w-bishops, laid all the churches
of Rouen under interdict until the assassin of the bishop should be
discovered. But prior to the eleventh century general interdicts are
but rarely mentioned in church history. It does not appear that there
was any ritual for either general or particular interdicts, apart from
the usually concomitant sentence of excommunication--which in former
ages itself entailed also interdict on the persons or places named in
the decree of penalty. The interdict was usually laid under conditions
that amendment, reparation, or restitution should atone for the wrong
done, at which the interdict would be lifted. According to present
church law, bishops are empowered, as delegates of the Holy See, to
put under interdict particular churches, and the like. See Moroni's
Dizionario (Venezia, 1845), xxxvi, p. 49; Ferraris's Bibliotheca
(Paris, 1853), article "Interdictum;" Guerin, Les Petits Bollandistes
(Paris, 1878), iv, pp. 378-382; and Addis and Arnold's Catholic
Dictionary, article "Interdict."--Rev. T. C. Middleton, O.S.A.

[86] Diaz states (ut supra) that the archbishop's provisor,
Juan Gonzalez, took refuge in the Dominican convent, which was
soon surrounded with armed soldiers. At the advice of friends,
Gonzalez gave himself up, and was kept a close prisoner in his own
house--"guards being placed there at his cost; and penalty was imposed
of major excommunication and 500 pesos, if he should talk with any
person outside." As soon as Santo Domingo was blockaded, a decree of
the Audiencia was made known to all the convents that they must not
ring the bells for an interdict. To prevent this being done at Santo
Domingo, "they scaled the convent through the hall of the Inquisition,
which is above the main entrance, and ten soldiers went up to the
bell-tower." Next day, the friars rang a small bell to call the people
to mass, but the guards would not allow any person to enter the church.

[87] Salazar gives, a detailed account of Villalba's imprisonment
(Hist. Sant. Rosario, pp. 233, 234), and claims that he was hurried
from his convent at Binondoc, without cloak or hat, or bed, although
he was in poor health; and that, when the ship was compelled to put
back to Manila, the Audiencia would not allow him to remain there, but
at once despatched him to the Franciscan infirmary at Nueva Caceres,
where he remained until the next galleon sailed for Acapulco.

[88] This document, as being written by Sanchez, the