The essays presented in this book represent a series of explorations in the social and religious history of France's Huguenots between the Edict of Nantes and its revocation. This book investigates the history of the Huguenots: how the community evolved numerically and sociologically in the face of intensifying pressure to return to the Catholic church; the nature of huguenot identity; the religious psychology, cultural practices and mental world of the group and its members. It also studies marital customs, moral beliefs, social mobility and wealth accumulation. The author explores whether there was a link between Calvinism and capitalism, as German sociologist Max Weber believed. He looks at whether the Huguenots displayed a greater inner-wordly asceticism or more of an aptitude for economic success than their Catholic neighbours. There is an investigation of the Protestant and Catholic visual cultures and a look at their behaviours and customs.

This book investigates the reasons why the Catholic population of Paris increasingly tolerated the minority Protestant Huguenot population between 1685 and 1789.

Examines the situation of French Protestants before and after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in France and in the countries to which many of them fled during the great exodus which followed the Edict of Fontainebleau, covering a period from the end of the sixteenth to the beginning of the nineteenth century.

Rich in detail and broad in scope, this majestic book is the first to reveal the interaction of politics and religion in France during the crucial years of the long seventeenth century. Joseph Bergin begins with the Wars of Religion, which proved to be longer and more violent in France than elsewhere in Europe and left a legacy of unresolved tensions between church and state with serious repercussions for each. He then draws together a series of unresolved problems—both practical and ideological—that challenged French leaders thereafter, arriving at an original and comprehensive view of the close interrelations between the political and spiritual spheres of the time. The author considers the powerful religious dimension of French royal power even in the seventeenth century, the shift from reluctant toleration of a Protestant minority to increasing aversion, conflicts over the independence of the Catholic church and the power of the pope over secular rulers, and a wealth of other interconnected topics.

Physico-theology celebrated the observation of nature as a way toward the recognition of God as Creator and to demonstrate the compatibility of the biblical record with the new science. It was a crucial, albeit often underestimated element in the intellectual as well as socio-cultural establishment of the new science in western and central Europe beginning in the mid-seventeenth century. The importance of physico-theology in enhancing the acceptance of the new science among a broad educated public cannot be underestimated. Unfortunately, this insight has not yet received much attention in the history of early modern science, chiefly because the history of physico-theology tends to highlight the activities of virtuosi rather than well-known scientists. A contribution to the history of knowledge, this is the first monograph in English on physico-theology on the European scale. It concentrates on two genres, the argument from design, and the palaeontological argument regarding the role of the Deluge in the formation of fossils. It does so without neglecting practice (correspondence and collecting). It pays considerable attention to the historical context, above all to the new image of God as a wise, benevolent, rather than unpredictable being, which provided the practitioners of physico-theology (including clergy, physicians, lawyers, and philologists) with a new and powerful argument. It draws attention to the predominantly Protestant nature of the phenomenon and looks at the longevity of the argument from design in Britain and the Netherlands, where its demise came about as late as the first half of the nineteenth century.

Written by an international team of distinguished scholars, this comprehensive book introduces students to the fundamental historical, systematic, moral and ecclesiological aspects of the study of the church, as well as serving as a resource for scholars engaging in ecclesiological debates on a wide variety of issues.

Probate inventories provide an unparalleled and intimate glimpse into the lives of the inhabitants of early modern England. After death, the items within the deceased’s home would frequently be itemised and valued room-by-room. As well as providing invaluable information about the rich diversity and value of domestic material culture, the inventories also offer insights into the different tastes, domestic arrangements and range of activities that took place within the early modern home. Inventories also enable scholars to reconstruct the informal social and business networks that are crucial for understanding this period, but which might otherwise remain hidden. By offering a critical introduction to the use of probate inventories for historical research, and by providing transcriptions of inventories from French immigrants to early modern London, this book provides a new and important resource for students and researchers interested in the early modern household, material culture studies, and the domestic lives of the Huguenot refugees. The book begins with a detailed introduction that provides historical background on the French immigrant community in London. This is followed by an original analysis of the key differences that existed between French and English domestic interiors during this period, along with a discussion of how these trends are visible within the included inventories. The book subsequently provides a critical discussion of the issues and challenges involved in studying probate inventories and the difficulties in their interpretation. Following a description of the methodology used for the current study and the general characteristics of the sample included, the volume provides transcriptions of ninety-two probate inventories from members of London’s Huguenot community. In addition, the book contains a fully referenced historical glossary of the items of early modern material culture listed within the inventories. Taken together, the book ha