The Reformation
The Protestant Reformation, Explored
From forerunners and reformers to families, confessions, and the Five Solas — with an honest look at the hard parts.
Tap any card to open its story — or search a person, family, confession, or event.
This map is simplified. The gold lines trace the movement's connected spine — forerunners into the spark, the spark into the reformers — while the Solas, confessions, and events sit in their own labelled bands.
Dates mark turning points, not clean beginnings. Where a detail is traditional or contested, the card says so.
The Reformation map as a list
47 entries, grouped by section
Every person, movement, confession and event on the map above, in the same sections, with the description from its card. Open a card on the map for its full story.
Forerunners 12th–early 16th c.
The Waldensians
A 12th-century lay movement preaching Gospel poverty and Scripture in the common tongue — later folded into the Reformed family.
John Wycliffe
An Oxford scholar who argued for Scripture’s supreme authority and inspired the first complete English Bible — the “Morning Star of the Reformation.”
Jan Hus
A Bohemian priest and reformer, influenced by Wycliffe, burned at the Council of Constance in 1415 despite a promise of safe conduct.
Desiderius Erasmus
The great Christian humanist whose printed Greek New Testament (1516) sent scholars back to the original text, though he himself never left the Catholic Church.
The Spark 1517–1521
The Ninety-Five Theses
Luther’s 95 arguments against the sale of indulgences — the spark that lit the Reformation.
The Reformation Families 1520s–1560s
Martin Luther
The friar whose stand on Scripture and justification by faith launched the Reformation and the Lutheran family.
Philip Melanchthon
Luther’s brilliant younger colleague, the “Teacher of Germany,” who systematised Lutheran theology and drafted the Augsburg Confession.
Huldrych Zwingli
The reformer of Zurich who launched the Swiss Reformation from 1519 — independently of Luther — and died in battle at Kappel in 1531.
Heinrich Bullinger
Zwingli’s successor at Zurich for 44 years, author of the Second Helvetic Confession and a tireless correspondent across Protestant Europe.
John Calvin
The French reformer of Geneva whose Institutes of the Christian Religion gave Reformed theology its most influential systematic shape.
John Knox
The fiery preacher, shaped in Calvin’s Geneva, who led the Scottish Reformation and helped birth Presbyterianism.
The Huguenots
French Reformed Protestants, nurtured from Geneva by Calvin and Beza, who endured decades of war and massacre before the Edict of Nantes (1598) gave them a limited toleration.
Conrad Grebel
A leader of the “radical reformation” who broke with Zwingli over infant baptism and shared in the first adult believer’s baptism in 1525.
Felix Manz
A co-founder of the Swiss Brethren and the first Anabaptist executed by a Protestant government — drowned by the Zurich authorities in 1527.
Menno Simons
A Dutch former priest who, after the disaster at Münster, reorganised peaceful Anabaptism — the Mennonites bear his name.
Henry VIII
The English king whose break with Rome (Act of Supremacy, 1534) began the English Reformation — for political more than doctrinal reasons.
Thomas Cranmer
Archbishop of Canterbury and architect of English Protestant worship, author of the Book of Common Prayer — burned under Queen Mary in 1556.
Elizabeth I and the Settlement
The queen whose Religious Settlement of 1559 fixed the lasting shape of the Church of England: Protestant doctrine, bishops, and the Prayer Book.
The Five Solas a later summary
Sola Scriptura
In the Reformation view, Scripture alone is the highest and final authority for faith and life.
Sola Fide
In the Reformation view, a sinner is justified — declared right with God — through faith alone, not by works.
Sola Gratia
Salvation is a gift of God’s grace, not something we earn or deserve.
Solus Christus
Christ alone is the mediator between God and humanity; salvation comes through his work.
Soli Deo Gloria
All glory belongs to God alone.
The Confessions 1527–1646
Schleitheim Confession
An early Anabaptist statement of seven articles — baptism, discipline, the Supper, separation, and refusal of the sword.
Augsburg Confession
The foundational Lutheran confession, presented to Emperor Charles V in 1530.
Scots Confession
The confession of the Scottish Reformation, drafted in 1560 as Scotland embraced the Reformed faith.
Belgic Confession
A Reformed confession of the Low Countries, written by Guido de Brès, who was later martyred.
Heidelberg Catechism
A warm, pastoral Reformed catechism from the Palatinate, famous for its opening question on comfort.
Second Helvetic Confession
Bullinger’s mature Reformed confession, quickly adopted across Reformed Europe.
Thirty-Nine Articles
The doctrinal articles of the Church of England, finalised in 1571 from Cranmer’s earlier Forty-Two Articles (1553).
Canons of Dort
The Reformed synod’s response to the Arminian Remonstrants — the source later summarised as “TULIP.”
Westminster Confession
The influential Reformed confession produced by the Westminster Assembly during the English Civil War era.
Key Events & Aftermath 1524–1672
The Peasants’ War
A vast peasant uprising, partly stirred by reform ideas; Luther condemned it fiercely, and it was crushed with great bloodshed.
The Marburg Colloquy
A meeting to unite Luther and Zwingli; they agreed on 14 of 15 articles but split over the Lord’s Supper.
The Münster Rebellion
Apocalyptic radicals seized the city of Münster and proclaimed a “New Jerusalem,” until a siege crushed it in 1535.
The Council of Trent
The Catholic Church’s own reforming council and its formal answer to the Reformation — the Counter-Reformation.
The Peace of Augsburg
A settlement letting each German prince choose Lutheran or Catholic for his territory — “cuius regio, eius religio.”
St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre
The mass killing of French Protestants (Huguenots) beginning in Paris in August 1572.
The Patriarch and the Lutherans
Lutheran theologians sent the Augsburg Confession to the Ecumenical Patriarch hoping for agreement. He answered, point by point, with the Orthodox faith.
The Edict of Nantes
Henry IV’s edict granting the Huguenots freedom of conscience and limited rights of worship, ending the French Wars of Religion. Louis XIV revoked it in 1685.
The Peace of Westphalia
The treaties ending the Thirty Years’ War and Europe’s great age of religious warfare.
Cyril Lucaris and the Synod of Jerusalem
A Calvinist-leaning confession published in the name of the Patriarch of Constantinople (1629) led Orthodox councils to define their faith against it, most fully at Jerusalem in 1672.
An honest reckoning
Luther’s Writings Against the Jews
Late in life Luther wrote vicious antisemitic tracts, including On the Jews and Their Lies (1543). We name this plainly; it cannot be excused.
Anabaptists Killed by Fellow Protestants
Anabaptists were hunted, imprisoned, and executed — not only by Catholics but by fellow Protestants, including in Reformed Zurich.
The Peasants’ War and Luther’s Fury
When the peasants revolted, Luther urged the princes to crush them without mercy — a response many find indefensible.
A Table Divided
Protestants split — bitterly and lastingly — over the meaning of the Lord’s Supper, fracturing their unity from the start.
The Wars of Religion
For over a century, Catholics and Protestants — and Protestants against each other — waged devastating wars, ending in the Thirty Years’ War.
Keep exploring: See the wider family tree · Ask the Study Assistant · Read: What Is Arminianism? · Explore Christian Orthodoxy · Read the full story of the correspondence