What kinds of punishments were inflicted?
Church courts of the Middle Ages had a deserved reputation for being far more lenient than their secular equivalents and this caused tension when the jurisdictions crossed. Henry II of England was particularly displeased about this in his dispute with the church that led to the murder of St Thomas Beckett. For instance, the secular punishment for sodomy and bestiality was death right up to the nineteenth in most European countries but a church court was more likely to send the miscreant off on a pilgrimage. Records of punishments show that public confession, the wearing of a cross, pilgrimages, imprisonment and also execution were all sanctions available to the inquisitor with more mild reproofs being much the more common.
