The Edict of Nantes
The law by which Henry IV settled the position of the Reformed in France in 1598. It consists of the edict in 92 articles, 56 particular articles and two royal warrants, and is the primary evidence for what was granted and what was withheld.
The settlement is made up of four documents, all printed on the page linked here. The edict proper has a preamble and 92 articles and was sealed as a “perpetual and irrevocable” law. The 56 particular articles, dated 2 May 1598, settle details and local cases. Two royal warrants (brevets), dated 3 April and the last day of April, promise money and leave fortified towns in Reformed hands for eight years; the second says that the Reformed had agreed not to press the king to put it into a more solemn form.
The edict is dated only “in the month of April” 1598. The notes at its foot record its registration by the Parlement of Paris on 25 February 1599, by the Chambre des Comptes on the last day of March and by the Cour des Aides on 30 April 1599. It calls the Reformed faith throughout “the so-called Reformed religion” (religion prétendue réformée), the wording of a Catholic chancery. It is cited in the Edict of Nantes for its own terms; it is not evidence of how far those terms were carried out.
Cited in
- April 1598, firm date