This strange confusion of ideas relative to victory and innocence, to might and right, first gave rise to _trial by ordeal_, or the _judgment of God_, which included ordeal by fire, by boiling water, by the cross, and by the sword, to which women, and even princesses, were subjected. Mankind, in the simplicity of its belief, appealed to God, the sovereign judge, and implored Him to grant strength and victory to the just cause. _Trial by ordeal_ fell into discredit about the time of Charlemagne, and was superseded, towards the latter half of the twelfth century, by the judicial duel. The institution of chivalry favoured this hasty method of decision, which was in accordance with the manners and ideas of the period. Questions which otherwise would have been difficult to solve were thus abruptly settled, and from these bloody decisions there was no appeal. In some countries, indeed, the judge who had decided between two antagonists had himself to submit to the judgment of God, as represented by the judicial duel, and was forced to come down from his judgment-seat and contend in arms against the criminal he had just condemned. On the other hand, however, it must be said that the judge, in his turn, possessed the privilege of challenging a prisoner who refused to bow to his decision. [Illustration: Fig. 126.--Duel concerning the Honour of Ladies.--Fac-simile of a Miniature in the “Histoire de Gérard de Nevers,” a Manuscript of the Fifteenth Century, in the National Library of Paris.]