Pardonmonger

I read of Tecelius, the Popes pardonmonger in Germany, that having by sale of indulgences scraped together a huge masse of money and returning for Rome, he was met and eased of his cash by an odde fellow; who being afterwards prosecuted for a felon, produced a pardon for future sinnes granted him by Tecelius himself, and being thereupon acquitted by the Judge, he roasted that which that other old fox had taken in hunting.

Some of the bones were probably not even human, for Chaucer had the hardihood to represent the pardonmonger as carrying about with him a “pilwebere,” which he called our Lady’s veil, a cross of tin set full of stones, and pig’s bones in a glass; […]

For a certain nobleman having bought such an indulgence for thirty dollars, laid wait for the agent of the Pope as he passed between Jütterbock and Trebbin, deprived him of all his money, and stripped and beat him, alleging the plenary indulgence as freeing him from the consequences of his crime. In vain the unfortunate pardon-monger appealed to the Duke George of Saxony, who heard the story, and rather sympathized with the inflicter of the punishment than with his victim.

The first part is the tale of the temptation of King Humanity by Dame Sensuality; the second is the cheating of a poor man by a Roman Pardonmonger selling indulgences and absolutions; […]