionary.)