Renaissance; Protestant Reformation (1517); Wars of Religion

Early Modern Era · ~1500 – ~1800

Between roughly 1400 and 1650, Europe was reshaped by two overlapping upheavals. The Renaissance began in Italian cities such as Florence, where artists, scholars and patrons revived classical learning, developed new techniques in art and architecture, and placed fresh emphasis on human potential. Movable-type printing, developed around 1450, carried those ideas rapidly across the continent.

In 1517 Martin Luther's challenge to the sale of indulgences grew into the Protestant Reformation, which split western Christendom into rival churches. Catholic renewal, marked by the Council of Trent, answered it. Rivalries between faiths, dynasties and states then erupted into the Wars of Religion, above all in France and in the Thirty Years' War, which ended with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.

Things happened, and the rest is history

Brunelleschi's dome and the Florentine Renaissance
Event
What happened
In 1420 Florence commissions the architect Filippo Brunelleschi to build a vast dome over its cathedral, Santa Maria del Fiore, and it is completed in 1436. Florence is rich from banking and the wool trade, and after 1434 the Medici family dominates its politics and patronage. Around them artists and humanists such as Donatello, Masaccio and Alberti study the ancient world and develop linear perspective.
The rest is history
The dome shows the Renaissance joining engineering, art and a revived interest in Roman models. Humanism spread from Florence to Rome, Venice, Milan and beyond, and Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael carried it into the High Renaissance. The historian Jacob Burckhardt popularised the idea of the Renaissance as a sharp break with the Middle Ages in 1860. Modern scholars stress its continuities with medieval culture.
Sources
1. BookBurckhardt, Jacob. Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien. Basel: Schweighauser, 1860.The classic statement of the Renaissance as a break with the medieval past.
2. BookBurke, Peter. The Italian Renaissance: Culture and Society in Italy. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1986.
3. BookKing, Ross. Brunelleschi's Dome. London: Chatto & Windus, 2000.
Gutenberg and the printing press
Event
What happened
Around 1450 Johannes Gutenberg of Mainz develops a system of movable metal type, oil-based ink and an adapted screw press. His 42-line Bible appears around 1455. Printing shops then spread quickly through Germany, Italy and the rest of Europe.
The rest is history
Printing made classical and humanist texts cheaper and let vernacular pamphlets circulate on a new scale. Luther's German writings sold in great numbers after 1517, and the Reformation was fought as much in print as in pulpits. Elizabeth Eisenstein argued that printing was an agent of change that transformed European culture. Other historians note that manuscript and oral communication persisted for generations.
Sources
1. BookEisenstein, Elizabeth L. The Printing Press as an Agent of Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979.
2. BookEdwards, Mark U. Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994.
Luther's Ninety-Five Theses
Event
What happened
In late October 1517 Martin Luther, a friar and professor of theology at Wittenberg, sends his Ninety-Five Theses attacking the sale of indulgences to Archbishop Albert of Mainz. The indulgence preaching of Johann Tetzel helped fund the rebuilding of St Peter's in Rome and Albert's own debts. The theses are soon printed and spread across Germany.
The rest is history
The quarrel escalated quickly. After the Leipzig Debate with Johann Eck in 1519, Pope Leo X threatened Luther in the bull Exsurge Domine (1520), and Luther was excommunicated in January 1521. Others developed reform independently, among them Huldrych Zwingli in Zurich and John Calvin in Geneva, whose Institutes appeared in 1536. The result was a lasting division of western Christianity.
Sources
1. PrimaryLuther, Martin. Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum (the Ninety-Five Theses). Latin theses, 1517.
2. BookMacCulloch, Diarmaid. Reformation: Europe's House Divided, 1490-1700. London: Allen Lane, 2003.
3. BookRoper, Lyndal. Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet. London: Bodley Head, 2016.
The Diet of Worms
Event
What happened
In April 1521 Luther is summoned before the Imperial Diet at Worms, presided over by the young Emperor Charles V, and refuses to retract his writings unless shown wrong by scripture or reason. In May the Edict of Worms declares him an outlaw. Frederick the Wise of Saxony has him taken into protective custody at the Wartburg, where he translates the New Testament into German in 1522.
The rest is history
The edict was enforced unevenly. Charles V was busy with wars against France and the Ottomans, and many princes and city councils embraced Luther's teaching, for political as well as religious reasons. The Peasants' War of 1524 to 1525 showed how reform could unleash unrest. In 1531 Protestant princes formed the Schmalkaldic League for mutual defence.
Sources
1. BookRoper, Lyndal. Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet. London: Bodley Head, 2016.
2. BookCameron, Euan. The European Reformation. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991.
The English Act of Supremacy
Event
What happened
After the pope refuses to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII has Parliament pass the Act of Supremacy in 1534, declaring him Supreme Head of the Church of England. Under Thomas Cromwell the monasteries are dissolved between 1536 and 1540, and their lands pass to the crown and its supporters.
The rest is history
England's break with Rome began as a dynastic and political matter more than a doctrinal one. Protestant worship was introduced under Edward VI, notably the Book of Common Prayer of 1549, and Catholicism was restored under Mary I from 1553. Elizabeth I's settlement of 1559 created a Protestant church that kept many traditional forms.
Sources
1. PrimaryAct of Supremacy, 26 Hen. 8 c. 1. Statute of the English Parliament, 1534.
2. BookScarisbrick, J. J. Henry VIII. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1968.
3. BookDuffy, Eamon. The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992.
The Council of Trent
Event
What happened
Meeting at Trent in three phases between 1545 and 1563, the Catholic Church's council reaffirms its doctrine against Protestant teaching. It upholds scripture and tradition as authorities and the seven sacraments. It also condemns abuses in the sale of indulgences and orders seminaries to train priests.
The rest is history
Trent shaped Catholic identity for centuries and ended realistic hopes of reunion with Protestants. It was followed by the Roman Catechism of 1566 and a standard Roman Missal in 1570. New orders such as the Jesuits, approved in 1540, led in education and missions. Historians now often prefer Catholic Reformation to Counter-Reformation, since much renewal was internal.
Sources
1. BookO'Malley, John W. Trent: What Happened at the Council. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2013.
2. BookJedin, Hubert. A History of the Council of Trent. London: Nelson, 1957.
The French Wars of Religion and the Edict of Nantes
Event
What happened
From 1562 to 1598 France suffers a series of civil wars between Catholics and Calvinist Huguenots, entangled with rivalries between noble houses such as the Guise and the Bourbons. In August 1572 Catholic soldiers and mobs massacre Huguenots in Paris, and the killing spreads to the provinces. Henry of Navarre converts to Catholicism and as Henry IV issues the Edict of Nantes in 1598, granting Huguenots liberty of conscience and limited public worship.
The rest is history
The edict ended the wars and strengthened royal authority, but its toleration was always contested. In 1685 Louis XIV revoked it, and many thousands of Huguenots left France. The wars became a classic case of how confessional conflict, dynastic rivalry and weak central government can combine to produce prolonged violence.
Sources
1. PrimaryEdict of Nantes. Royal edict of Henry IV, April 1598.
2. BookHolt, Mack P. The French Wars of Religion, 1562-1629. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
3. BookKnecht, R. J. The French Wars of Religion, 1559-1598. London: Longman, 1989.
The Peace of Westphalia
Event
What happened
The Peace of Augsburg of 1555 let Lutheran princes in the Holy Roman Empire choose their territory's religion but excluded Calvinists. Continuing tensions helped to bring on the Thirty Years' War of 1618 to 1648, which devastated much of central Europe. Treaties signed at Münster and Osnabrück in 1648 end it and extend recognition to Calvinists.
The rest is history
Westphalia closed the era of large-scale religious wars in western Europe and confirmed the autonomy of German princes within the empire. It is often said to have created the modern system of sovereign states, which historians now treat as an exaggeration. Afterwards dynastic and state interests increasingly dominated European warfare.
Sources
1. PrimaryInstrumentum Pacis Osnabrugensis (Treaty of Osnabrück). Peace treaty, 1648.
2. BookWilson, Peter H. Europe's Tragedy: A History of the Thirty Years War. London: Allen Lane, 2009.
3. BookParker, Geoffrey, ed. The Thirty Years' War. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984.
Luther nailed the theses to the church door
Popular belief
The legend
On 31 October 1517 Martin Luther walks up to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, hammers up his Ninety-Five Theses, and so begins the Reformation.
The rest is history
The nailing is far less certain than the story suggests. Luther's own letters mention sending the theses to Archbishop Albert, not posting them. The earliest report of a posting comes from Philip Melanchthon after Luther's death, and Melanchthon was not in Wittenberg in 1517. The door did serve as a university notice board, so it is plausible. Erwin Iserloh challenged the account in 1962, and historians still debate it. The theses were certainly printed and spread quickly.
Sources
1. BookIserloh, Erwin. Luthers Thesenanschlag: Tatsache oder Legende? Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1962.
2. BookRoper, Lyndal. Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet. London: Bodley Head, 2016.
"Here I stand, I can do no other"
Popular belief
The legend
At the Diet of Worms in 1521, the story goes, Luther defies emperor and church with the words "Here I stand, I can do no other."
The rest is history
Luther did refuse to recant at Worms, and that is firmly attested. The famous words appear in a printed version of the speech issued soon afterwards but not in the official record of the hearing. Historians therefore doubt that they can be proved to have been spoken. The phrase endured because it captures the drama of a lone conscience facing worldly power, and it became central to Protestant memory.
Sources
1. BookBrecht, Martin. Martin Luther: His Road to Reformation, 1483-1521. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.
2. BookRoper, Lyndal. Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet. London: Bodley Head, 2016.
Greek exiles from Constantinople started the Renaissance
Popular belief
The legend
A popular account says that after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453, Greek scholars fled to Italy with ancient manuscripts and so sparked the Renaissance.
The rest is history
Italian humanists were studying Greek long before 1453. The Byzantine scholar Manuel Chrysoloras taught Greek in Florence from 1397, and Petrarch and Boccaccio had pursued classical learning in the fourteenth century. Byzantine scholars such as Bessarion were already in Italy by the 1430s. The fall of Constantinople sent more scholars west and probably quickened Greek studies, but it did not begin the Renaissance.
Sources
1. BookWilson, N. G. From Byzantium to Italy: Greek Studies in the Italian Renaissance. London: Duckworth, 1992.
2. BookNauert, Charles G. Humanism and the Culture of Renaissance Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
Catherine de' Medici planned the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre
Popular belief
The legend
Protestant writers and later tradition portray the queen mother, Catherine de' Medici, as the scheming mastermind who lured the Huguenots to Paris with a royal wedding in 1572 so they could be slaughtered.
The rest is history
Historians generally reject a long-planned plot. The wedding of Henry of Navarre and Margaret of Valois was meant to promote peace. The crisis began when Admiral Coligny was wounded in an assassination attempt on 22 August 1572, and fear of Huguenot reprisal seems to have led the royal council to order the killing of Huguenot leaders. Violence then spread beyond control as Parisian mobs attacked ordinary Huguenots. Scholars still debate how far the crown directed events.
Sources
1. BookHolt, Mack P. The French Wars of Religion, 1562-1629. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
2. BookKnecht, R. J. The French Wars of Religion, 1559-1598. London: Longman, 1989.

← Back to the outline

Things happened, and the rest is history

Brunelleschi's dome and the Florentine Renaissance

Gutenberg and the printing press

Luther's Ninety-Five Theses

The Diet of Worms

The English Act of Supremacy

The Council of Trent

The French Wars of Religion and the Edict of Nantes

The Peace of Westphalia

Luther nailed the theses to the church door

"Here I stand, I can do no other"

Greek exiles from Constantinople started the Renaissance

Catherine de' Medici planned the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre