Stigmatisation (Lat. stigmatizatio, 'a puncturing,' from Gr. stigma, 'a puncture'), the name applied by Roman Catholic writers to the supposed miraculous impression on certain individuals of the 'stigmata,' or marks of the wounds which our Lord suffered during the course of His Passion. St Paul says of himself, 'I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus' (Gal. vi. 15), but his bold metaphor is most likely taken from the notion of soldiers branding on their bodies their general's name. In the early days many Christians branded the name of Christ on their foreheads, and various voluntary mutilations for Christ's sake were practised by enthusiasts. The stigmata comprise not only the wounds of the hands and feet, and that of the side, received in the crucifixion, but also those impressed by the crown of thorns and by the scourging. The impression of the stigmata is by those who believe in its reality regarded as a mark of the signal favour of our Lord, manifested to believers specially devoted to the contemplation of His Passion. The most remarkable example of stigmatisation is that said to have occurred in 1224 to Francis of Assisi, on the mountain of Alverno. Being absorbed in rapturous contemplation of the Passion of Christ, he saw a seraph with six shining wings, blazing with fire, and having between his wings the figure of a man crucified, descend from heaven and approach him, so as to be almost in contact. After a time the vision disappeared, leaving the soul of Francis filled with reverence and awe. And now he became aware that in hands, feet, and side he had received externally the marks of crucifixion. These mysterious marks continued during the two years until his death, and are claimed to have been seen by many eye-witnesses, including Pope Alexander IV.
The Dominicans openly disputed the fact, but at length made the same claim for Catharine of Sienna, whose stigmata were explained as at her own request made invisible to others. The Franciscans appealed to Sixtus IV., and that pope, himself a Franciscan, forbade representations of St Catharine to be made with the stigmata. Still the fact is recorded in the breviary office, and Benedict XIII. granted the Dominicans a special feast in commemoration of it. Many others, especially women, are claimed to have received all or some of the stigmata. The last to be canonised (1831) for this reason was Veronica Giuliani, who is said to have received in 1694 first the marks of the crown of thorns, and afterwards those of the crucifixion. More recent cases are those of Anna Katherina Emmerich (1774–1824), who became a nun at Agnetenberg; 'L'Ecstatica' Maria von Mörl of Cadaro (1839); Louise Lateau (1850–83, in 1868), whose stigmata were stated to bleed every Friday; and Mrs Girling (1827–86, about Christmas 1864), of the New Forest Shaker community. Dr Imbert Gourbeyre, in his work Les Stigmatisées (1873), enumerates 145 persons, of whom but 20 were men, as having received the stigmata, and of these 80 lived before the 17th century. Apart altogether from the question of the value of the evidence offered, we may reasonably conclude that some kind of stigmatisation is a pathological condition of occasional occurrence, but from this to the assertion that it is a special sign of divine favour is a wide and an unwarrantable leap.