File:Pedro Berruguete Saint Dominic Presiding over an Auto-da-fe 1495.jpg

English: Representations of an auto-da-fé often depict torture or someone being burnt at the stake. The two victims at the mid-lower right are tied by the neck to two posts and held up by two stakes driven horizontally into the posts behind them, meant to prolong their deaths by preventing suffocation by the ropes or garrotes wrapped around their necks. Another possible purpose of these stakes was to further shame and humiliate the victims, due to their apparently intentional resemblance to the human male anatomy. The two victims tied to the posts await their deaths as the pile of burning firewood before them is fed and fueled sufficiently to attain the desired result. The two victims standing in line await their own turns next on the posts. All of these victims are Cathars, allegedly Saint Dominic's primary targets. Some defenders of Saint Dominic dispute that he ever acted as an inquisitor. Painted in the late 1400s, it depicts an episode in the life of St. Dominic from nearly 300 years earlier. In Pedro Berruguete's 15th century Spain, autos-da-fe were still a fairly routine and commonplace event and thus many elements of the painting most probably portray one or more real life events as directly witnessed by the artist himself. The artist may have incorporated some subtle but distinct forms of protest into the painting: first by placing a few sleeping or drowsy attendants in the work; secondly the only figure in the entire painting who was portrayed with a "fully open mouth" while speaking happens to be the one Cathar who is next in line for execution. Later, during the Protestant Reformation, this painting was used for anti-Catholic propaganda. A very high-definition file of the painting is available at the Prado site. Also, clicking on the file will enlarge it significantly.