Ordeal of the Eucharist.
This ordeal was in use among the clergy. The accused party took the sacrament in attestation of innocence, it being believed that, if guilty, he would be immediately visited with divine punishment for the sacrilege. A somewhat similar ordeal was that of the corsned, or consecrated bread and cheese. If the accused swallowed it freely, he was pronounced innocent; if it stuck in his throat, he was presumed to be guilty. Godwin, Earl of Kent, in the reign of Edward the Confessor, when accused of the murder of the king's brother, is said to have appealed to the ordeal of the corsned, and was choked by it.