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inquisitorial
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Inquisitorial

Inquisitorial \In*quis`i*to"ri*al\, a. [Cf. F. inquisitorial.]

  1. Pertaining to inquisition; making rigorous and unfriendly inquiry; searching; as, inquisitorial power. ``Illiberal and inquisitorial abuse.''
    --F. Blackburne.

    He conferred on it a kind of inquisitorial and censorious power even over the laity, and directed it to inquire into all matters of conscience.
    --Hume.

  2. Pertaining to the Court of Inquisition or resembling its practices. ``Inquisitorial robes.''
    --C. Buchanan.

Wiktionary
inquisitorial

a. 1 of or pertaining to an inquisition, specifically the Inquisition 2 in a manner of inquisition or inquisitors 3 (context legal English) describing a trial system in which the prosecutor also acts as judge

WordNet
inquisitorial
  1. adj. especially indicating a form of prosecution in which proceedings are secret and the accused is questioned by a prosecutor who acts also as the judge [ant: accusatorial]

  2. marked by inquisitive interest; especially suggestive of an ecclesiastical inquisitor; "the press was inquisitorial to the point of antagonism"; "a practical police force with true inquisitorial talents"- Waldo Frank

  3. having the authority to conduct official investigations; "the inquisitorial power of the Senate"

Usage examples of "inquisitorial".

During the month of May seven persons were appointed to examine, my papers, and among the inquisitorial septemvirate were two men well known and filling high situations.

Dread of the perverted gynecologist and his inquisitorial instruments.

But these revolts of Valentine were rare, although her life was a series of tortures inflicted with inquisitorial cruelty.

The fellow at the door was an exciseman--a race everywhere detested and with good cause, for besides the insolence of their manners nothing makes a man feel more like a slave than the inquisitorial search they are accustomed to make through one's clothes and most secret possessions.

In Italy, the Inquisition was condemning people to death until the end of the eighteenth century, and inquisitorial torture was not abolished in the Catholic Church until 1816.

Among the German farmers of Lancaster, for example, are scores, perhaps hundreds, of truly, literally Good People, escap'd from a Hell we in our small tended Quotidian may but try to imagine, entire Villages put to Flame, and Tortures worse than Inquisitorial, disembowelments, bloodlettings, a world without Innocence, yet, escap'd here, into Innocence reborn, something deeper and more intricate, they call it "a new Life in Christ," it is their way of explaining it.

But the unsought favor of the government was as much a check as an assistance to Piero's schemes, bringing him so frequently into requisition for official intrigues that he had less opportunity for counterplotting, while his knowledge of State secrets which he might not compromise, of the far-reaching vision of Inquisitorial eyes, and of the swift and relentless execution of those unknown _osservatori_ who had been unfaithful to their primal duty as spies, made him dare less where others were concerned than he would have foretold before he had been admitted to these unexpected official confidences.

Paul remembered his holiday tour, and how things like the Bridge of Sighs, a covered bridge high above the canal, where criminals were conveyed back and forth from the cells to the inquisitorial chambers, had seemed so quaint.

You will recall, if you please, that the matter was decided wholly without regard to proper inquisitorial procedure, and indeed wholly without regard to the proper rule of canon law.

Peremptorily refusing to answer the articles in detail, and objecting even to sign the short rejoinders he had made, he persisted in his demand for an open trial, and inveighed against the secret and inquisitorial examinations to which he was subjected, declaring that he would answer no more interrogations.