The French Wars of Religion
In the late 16th century, France was torn apart by a series of violent religious conflicts between Catholics and Protestants, with several noble families competing for mastery over the kingdom’s salvation
WHAT WERE THE FRENCH WARS OF RELIGION AND WHY DID THEY BREAK OUT?
Beginning in 1562, the French Wars of Religion were a series of eight civil wars fought between Roman Catholics and Protestants (or Huguenots) that engulfed the country for 36 years. With the arrival of Protestantism earlier that century into France, a kingdom whose population was overwhelmingly Catholic, years of mounting suspicion and sporadic violence between the two faiths soon divided French society.
