Despite what the vast majority thinks, the Inquisition did not originate in Spain, but was a Vatican creation to put an end to the spread of the Cathar or Albigensian heresy in France, which spread throughout Europe during the 12th and 13th centuries. The black anti-Spanish legend, encouraged and spread by the enemies of the Hispanic Monarchy took its toll on it. However, it was a process before a court that offered the greatest procedural guarantees in the Europe of the Religious Wars of the Modern Age.