The French War of Religion (1562-1629)

By end of 16th century France had become perhaps the weakest kingdom in western Europe. The reason for this was the long series of civil wars, commonly known as the French Wars of Religion.

Protestants were known as Huguenots, and were accused of heresy by the Catholic king and government and in 1536 a General Edict was issued urging their extinction; thus began the French Wars of Religion.

With the death of Henry II following his jousting accident while celebrating the conclusion of the Peace of Cateau-Cambresis in 1559, France entered period in which the authority of the crown and its agents suffered progressive erosion before reaching a nadir during the 1580s.

The French Wars of Religion began in 1562 with the massacre at Vassy in Champagne; continue until the Edict of Nantes in 1598; and then erupts again briefly in the 1620s.

Historians typically divide the French Wars of Religion into nine different conflicts, beginning in 1562 and ending in 1598 with the promulgation of the Edict of Nantes.

Edict of Nantes, signed by Henry IV in 1598 ended the French Wars of Religion and allowed the Huguenots some freedom and right to practice their religion in twenty specified towns of France.

But the Edict of Nantes did not end religious warfare within the country; and the war extended until 1629.

The French War of Religion (1562-1629)

Vercingetorix - Gallic Chieftain

Vercingetorix was a tribal chieftain of the Gallic Celtic Arverni tribe who attempted to stop the encroachment of Romans into his territory, Provence, in present-day France, from 53 to 52 b.c.e. The Roman leader, Gaius Julius Caesar (100–44 b.c.e.), and his lieutenant Quintus Atius Labienus (100–45 b.c.e.), lost early engagements against Vercingetorix, who against all odds had managed to unite the generally warring tribes in Provence.

This temporary alliance allowed Vercingetorix the upper hand. He retreated by using hit-and-run tactics within the natural boundaries of Provence that were unknown to the Romans. To prevent the Romans from finding sustenance, they scorched over 20 towns.

In the spring of 52 b.c.e. Caesar ordered siege fortifications to be built in order to capture the capital of Avaricum, present-day Bourges, which contained huge supplies of grain. Through unrelenting rain his troops built two 80-foot towers with more than 300-foot ramps in one month. The Gauls tried to sabotage the Roman siege works unsuccessfully. In the end 800 Gauls fled to Vercingetorix. The angry Romans massacred the 40,000 remaining inhabitants of Avaricum.

Caesar, tired of the ceaseless and unproductive skirmishes and battles, had no desire to face the fierce Celtic tribes and decided to starve them out before reinforcement could reach Alesia. Caesar had his Romans build encircling fortifications around the Arverni stronghold at Alesia, near present-day Dijon, from which Vercingetorix had planned to fight and in which he was ultimately trapped.

Caesar once again used siege warfare to obtain his objective. He had his troops build a two-walled perimeter that would keep the Arverni and the Romans within close contact. The outer ring held the Romans, who besieged the Arverni.

Modern-day excavators found the first wall to be 13 miles long with an 18-foot ditch that was meant to starve the Arverni. The second wall faced pointed stakes that could easily impale unsuspecting tribesmen. Yet another wall, 9 feet high and full of breastworks of earth, was constructed.

In addition, every 130 yards, observation towers were erected. Two siege towers were built, each 80 feet high, that could contain ramparts of varying lengths. Vercingetorix tried to destroy the walls and often had skirmishes with the Romans, but to no avail.

His last attempt to alleviate the siege led to failure, his men fell onto the spikes, and the Romans killed many Gauls. Alesia was so well fortified by the Romans that Vercingetorix was given no choice when reinforcements failed to arrive. The war council in Alesia decided to wait for the end.

The Arverni were slowly starving, so Vercingetorix released the women and children from his stronghold, hoping Caesar would take pity and treat them as prisoners, but he refused, and the women and children perished. Caesar won the five-day Battle of Alesia because the tribes under Vercingetorix were poorly organized and some betrayed their leader.

Various stories surround the surrender of Vercingetorix. One story relates that Vercingetorix and several tribal leaders simply surrendered to Caesar. The second story, written by Plutarch at least 100 years after the event, accounts that Vercingetorix rode out of Alesia in a stately fashion and around Caesar’s camp, removing his battle armaments and surrendering with theatrical gestures before kneeling to him.

His death is also shrouded in debate. One historian claims he was killed shortly after his surrender. Another argues that for the next five years Vercingetorix was Caesar’s prisoner in the Tullianum in Rome.

Vercingetorix allegedly became a showpiece and was paraded around various Roman cities for five years in between stays at the Tullianum prison in Rome. Vercingetorix was publicly beheaded in Rome in 46 b.c.e. The Celtic tribes never fought again in present-day France and were absorbed into the Roman Empire.

Fort Toulouse - Wetumpka, Alabama

In 1717, a party of French soldiers arrived at the head of the Alabama River near the modern cities of Wetumpka and Montgomery.

Their mission was to establish a permanent presence for the King of France in the deep wilderness of Alabama, then under the control of the Creek Nation. The French had cultivated strong ties with the Alabamas (also spelled Alibamos), who lived around the point where the Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers joined to form the Alabama. A branch of the Upper Creeks, but possessing their own languages and customs, the Alabamas were actually a conglomeration of several smaller tribes.

The French needed a presence among them to half English expansion into the Creek country, which was then claimed not only by the Creeks and the French, but by the English and Spanish as well. A log fort called Fort Toulouse, named for the Count de Toulouse who was a son of King Louis XIV, was built on the Coosa River side of the point of land formed by the confluence of the Coosa and the Tallapoosa Rivers.

Despite its remote position deep in the wilderness that then covered virtually all of Alabama, the little settlement at Fort Toulouse survived for more than 45 years. The French built homes, cultivated gardens, intermarried with Indian women and engaged in trading and exploring. Although Fort Toulouse was surrounded by stockade walls and armed with small pieces of cannon, it owed its general survival to the goodwill of the Alabama who remained strongly loyal to the French despite the increasing influence of the English among the Creeks.

Over time, the fort was rebuilt at least once as the Coosa River slowly eroded away the bluff on which it stood. Archaeologists have found the remains of one of the corner bastions (angled projections that extended from the corners of the fort to allow infantry and cannon to sweep the walls in the event of an attack) of the original fort as well as buried traces of the second. Their work at the site has allowed modern interpreters to reconstruct Fort Toulouse so that visitors today can see the important early structure as it originally appeared.

Fort Toulouse was evacuated by the French in 1763 due to the treaty that ended the French and Indian War. Their homes and gardens were reclaimed by the forest and the fort itself soon rotted away. By the end of the century, the only remains still to be seen were a few old cannon abandoned at the site.

To learn more about Fort Toulouse and the other historic features of the site, please visit www.exploresouthernhistory.com/forttoulouse.

The French wars of religion

The French wars of religion
No wars are more terrible than civil wars. They tear at the very fabric of society, rending its institutions and destroying the delicate web of relationships that underlie all communal life. The nation is divided communities break into factions; families are destroyed. At every level of organization the glue that binds society together comes unstuck.

For nearly half century civil war tore France apart. Massacres of Catholic congregations matched massacres of Protestants ones. Assassinations of Catholic leaders followed assassinations of Protestants ones. Kings of France died at the hands of their subjects. Leaders of Protestants and Catholic movements died by the order of the king, Aristocratic armies roamed the country wreaking havoc on friend and foe alike. Indeed, the religious causes that brought the wars about were soon forgotten.

Protestantism came late to France. The unyielding hostility of the monarchy had prevented Lutheran reforms from making much headway there. Through a series of concessions made by the papacy in the fifteenth century and codified in the Concordat of Bologna (1516), the French kings had gained the right too make ecclesiastical appointments and thus controlled much of the wealth of the Church.

Lutheranism held little attraction for Francis I (1515-1547) and he rigorously suppressed it, sending John Calvin among others, into exile. The Catholic church directed by the monarchy proved even more resistant to reform than had the Catholic church directed by the papacy. It was not until after Calvin reformed the church in Geneva and began to export his brand of Protestantism that French society began to divide along religious lines.
The French wars of religion