Discussion

The Wars of Religion, Part

I

 

The religious wars began with overt hostilities in 1562 and

lasted until the Edict of Nantes in 1598. It was warfare that

devastated a generation, although conducted in rather

desultory, inconclusive way. Although religion was certainly

the basis for the conflict, it was much more than a

confessional dispute.

"Une foi, un loi, un roi," (one faith, one law, one king). This

traditional saying gives some indication of how the state,

society, and religion were all bound up together in people's

minds and experience. There was not the distinction that we

have now between public and private, between civic and

personal. Religion had formed the basis of the social

consensus of Europe for a millenium. Since Clovis, the

French monarchy in particular had closely tied itself to the

church -- the church sanctified its right to rule in exchange

for military and civil protection. France was "the first

daughter of the church" and its king "The Most Christian

King" (le roy tres chretien), and no one could imagine life

any other way.

"One faith" was viewed as essential to civil order -- how else

would society hold together? And without the right faith,

pleasing to God who upholds the natural order, there was

sure to be disaster. Heresy was treason, and vice versa.

Religious toleration, which to us seems such a necessary

virtue in public life, was considered tantamount to letting

drug dealers move next door and corrupt your children, a

view for the cynical and world-weary who had forgotten God

and no longer cared about the health of society.

Innovation caused trouble. The way things were is how they

ought to be, and new ideas would lead to anarchy and

destruction. No one wanted to admit to being an

"innovater." The Renaissance thought of itself as

rediscovering a purer, earlier time and the Reformation

needed to feel that it was not new, but just a "return" to the

simple, true religion of the beginnings of Christianity.

These fears of innovation certainly seemed justified when

Henri II died suddenly in 1559, leaving an enormous power

vacuum at the heart of social authority in France. The

monarchy had never been truly absolute (although François

I er

made long strides in that direction), and had always ruled

in an often uneasy relationship with the nobility. The nobles'

sense of their own rights as a class, and the ambitions of

some of the more talented, were always there to threaten

the hegemony of the crown.

When the vacuum appeared, the House of Guise moved in.

François II, although only 15, was married to Mary Queen of

Scots, a niece of the Duc de Guise. The Guise were a cadet

branch of the House of Lorraine (an independent imperial

duchy) that were raised to the peerage by François I er

. They

were ambitious and had already produced at least two

generations of exceptional leaders. The duc de Guise,

François, was a military hero, and his brother, the Cardinal

de Lorraine, was a formidable scholar and statesman.

During François II's brief reign, Guise power was absolute.

This greatly threatened the House of Montmorency, an

ancient line which had enjoyed great political prominence

under Henri II, as well as the Bourbons, who as the first

princes of the blood had the rights of tutorship over a minor

king. François II was not technically a minor (14 was the age

of majority), but he was young and sickly and no one

expected much from him.

These dynastic tensions interweave with the religious and

social ones. The Bourbon princes were Protestant (the

Antoine de Bourbon, King of Navarre and the Louis de

Bourbon, Prince de Condé), and although the constable de

Montmorency was Catholic, his nephews, the Châtillon

brothers (including Admiral de Coligny) were Protestants.

The Guise identified themselves strongly as defenders of the

Catholic faith and formed an alliance with Montmorency and

the Marechal St. André to form the "Catholic triumvirate."

They were joined by Antoine de Bourbon, who flip-flopped

again on the matter of his religion. His wife, Jeanne d'Albret,

the Queen of Navarre, remained staunchly Protestant and

established Protestantism completely in her domains.

Catherine de' Medici tried to promote peace by issuing the

"Edict of Toleration" in January '62, which made the practice

of Protestantism not a crime, although it was restricted to

preaching in open fields outside the towns and to the

private estates of Huguenot (Protestant) nobles. This was

not well-received by many Catholics.

The First War (1562-1563)

The first religious war was provoked by the Massacre at

Vassy in '62. The Duc de Guise, travelling to his estates,

stopped in Vassy on a Sunday and decided to hear Mass. A

few of his servants got into a scuffle with some Huguenots

who were attending a service in a nearby building, and the

whole thing escalated until the Guise faction had fired on

the unarmed Huguenots, set the church on fire, and killed a

number of the congregation.

The national synod for the reformed church met in Paris and

appealed to the Prince de Condé to become the "Protector

of the Churches." He, his clients, and their respective client

networks took on the task, and from this point the

leadership of the Huguenots moves away from the pastors

towards the noble "protectors", and takes on a more militant

tone. Condé mobilizes his forces quickly and moves

decisively to capture strategic towns along the waterways,

highways, and crossroads of France. He takes a string of

towns along the Loire and makes his headquarters at

Orléans. He also contracts with Protestant leaders of

Germany and England for troops and money.

The royal forces are slower to respond, as the permanent

garrisons are located along the Habsburg frontiers.

Catherine de' Medici was forced to turn to the Guise faction

to deal with this alarming development. The Guise in turn

sought help from the Pope and Phillip II of Spain. The

Protestants were well dug-in in their garrisons, and the siege

efforts to recapture the towns were long and costly. Only

one open pitched battle was fought: that at Dreux which

was a Catholic victory. At it, the Protestants captured

Montmorency, the Catholics captured Condé. The young

Admiral de Coligny managed to safely withdraw most of the

Protestant forces to Orléans, which was then beseiged

during the winter of '62-'63.

At Orléans, the Duc de Guise was killed by an assassin.

Antoine de Bourbon had been previously killed at the siege

of Rouen, and this last casualty pretty much eliminated the

first generation of Catholic leadership. With the Huguenot

heartland in the south virtually untouched and the royal

treasury hemorrhaging, the crown's position was weak and

Catherine bent her efforts towards a settlement. The noble

prisoners were exchanged, and the edict of Amboise issued

in March '63. This restricted Protestant freedoms somewhat,

allowing worship outside the walls of only one town per

bailliage, although the nobility still had the freedom to do as

they would on their estates. This increased the resentment

and tension in the towns and was generally unsatisfying to

most.

The Second War (1567-1568)

Even though the Duc de Guise had died, the Guise faction

remained powerful and the Cardinal de Lorraine

consolidated his power even more. He argued for more

vigorous suppression of the Huguenots in response to

Protestant insurrection in the neighboring Low Countries,

where outbreaks of iconoclasm were met with fierce

repression by Spain. Catherine began a two-year tour of the

provinces with her son Charles IX, as part of an effort to

establish a sense of unity with the nobility. During this time,

she passed through Bayonne and met with the Duke of Alva,

the King of Spain's "hard man" in the subjugation of the

Netherlands. This spread a ripple of alarm through the

Protestant community. When the Spanish marched troops

along the "Spanish Road" from Italy to Flanders, their

presence on the eastern borders of the kingdom added to

the panic. The rumor that Catherine was plotting with Spain

to exterminate them caused the Huguenots to attempt a

coup at Meaux, to seize the person of the king and get him

away from the Guises. This plan failed, and provoked the

second war. This was much a repeat of the first. At the end

of it, Montmorency was dead, the crown was more in debt,

and the Peace of Longjumeau was a pretty much the same

as the Peace of Amboise.

The Third War (1568-1570)

It was destined to be short-lived. The Cardinal de Lorraine

hatched a plot to overturn the peace and capture Condé and

Coligny. They escaped to La Rochelle and raised another

army to begin the third war. Condé and Coligny made an

alliance with William of Orange in the Netherlands, who was

fighting for the independence of the United Provinces from

Spain. The Guise became ever more closely involved with

Spain. The Cardinal de Guise also saw in Mary Stuart, Queen

of Scots, a tool for unseating Elizabeth and putting a

Catholic monarch on that throne as well. (As long as

Elizabeth was childless, Mary was next heir to England.) The

third war therefore involved a even larger number of foreign

interests, and lasted from '68 to '70.

The Protestant strategy this time was to fortify the

Southwest and stand off the crown. This was reasonably

successful for a fairly long time. However, at Jarnac, under

the nominal leadership of the king's younger brother, Henri

d'Anjou, the Protestants suffered a great defeat and the

Prince de Condé was killed. Coligny met the Catholics at

Moncoutour and suffered another defeat. However, he

collected his forces and made a brilliant "long march" across

the south of France, defeating the royal army on at least one

occasion and depriving the crown of their chance to break

the Protestant hold on the South.

The cost of keeping the army in the field was telling on the

crown again, and yet another peace was negotiated at St.

Germain. This peace was more favorable to the Protestants

than the previous, naming specific towns as secure

strongholds, returning confiscated property to Huguenots,

and guaranteeing some equality before the law. This third

war was more protracted, and brought the war to the rural

areas in central and southern France, spreading the

suffering to the population and raising the cultural tensions

between Catholics and Protestants.

The St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre (1572)

After the peace of St. Germain, Catherine exerted a great

deal of diplomatic effort trying to create harmony between

Catholic and Protestant leaders. Admiral de Coligny, now the

chief military leader of the Huguenots, was welcomed into

the king's council, Elizabeth of England entertained the

prospects of marriage to one of King Charles' younger

brothers, and Catherine negotiated with Jeanne d'Albret,

Queen of Navarre, to marry her daughter Margeurite

(Margot) to Henri de Navarre, the ranking Huguenot prince

of the blood. However, the common people felt no such

harmony, and tensions grew in the towns and countryside.

Protestant rhetoric had become increasingly revolutionary in

the late 60's, with leading thinkers advocating that

Christians did not have the obligation to obey leaders who

themselves defied God. Calvin himself came to the

conclusion, after advocating for many years that obedience

to the civil authorities was a Christian duty, that a prince

that persecuted the church had forfeited his right to be

obeyed. François Hotman's Francogallia was written during

this time (although not published until 1573). It advocated

the existence of a mythical Frankish constitution whereby

the kings of France were elected by the people and

governed only through their consent. This was all very

frightening and served to unite the Protestant faith with

treason in the mind of the average person.

Along with these more abstract issues, tension between

Catholics and Protestants had some more mundane

economic and social elements. Protestants were often

represented in the newer and more lucrative trades, such as

printing, out of proportion to their numbers in the general

population. The Protestant emphasis on literacy as the basis

for understanding the Bible made for a generally better

educated group. Protestantism was more an urban than a

rural phenomenon (except in the Southwest), one well-

suited to capitalists and merchants. For example, the 100 or

so Catholic feast days that they didn't celebrate made for

more days to do business. This wasn't viewed as being

much of an advantage by the peasants, but was viewed as

an unfair advantage by other Catholic townsmen.

The years of persecution had created a cell-like structure of

congregations, consistories, and synods where people in the

group stuck together and helped each other, both in

matters of religion and everyday business. Like that other

minority in Europe, the Jews, this engendered a feeling of

suspicion about their "secret" organization.

The participation of women in the church service, with men

and women singing together and studying the Bible, was

viewed with a range of emotions: from a sign that society

was collapsing when cobblers and women could debate the

meaning of the Bible (even the Protestants were sometimes

alarmed at the effects of their doctrine about "the

priesthood of all believers"), to a conviction that Protestant

worship must involve some kind of orgiastic rituals.

Prices had also risen very sharply between the beginning of

the century and the 1560s, especially the prices of food,

fuel, and shelter. This might seem irrelevant to matters of

religion, but the sense of stress about making ends meet,

increasing homelessness and poverty in the towns, a sense

of anxiety about the future, and all the other things that go

with this kind of economic pressure make for a fearful and

hostile society looking for scapegoats.

Many Catholics felt that the toleration of heresy in their

midst was like a disease in the body of Christ that

threatened the very contract between God and his people.

There was an increasing rhetoric among the popular

preachers to purge this infection to restore God's favor and

with it, social stability.

All of this tension is important background to the watershed

event of the wars: the evening of August 23, 1572 -- the

feast of St. Bartholomew. The 19 year-old Henri de Navarre

and Margot de Valois were married in Paris on August 17

and the festivities were still going on. The entire Huguenot

leadership came to Paris for this wedding. Henri himself

brought 800 mounted noblemen in his train.

On August 22, as Admiral de Coligny was returning to his

lodgings from a visit with the king, an assassin fired at him,

breaking his arm and wounding him severely, but not killing

him outright. The Huguenots were outraged and demanded

justice from the king. Everyone suspected the Guises of the

attack. When various Huguenot leaders counselled Coligy to

flee the city -- certainly at this time they could have easily

made it to the safety of a Protestant stronghold -- he

reputedly refused, feeling that it would show a lack of trust

in the king. However, the Huguenots were threatening riot in

the streets if something wasn't done, and it was a very hot

summer.

At some point during the night of August 23, the decision

was taken at the Louvre to kill Coligny and the Huguenot

leaders gathered around him. Charles IX was certainly there,

Catherine de' Medici, Henri d'Anjou. It may not have been

originally intended to be a general massacre. Charles IX was

reputedly badgered into this decision by Catherine and his

councillors, and when he finally broke he is alleged to have

said, "Well, then kill them all that no man be left to reproach

me."

During the early hours of Sunday morning, a troop of

soldiers came to Coligny's door. They killed the guard that

opened the door, and rushed through the house. Coligny

was dragged from his bed, stabbed, and thrown out the

window to the pavement below. Reputedly the Duc de Guise

mocked the body, kicking him in the face and announcing

that this was the king's will. Rumors ran thick and fast, and

somehow the militia and the general population went on a

rampage, believing themselves to be fully sanctioned by the

king and the church. Catholics identified themselves with

white crosses on their hats, and went around butchering

their neighbors. The neighborhood militias played a very

significant role in the slaughter. The killing went on for 3

days or so, with the city councillors and the king unable to

bring the whole thing under control. There are numerous

tales of atrocities, occasional ones of courage and

compassion. Historians have debated what really happened

and why in excruciating detail ever since.

The Louvre itself was not immune. Henri de Navarre slept in

his bridal suite with an entourage of 40 Huguenot

gentlemen, all of whom were killed. Henri and his cousin,

the Prince de Condé (another Henri, the son of the late Louis

who had been the champion of the churches), were dragged

before the king and threatened with death if they did not

convert. They did, and Navarre became a prisoner of the

court for the next four years, living in constant fear of his

life.

The massacres spread to the provinces over the next few

months. Some thought they had directives from the crown

to kill all the Protestants, others thought there was no such

thing. The actions of the governors and mayors depended

very much on the individuals and the circumstances in their

areas. Areas with vocal Protestant minorities often suffered

the most.

The St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, as it came to be

known, destroyed an entire generation of Huguenot

leadership. Henri de Navarre was a prisoner, not yet a

known quality as a leader. Condé eventually escaped to

Germany, and Andelot, Coligny's younger brother, was an

exile in Switzerland. Although it wasn't clear at the time,

this was the beginning of the decline of the Protestant

church in France. In spite of the wars, the '60s had seen an

enthusiastic growth in the Religion. Over the months

following, many Protestants despaired and abjured their

faith. The experience radicalised many of the survivors,

creating a profound distrust of the king, an unwillingness to

disarm, and an upsurge in the political rhetoric of

resistance. Works with titles like The Defense of Liberty

against Tyrants were to come off the Huguenot presses.

The Huguenot "state within a state" became solidified, as

the churches organized themselves into an efficient

hierarchy for communications and self-protection. They

collected their own tithes, maintained their own armies and

garrisons, and provided for the governance and social

welfare of the Protestant communities.

The Fourth War (1572-1573)

The fourth war was set off when the city of La Rochelle, the

de facto capital of the Protestants, refused to pay taxes to

the king because of the massacre and refused admittance

to the royal governor. The king declared war on the town in

November '72 and finally got an army to beseige it in

February. The army was nominally led by Henri d'Anjou, and

included Henri de Navarre as a hostage. Being a port city

that was easily resupplied by sea, with a near-impregnable

harbor, La Rochelle was not easily reduced. There were high

casualities on both sides, and the royal treasury began to

feel the strain. The siege was called off in May, as Catherine

began to prepare for the election of the Duc d'Anjou to the

throne of Poland. The Treaty of La Rochelle was

disadvantageous to the Protestants, and left them certain to

break it when they were strong enough.

The Fifth War (1576)

In 1574, Charles IX died, sweating blood and reputedly

tormented with guilt for the massacre. His brother, Henri,

now installed as king of Poland, lost no time giving the slip

to his Polish courtiers and heading for the border. He took a

leisurely tour of Italy and then arrived in France to take up

the crown. The people remembered him as the "young

eagle" of Jarnac and Moncontour, and were looking to him to

take a strong hand and settle things down in the kingdom.

This was not to be. Henri III's reign was tormented by the

impossibility of peace.

Meanwhile, Condé was raising money, troops, and support

from the German princes, particularly Jan Casimir, the son of

Frederick III of the Palatine. Henri de Montmonrency, the

Sieur de Damville, Governor of Languedoc, who ruled his

region as like an "uncrowned king of the south," brought

another substantial army to the Protestant side. Although he

himself was Catholic, the Languedoc was a heavily

Protestant region and he was related to the Coligny

brothers. In February '76 Navarre escaped from the court

and headed into his own territory, raising an army behind

him. The king's younger brother, the Duc d'Alençon, the last

of the Valois sons, began to play to the anti-royalist factions.

His propagandists put out manifestos portraying him as

alternative ruler to the current king, one able to speak up

for the rights of the people and rule more justly -- cutting

taxes all the while, of course.

This was a potent alliance, one for which Catherine had no

good counter at the time. When 20,000 troops invaded

France under Jan Casimir in the spring of '76 and these

various armies collected themselves together in the heart of

France within striking distance of Paris, the crown was

forced to negotiate. The Edict of Beaulieu, otherwise known

as the Peace of Monsieur ("Monsieur" being the traditional

title for the reigning king's next-oldest brother) was signed

in May and was very favorable to the Protestants. In

separate private agreements, the leaders got substantial

settlements: Navarre was confirmed as Governor of

Guyenne, Condé was made Governor of Picardy, Alençon

was made Duc d'Anjou and given a raft of titles, and the

crown agreed to pay the bills for Jan Casimir's mercenaries.

It left Henri III smarting. The Parlement of Paris refused to

register it, and some of the towns ceded to the Protestants

refused to admit their troops. Picardy, for example, refused

to admit Condé to his capital.

The Sixth War (1577)

In the spring of '76, a convocation of the Estates General

was held. The Protestants had been pushing for this for

some time, but when it came, there were almost no

Protestant delegates. The Estates advocated establishing

one religion in the realm, and Henri III demanded new taxes

and revenues in order to finance such a project. The Estates

somehow wanted this to be done without spending any

money. The cost of the wars was driving up the national

debt beyond the level of endurance, and it made staunch

absolutists like Jean Bodin (whose Six Books of the

Commonwealth was published in 1576) question the value

of enforcing the royal prerogatives at such costs.

This year saw the formation of the first attempt at a Catholic

League to oppose the Protestants if the king would not. To

coopt this threat to his authority, Henri III declared himself

the head of it. However, somehow a royal force was put

together to take back some of the Protestant towns along

the Loire. La Charité fell in May of '77, but the bulk of the

Protestant forces were at large in the South and there was

no hope of a victory over them. The Peace of Bergerac was

signed in July. It was more restrictive in allowing places of

worship to the Protestants than the previous peace, but was

still largely the same. It disallowed any leagues and

associations, trying to fend off the growing movement from

the Catholic right wing.

The Seventh War (1580)

This was a brief flurry of activity, the most notable of which

was Henri de Navarre's seizure of the city of Cahors.

Sometimes called "The Lovers War", it seems to have been

some kind of maneuvering between Navarre and the crown

in which Queen Margot was involved. It didn't last long, and

Navarre and Catherine de Medici signed the Treaty of Nerac,

followed by the Peace of Fleix.. Henri consolidated his

control of the Southwest and bided his time. The Duc

d'Anjou spent these years (1580-1584) intriguing and trying

to acquire the sovereignity of the Netherlands, who were

seeking a prince to replace Phillip II, the king of Spain

against whom they were in rebellion. Although not a

Protestant himself, or even truly sympathetic to them, this

seemed his best opportunity for a place in the world until his

older brother died. When Anjou died in '84, it precipitated a

new crisis. King Henri III was childless and looked to remain

so. With the death of Anjou the heir presumptive became a

Protestant: Henri de Navarre.