RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Waldenses
Lord’s Supper were officially adopted and the only distinctive tenet retained was the prohibition against war. They, accordingly, ceased virtually to be Waldenses, and became merged in the Upper German and Swiss faction of the Protestants. As a result, however, the Waldenses became divided into the Protestant and the old-school factions. In the Cottian Alps the Protestant faction prevailed without serious antagonism, but in Provence the old-school Waldenses did more than protest, for late in 1532 or early in 1533 the two “barbs,” Daniel de Valence and Jean de Molines, went to Bohemia for help. The moral support of the Bohemian Brethren they received, but to no purpose; for the assembly of Val San Martino, Aug. 15, 1533, explicitly confirmed the resolutions of Angrogna. The Protestant party now proceeded to carry the Reformation through everywhere in closest harmony with Farel and his followers. The new faith spread most rapidly in the colonies of Provence and Venaissin, where, by 1535, some 10,000 Protestant Waldenses, exhausted by the persecutions of Church and State, were ready to emigrate to Protestant Germany. But in 1545 troops were sent against them by the president of parliament, Jean Maynier, seigneur d’Oppéde, which destroyed twenty-two villages and put to death 4,000 Waldenses, only about an equal number escaping to Germany and Geneva. In the Cottian Alps, under Saunier’s influence, the Waldenses decided in 1532 to have the Bible printed in French (see BrsLE VERsions, B, VI., § 3). In consequence the Waldenses of this district now received French pastors from the Academy of Lausanne, who gradually remodeled their services after those of Geneva; induced them to erect their own churches from 1555, as well as to receive communion in both forms (to the number of 6,000 at Angrogna); and in 1559 drew up at Turin a creed based on the Gallican Confession (q.v.). When, moreover, Piedmont was restored to Duke Emanuel Philibert by the peace of Cateau-Cambresius, Waldensian refusal to receive Roman Catholic priests caused the duke to send troops against them in Noy., 1560. Such was their persistence in petty warfare, however, that by the peace of Cavour (June 5, 1561) the duke was constrained to grant them limited toleration in a series of places in the valleys of Luserna, San Martino, and Perosa. The congregations of these valleys and of Cluson and the margravate of Saluzzo were accordingly able to form an organization modeled after the statutes of Geneva at the synods of Angrogna (1563) and Villar (1564); and on Nov. 11, 1571, they formed a league to resist all infractions of the peace of Cavour. In Calabria and Apulia the Waldenses were less fortunate, and it was not till 1556 that the former appointed their own pastors and administration of the sacrament. For this they were formally extirpated in 1560 by Spanish troops under the auspices of the grand inquisitor Michele Ghislieri (later Pope Pius V.). In eleven days in June, 2,000 persons were put to death, 1,600 were imprisoned, and others were condemned to the galleys. The Apulian Waldenses, who had thus far prudently held themselves in retirement, now fled in larger numbers to Geneva, though the majority, intimidated by the slaughter in Calabria, reentered the Roman Church.
Waldenses
THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
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After 1571 there remained of the old Waldensian communities within the bounds of the present kingdom of Italy only those in the margravate of Saluzzo and the so-called Waldensian valleys; and these were no longer Waldensian, but a part of the Calvinistic division of Protestantism.
When Daniel de Valence and Jean de Molines were defeated at the assembly of Val San Martino, on Aug. 15, 1533, they are said, on good authority, to have made away with all ancient Waldensian manuscripts and memoirs that they could secure. In the so-called Waldensian manuscripts, however, there is
extant an entire series of treatises
2. Litera- doubtless modeled on Czech originals.
ture. Here belong the following: Ayczo es la causa del nostre departiment de la gleysa
romana (based on the ‘‘ Grounds of Separation ”’ of Luke of Prague, q.v.); De li sept sacrament, Purgatori, Dejuni, De las invocacions de li sant (all revisions of chapters of the Confessio Taboritarum of 1481); De la potesta dona a li vicari de Christ (literal translation of a portion of John Huss’s Tractatus de ecclesia) ; Las Interrogacions menores (revision of the catechism of the Bohemian Brethren); a fragment of a treatise on anti-Christ; and probably the Hpistola al Lancelau. All these were apparently translated and adapted by Daniel de Provence and Jean de Molines, who sojourned, on their mission, six months in Bohemia. Five of them are extant only as integral parts of the voluminous T'resor e lume de fe, preserved in manuscript at Geneva, Cambridge, and Dublin, and also
containing the treatises Articles de la fe, Li Comman-
dament, Penitenca, and De Voragon dominical. The first formulary of the Articles is not of Bohemian, but of Waldensian origin, while the remainder of the treatise, like Li Commandament, is demonstrably drawn from the Somme le roy of the Dominican Laurentius. It is to be concluded that manuscript Cambridge B was the original one, and among those which Daniel and Jean removed; that the prose works in the Waldensian tongue for a very considerable part originated from these two after Aug., 1533; and that the collection and preservation of fragments of the ancient Waldensian literature are quite or wholly due to these two “ barbs,” especially since, for a long time, the Reformed Waldenses had no interest in the ancient language and its literature. The history of the Waldensian Reformed of Dauphiny and Provence forms part of the history of the Reformed Church of France; only the development of the Reformed communities in Piedmont, which have retained the name of Waldenses, need here be considered. Outside of the terri-
3. The tory covered by the peace of Cavour Waldensian they were gradually driven from the Reformed. valleys of De Queryas, Barcelona, Mattias, and Meana, and out of the eight
localities in Saluzzo after its annexation to Savoy in 1603. Propaganda failing to render the government pliant, Charles Emanuel II. decided upon force in 1655, only to arouse such commotion in the Protestant world that, at Cromwell’s request, Mazarin induced the duke, in August, to grant peace and amnesty. Feeling that the terms of the peace were not observed, the Waldenses rebelled in 1663, and within the year forced the duke solemnly to ratify
the above treaty. Shortly after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in 1686, Victor Amadeus II., in agreement with Louis XIV., issued a decree forbidding the Reformed faith in his dominions, requiring all the Reformed preachers and teachers to leave his territories within fourteen days; and empowering the Roman Catholic clergy to baptize and educate all Reformed children in the tenets of that church. The Waldenses again resorted to arms but were defeated. More than 3,000 fell in battle; over 5,000 were taken prisoners; their churches were razed; and their property was confiscated. -At the intercession of the Protestant powers, the duke permitted some 2,500, who had been condemned to prison or the galleys, to emigrate, the great majority finding refuge in Germany. Though apparently exterminated in Piedmont, they did not abandon hopes of regaining their old homes, and in the summer of 1689, in the confidence of William ITI. of Orange, the preacher Henri Arnaud collected 800-900 Waldenses and Huguenots on the shores of Lake Geneva and marched by devious roads to Piedmont. Here in the mountains he waged so stubborn a contest against fifty times his number that the duke broke off his alliance with France and on June 4, 1690, freely permitted all Waldenses and French refugees to return to the valleys, besides releasing all their fellow sectaries who were still in prison or in the galleys. The Waldenses who had fled to Germany now flocked back to Piedmont, but on July 1, 1698, at the instance of Louis XIV., the duke issued a patent forbidding the Reformed in the valleys from having any religious association with French subjects and ordering all French refugees toleave the country within two months. In 1698- 1699, therefore, over 2,500 Reformed were forced to emigrate, the majority finding a new home in Germany, especially in Wiirttemberg. The scattered colonies joined in a synod numbering fourteen churches and 4,000 members in 1716. In Piedmont, meanwhile, repressive measures were still enforced despite the protests of Protestant powers, though it was only in the Val Pragelas that-real severity was exercised. On June 20, 1730, the duke ordered that all who had been born or baptized in the Roman Catholic Church before 1686, or who had been Roman Catholics after 1696, but had subsequently apostatized, must either become Roman Catholic within six months or leave the country. The latter was preferred by 850, of whom 400 went to Holland, while the remainder were received in French or Waldensian colonies in Germany. During the Napoleonic invasion of 1799 the Waldenses had equal rights with Roman Catholics, and their clergy even received an annual subvention of 13,000 lire. With the return of the house of Savoy, however, conditions changed; and in Jan., 1815, Victor Emanuel I. withdrew the subvention and renewed all previous restrictions, though in the following year he removed some of the most burdensome, and even gave each of the Waldensian clergy an annual stipend of 500 lire. Nevertheless, it was not until the act of emancipation promulgated by Charles Albert on Feb. 17, 1848, that the Waldenses permanently secured all civilrights. The history of the Waldenses, 1526-1848, is the account of a continuous strife with the house of Savoy, and that they were not annihi-