The Edict of Potsdam
The edict by which the Elector of Brandenburg, himself Reformed, offered French Protestants refuge in his lands in the autumn of 1685, with free passage, exemption from taxes, houses, the rights of native subjects and their own French-speaking pastors.
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The edict is given at Potsdam on 29 October 1685 and signed by Frederick William. Its preamble speaks of the persecutions that the elector’s fellow believers of the Evangelical-Reformed faith have suffered in France and offers them a secure and free refuge. Fourteen articles arrange their journey by way of Amsterdam, Hamburg and Frankfurt, name the towns where they may settle, free their goods from duties, grant them houses and land, exempt them from taxes for a term of years, give them the rights of native subjects and provide that in each town they shall have a pastor and worship in French as in the Reformed churches of France. The thirteenth article excludes Roman Catholics from these favours.
It shows how a Protestant ruler described the events in France at the time and what he offered in response. See Louis XIV Revokes the Edict of Nantes.
Cited in
- October 1685, firm date