The Collaborative International Dictionary
Beghard \Be*ghard"\ Beguard \Be*guard"\, n. [F. b['e]gard, b['e]guard; cf. G. beghard, LL. Beghardus, Begihardus, Begardus. Prob. from the root of beguine + -ard or -hard. See Beguine.] (Eccl. Hist.) One of an association of religious laymen living in imitation of the Beguines. They arose in the thirteenth century, were afterward subjected to much persecution, and were suppressed by Innocent X. in 1650. Called also Beguins.
Usage examples of "beghard".
The Church, to protect itself against such horrors, burned the beghards wherever they were found.
You say this beghard has been found guilty of heresy, that she had been sent here to die, yet she is still alive.
A stake with a chain to hold the beghard's waist jutted up from the waiting timber.
The Scot was gazing at the beghard with a look of wonderment, even awe, and Thomas looked at the girl again and saw that under the scraps of straw and embedded filth she was beautiful.
If to believe that God gave all to everyone and wants everyone to share in every thing, then I am as bad as a beghard/ she admitted, but I never joined them.
The Perfect had been forerunners of the beghards, heretics who had denied the authority of the Church, and their evil had spread through the south until the Church, with the help of the French King, had crushed them.
He described how they had gone to Castillon d'Arbizon, and how they had found the beghard in the dungeons and how Thomas had saved her life.
The beghard's sin is not yours, my son/ he said, and when Thomas released her it was not your doing.
That had been the sin Robbie had confessed, though Abbot Planchard was a wise enough man to know that something else worried the young Scot and that the something else was probably the beghard.
Father Roubert was not upset because of weariness, but because of the beghard.
I'm not a beghard, though I could be one, but I am a heretic, and what choice do I have?
Planchard said, for I very much doubt if there are any beghards in these parts.
Joscelyn agreed, and regretted that the golden-haired beghard was not in the castle.
And these the populace now called Fraticelli, not unlike the French Beghards, who drew their inspiration from Pierre Olieu.
The Beghards of Narbonne had been condemned two years before, and Berengar Talloni, though he was one of the judges, had appealed to the Pope.