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Since the 16. century, there is, in many parts of Europe, flight, persecution,
and civil war. One's faith is determined by the ruling nobility or foreign
occupiers who are guided only by political or economic interests. For example,
the teachings of Luther (1483-1546) and Jean Calvin (1509-1564) find many
followers in some areas, while they are, on pain of death, forbidden in
others as heresy.
In France, opposing religious views and political rivalry with the catholic
party lead to fights with the Huguenots (French protestants). In 1572, Henri
IV seeks accomodation with the catholic party and marries the sister of
the French king, Charles IX. About 2000 leaders of the Huguenot nobility,
in Paris because of this wedding, are treacherously murdered in one night.
Through many days after that, Huguenots in the thousands a pursued and murdered.
Pope Gregor XIII celebrates the news. The wedding on Bartholomew's Day enters
history as the Paris blood wedding or as the Bartholomew Night.
The suppression of the reformed faith in Spanish Netherland by the emperor
Carlos V and his successors led to another wave of emigrants. The ensuing
flight, of reformed Dutchmen and Walloons, led, in particular, to Germany,
and Frankfurt became one of the most important refuges. Since 1554, refugees
from Spanish Netherlands settled in Frankfurt. This led to unceasing difficulties
with the lutheran city council.
After the Spanish conquest of Antwerp in 1585, rich traders, cloth traders
and textile workers emigrated from this great trading city to Frankfurt,
making Frankfurt for the first time a center for international trade. But
resistance against these new citizens soon arose among the lutheran patricians
and guilds, leading in 1596 to an explicit religious ban. In this situation,
the Frankfurt reformed protestants sought contact with Count Philipp Ludwig
II of Hanau, also a Calvinist.
Starting in August 1596, the count and the Frankfurt Calvinists negotiated
with the goal to found a new city Hanau. On 1. Juni 1597, the `Kapitulation',
the founding document for the Neustadt Hanau, was signed. |
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