Famous descendants of the Huguenots include American revolutionary Paul Revere and Irish playwright Samuel Beckett.
The Huguenots were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism.
The Huguenots were concentrated in the southern and western parts of the Kingdom of France. As Huguenots gained influence and more openly displayed their faith, Catholic hostility grew. A series of religious conflicts followed, known as the French Wars of Religion, fought intermittently from 1562 to 1598. The Huguenots were led by Jeanne d'Albret; her son, the future Henry IV (who would later convert to Catholicism in order to become king); and the princes of Condé.
The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre (French: Massacre de la Saint-Barthélemy) in 1572 was a targeted group of assassinations and a wave of Catholic mob violence, directed against the Huguenots (French Calvinist Protestants) during the French Wars of Religion. Traditionally believed to have been instigated by Queen Catherine de' Medici, the mother of King Charles IX, the massacre took place a few days after the wedding day (18 August) of the king's sister Margaret to the Protestant Henry of Navarre (the future Henry IV of France). Many of the wealthiest and most prominent Huguenots had gathered in largely Catholic Paris to attend the wedding.
Video Title: Fading Whispers of Light - Documentary about the Huguenots. Source: amazing discoveries. Date Published: February 12, 2020. Description:
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." George Santayana
The film searches for traces and comes to sobering conclusions: Never in the history of the world has total unity led to peace, but to the violent oppression of minorities. The ongoing effort to dissolve all borders contradicts the Bible and indicates that humanity is drifting into a final, violent conflict.
The French Reformation gave us the Huguenots or French Calvinism. The Huguenot movement, though, is often not understood. This video tells the story of the Huguenots, French Calvinists, and the French Wars of Religion.Ryan M. Reeves (PhD Cambridge) is Assistant Professor of Historical Theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.
