The Long European Reformation

This text places the European Reformation in a broader context of early modern history. It traces the roots of Protestant and Catholic reforms among the crises of the 14th century and follows the legacies of religious reformation into the 18th century.

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The image of Martin Luther nailing his ninety-five theses to a church door has long epitomised the dramatic turning point from religious dissent to religious reformation. Luther's act, however, was only one of dozens of critical moments in the struggle for religious reform in Europe and the quest among Christians for a purer faith between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries. In this detailed yet approachable study, Peter G. Wallace adeptly interweaves the influential events of the early modern religious reformation with the transformations of political institutions, socio-economic structures, gender relations, and cultural values throughout Europe. In his examination of the European Reformation as a long-term process, Wallace reconnects the classic sixteenth-century religious struggles with the political and religious pressures confronting late medieval Christianity and argues that the resolutions proposed by reformers, such as Luther, were not fully realised for most Christians until the early eighteenth century.