INDEX EXPURGATORIUS

INDEX EXPURGATORIUS, a list of books issued by the Church of Rome, which, as hostile to her teaching, are placed under her ban, and are under penalties forbidden to be read. The first list published was by Pope Paul IV. in 1557, and in 1562 the Council of Trent appointed a committee whose special business it should be to draw up a complete list of obnoxious writings, a work which it fell to Paul IV. to finish after the sittings of the Council came to a close in an index issued in 1564.