How did the education and intellectual and spiritual formation of inquisitors influence their approach to those suspected or accused of heresy? One way to answer this question, as Christine Caldwell Ames has shown, is to analyse texts drafted directly by the inquisitors themselves. In the case of the medieval inquisition on the territory of the archdiocese of Gniezno, the great scarcity of such source materials is such that at first sight this task appears to be unfeasible. However, it seems that a more careful reading of the court records from the Świdnica Trial of 1332 can enable us to tackle this challenge.

While analysing the document that concerns us here, it is relatively easy to reconstruct the interrogatorium used by John of Schwenkenfeld, the set of questions and topics which enabled the interrogator to establish grounds for any charges of heresy. First of all, the Dominican friar wished to precisely examine the links between local beguines and the followers of the Free Spirit Sect, which was condemned by the Council of Vienne. Hence, large parts of the statements from those questioned also concentrate on articles included in the conciliar constitution Ad nostrum, namely the state of perfection, sinlessness, radical poverty, and scorn for the Church's sacraments and institutions. Since we do actually come across more or less clear references in the records of the interrogation of the Świdnica sisters to the beguines and beghards condemned by the Council, most modern historians have been of one mind in linking the Świdnica community with the Free Spirit Heresy. However, it is worth indicating at this point that it is not completely correct simply to identify these groups with one another. Evidently, John of Schwenkenfeld himself was unable to define explicitly what these beguines actually were.

There can be no doubt that John of Schwenkenfeld was an expert familiar with heterodox trends in the society of his day. However, it should be noted that he was also a specialist in questions that extended far beyond the realm of ordinary inquisition courts. Among the almost 190 articles recorded in the official proceedings of the Świdnica trial, there are also several real subtilia theologiae (‘theological subtleties’) which, as we shall see in this present study, should be regarded more as topics for refined debate in university divinity departments than as subjects for inquisition proceedings held in a Dominican refectory.