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Johnna Purcell
Term Paper
3 April 2015
Today, religion is considered a private matter that is generally between oneself and ones
god. But that was not always the case. In fact, throughout the majority of Western Civilization,
religion was considered a public matter. Religion was openly discussed in education and more
notably in politics. It was the norm for European countries to have a national religion and that
religion was almost always Catholicism. That was until 1517 when Martin Luther nailed his 95
Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church, creating Protestantism and quickly sending
Europe into religious disarray. At this time, many countries throughout Europe fell to civil wars
based upon conflicts between Catholics and Protestants. No war throughout the continent was as
bloody or as long as the French Wars of Religion. Lasting for nearly forty years, the French
Wars of Religion were a series of conflicts between French Catholics and Huguenots centered
upon Huguenots right to practice Protestantism. Tensions between the religions grew throughout
the first half of the 16th century until 1562 when civil war broke out in France. But why did
peace fail in 1562? Using the bargaining perspective we can examine the sources of bargaining
failures that may provide an answer.
The French Wars of Religion may be traced to the political and social turmoil in France,
beginning in the 1540s. According to Jean de Fraisse, the seeds of conflict were sown by
factions of dispute [in France] (Potter 5). This dispute began with the introduction of Lutheran
teachings during the 1540s and 1550s in France. While the French were staunchly Catholic and
strong critics of heresy, support from the nobility in France (particularly Louis Bourbon, Prince
of Cond) allowed Calvinism to gain popularity in France. Despite this support by factions of the

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French nobility, Huguenots (French Calvinists) were heavily persecuted throughout France by
order of the crown during the reign of both Francis I and Henri II (The Wars of Religion, Part
1).
Then, in 1559, Henri II died in an unexpected accident. Henris heir was his 15-year-old
son, Francis II. Due to the young age of the new king a power vacuum ensued in France. Noble
families and the various factions associated with them fought to gain political influence with the
new king. Because the young king was permitted by parliament to claim his throne, power
shifted not to the queen mother, Catherine de Medici, but rather to the powerful and politically
influential Duke of Guise and his brother, the Cardinal of Lorraine. The Duke of Guise and
Cardinal of Lorraine were both uncles to Mary Queen of Scots, the queen consort of France.
They came from a family that had long claims to power in Europe and was devotedly Catholic
(Potter 7).
During the reign of Francis II it became undeniably clear that factions were emerging
within the French nobility. These noble factions would be those that would come to define the
conflict of the first French War of Religion. The Guises, the Bourbons and the Montmorencys
were the most influential noble families within France. In addition to the families being very
powerful political entities, they also had varying religious allegiances. The Guises and the
Montmorencys were both Catholic while the Bourbons were sympathetic to the Protestant cause
(Potter 7).
The reign of Francis II was very short. The sickly teenager died after only eighteen
months in power. At this point Francis brother, Charles IX ascended to the throne. Because
Charles was only ten, his mother Catherine de Medici was installed as queen regent. Catherine
shared her authority with Antoine de Navarre (whose family had long held ties to Protestantism)

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as Lieutenant General. Upon her installation, Catherine focused upon ruling in a manner that was
largely neutral in terms of religion. Unlike her predecessors, Catherine (although a devout
Catholic) sympathized with Protestants. Catherine wanted to compromise with the growing
Huguenot population and included Protestants in her court (Coligny, Cond and Navarre). With
her actions, Catherine sought reconciliations but what she actually did was give ammunition to
the Catholic aristocrats plotting against the noble Protestants (Potter 8-9).
Even though Catherine continued to make religious concessions to the growing Huguenot
population throughout 1561, the number of armed Protestants continued to grow. As the
possibility of war became ever more obvious to the crown they began to bargain with the
Protestant faction. While Protestants continued to stress their loyalty to the crown, Catherine also
saw them as a serious threat that she undoubtedly feared. Therefore, Catherine agreed to relax
restrictions on practicing Protestants in return for their commitment to remain peaceful (Potter
12).
In January of 1562 Catherine crossed the line with the Catholic nobles. The Edict of
Saint-Germain was the first document that recognized Protestants right to worship. While the
document did not allow Protestant worship within towns, it set a precedent for worship on noble
estates. Catholic leaders were outraged and quickly the crown began to withdraw the language of
toleration from the Edict. The government stated that the document was not to be interpreted as
approval of permanent toleration of Huguenots, but the damage had already been done (Potter
12). Out of fear, Catherine attempted to make a bargain she could not enforce and by doing so
gave the Guise family the ammunition they needed to start a war.
Historians cite the Massacre of Vassy as the official beginning of the First War of
Religion (Potter 12). On March 1st 1562, the Duke of Guise was passing through the town of

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Vassy and he came across a group of Protestants worshiping within a barn in the town. From that
point accounts of the event vary. Protestants claimed that Guises men then began to attack the
crowd before ordering the church to be set on fire (Potter 47). Guises account to the Queen
stated that the Protestant congregation began to attack him at which point his men defended
themselves and the town against the violent Protestants (Potter 48). Despite the conflicting
details, the aftermath was the same; the Duke of Guise and his men killed approximately 1,2000
Huguenots (The Massacre at Vassy). This all happened as Guise was on his way to court to
reconcile with Navarre (Potter 65).
For Huguenots, the Massacre of Vassy was a premeditated act of aggression by Catholics
that was only the beginning of civil war violence. In contrast, the crown viewed it as a tragic
accident that led to an isolated rebellion that could be policed. The crown did not realize at the
time that the factions were not only religious but also political, which was a dangerous
combination. The Massacre of Vassy made the political factions within France painfully clear
and plunged the nobility and their armies into a civil war.
Despite the growing strength of the Protestant faction, the Huguenots were in no way
equipped to win a war against the French Monarchy. When war broke out the political factions
became visible. The Triumvirate was made up of Guise, Montmorency, Saint-Andre, and the
Cardinal of Lorraine. In the early days of the war the Triumvirs took control of the royal family
and protected them, as a result, the Triumvirate along with the royal family ended up making the
Catholic side of the religious war as well as the government instigator role in the civil war. The
Bourbon noble family, most notably the Prince of Cond, led the Protestant rebel forces (Potter
65-66).

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With the political elite fighting, insurgent Huguenot forces began to seize strategic points
throughout France. This was the strategy of the Huguenots in the war, to control as many
strategic towns as possible. The Catholics in response fought to recapture towns claimed by the
Protestants. There was only one true battle (openly pitched fight) in the war, which was a
decisive Catholic victory (The Battle at Dreux) (The Wars of Religion, Part 1). Throughout the
struggle, both sides began to lose their leaders. At Dreux, Catholic forces captured Cond and
Protestant forces captured Montmorency. An assassin then killed the Duke of Guise. Navarre
was also killed in battle. With the death or capture of nearly all the original Triumvirs and with
Protestant rebellions raging in the South of France, Catherine was eager to seek a peace (Potter
69 -71).
Negotiations began on March 8, 1563. Montmorency and the Prince of Cond were both
released from imprisonment by their enemies in order to begin facilitating the Catholic-Huguenot
peace. The Edict of Amboise (also known as the Edict of Pacification) was signed on March 19,
1563 and marked the official end of the first war (The Wars of Religion, Part 1). In the peace,
Protestants were granted freedoms to practice religion outside of towns that the crown deemed as
less important. They remained able to practice the reformed religion on their estates but
Protestant practices were not allowed while present at court. The Edict of Amboise was not as
generous as the Edict of Saint-Germain and was considered a general failure by both Huguenots
and Catholics (Potter 69 - 70).
After the implementation of the Edict of Amboise Catherine set out on a two year tour
of her kingdom in order to settle certain problems that had arisen surrounding the new peace in
France. Basically, Catherine had set out to reinforce the power of the crown and her own
authority. The most important instance in the two-year tour was the meeting of Catherine, her

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daughter the Queen of Spain, and the Duke of Alva. Scholars have debated if it was at that
meeting that Catherine dedicated herself to the Catholic (and Spanish) cause of destroying the
Huguenots. Most scholars conclude that Catherine was committed to toleration and peace and
therefore promised no such thing. But to the Protestant elite it looked as though she had betrayed
the peace. This instilled paranoia and suspicion in the Huguenot leadership that caused the war to
restart only two years later (Potter 71).
There is no doubt that the First War of Religion in France was a major international
event. It was a war that killed thousands of people. For the purpose of analyzing the war, I will
be treating it as a civil war. By the standards of the Correlates of War dataset, the First War of
Religion qualifies as a civil war. There were at least two groups fighting within the territory of a
single state. The Catholic side supported by the Crown and the Triumvirate made up the
government belligerent and the Protestant side supported by Cond and the Bourbon House were
the rebel belligerents.
In the international system peace tends to be the norm. Throughout world history there
have been few wars fought because wars are costly to states. When a state goes to war, they are
going to sustain war costs. Lives lost, property damaged and money spent all contribute to these
war costs (Lecture 5). These costs have a deterrent effect and make states less likely to fight
wars. Because war is so costly and rare, any argument about why war happens has to be about
why peace fails (Lecture 5).
So why did peace fail in France in 1562? The bargaining model may offer some insight
into just what happened. In the bargaining model, war is seen as a form of bargaining over things
that states value (Frieden, Lake and Schultz 86, 89). Additionally the bargaining model states

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that there is always a bargain that could prevent war. It is the purpose of the bargaining model to
explain why those bargains are not reached (Lecture 6).
One bargaining failure of the First War of Religion was failure due to private
information. This private information is closely linked to the monarchical and autocratic form of
government that was present in France. In the same way that democratic entities tend to be very
transparent when bargaining, monarchies are not. In 16th century France there was the Catholic
coalition made up of the French crown and the Triumvirate. The Triumvirate itself was
established via a secret treaty and those internal alliances only became well established once
fighting broke out. The Protestants were not privy to the information about the alliances between
the noble families as well as the Triumvirates ties to the crown.
Additionally, the Protestants had private information as well. In a civil war, the
government often has a very limited idea of the scale of the rebel coalition. This was the case in
the First War of Religion. While the crown was able to see the number of armed Protestants
increasing and was able to estimate the size of the rebellion, they had no true perception of how
large the retaliatory coalition would be against any aggressive actions they took. The Protestants
were not about to reveal this information about their might because it would weaken their
positions. The same went for the alliances within the Catholic coalition. This incentive to keep
secrets combined with the fact that information was not digital and intelligence gathering was
nearly impossible (it is 16th century France after all), led to private information being held by
both sides. This private information led Cond and the Protestants to believe that they could take
control of the royal family. It also led the Catholics to believe they could simply police what they
thought was minor violence perpetrated by Protestants. These inaccurate views of the relative
power and resolve of each side caused the Protestants and Catholics to go to war.

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Another, and arguably the most, prominent bargaining failures in the First War of
Religion were bargaining failures due to indivisibility. Fighting broke out in France because the
Crown and the nobility were arguing over a national religion. A good that was indivisible,
particularly to the Catholic faction. Throughout 1561, Protestants pushed the crown to allow
them more religious freedoms even to the point that they asked to have formal recognition. This
was too much for the Catholic faction. To the Catholics, the issue of a national religion was
indivisible. An indivisible good is a good that loses its value when divided and that was
definitely the case in France (Friedan, Lake, and Schultz 115). For Catholics, France had to be a
Catholic country. Catherine attempted to foster a peace by making concessions to Protestants by
giving them a limited right to practice their religion, but also not acknowledging a Protestant
religion in French Law. With these negotiations Catherine only managed to enrage most
Catholics and disappoint armed Protestants. For Catholics, dividing recognized religion with the
Protestants resulted in destruction of the value of the national religion. Having a national religion
means nothing if anyone may worship as they choose. Catholics believed that Catholicism was
the only true religion and that they were on the only path to god. The French Catholics would
rather fight a war than give up their national religion, so no bargain could be reached.
Another problem of indivisibility within the First War of Religion was the problem of
cascading challenges to the state. Cascading challenges to the state refers to the idea in civil war
that by giving concessions to one groups it creates a cascading power dynamic that can weaken a
government (Lecture 16). In the French Wars of Religion, the Catholic government was
undoubtedly concerned with cascading power. Basically, the Catholic coalition was concerned
that if they gave an inch to the Protestants they would take a mile. This was the exact reason that
the Crown backed off on the Edict of Saint-Germain, they were worried that by giving the

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Protestants too much power a slippery slope would ensue where they would have a full scale
rebellion in their hands from the various religious factions within the country. Therefore,
compromise on religion was simply not an option for the Crown. Not just because of the vitriolic
nature of a national religion but also because by letting Protestants have their concessions there
could later cause more demands to be made. Additionally, the French government realized that
by making concessions to the Huguenots they might experience demands from other factions of
French society. The power of the crown was indivisible as much as the national religion.
Additionally, there were also a variety of commitment problems both leading up to the
First War of Religion and also when negotiating the eventual peace. These commitment
problems caused bargaining failures to precipitate the First War of Religion and set the stage for
the second conflict.
During the First War of Religion French Monarchical politics were very turbulent. With
the death of Henri II there were now two young boys both in line to be king. The nobility
realized that this was the time in which it would be smart to make a power grab. For these
politicians religion was a political issue so they brought their sympathies with them to the
bargaining table. For the Protestant factions this caused a commitment problem in their bargains
with the Catholic faction whose power was continuously shifting with the control of the
monarchy. When Francis II came to power the monarchy was under influence from the Duke of
Guise. The Guise family was devoutly Catholic and had the ultimate goal of destroying
Protestantism not only in France but also throughout the whole of Europe (Potter 28-29). But
after only eighteen months, Francis II died and the Guises were ousted from power. At that point
the regime shifted towards toleration. With Catherine as regent and the Protestant Navarre
sharing monarchical power, Protestants found themselves bargaining with a crown willing to

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make concessions because Protestant power and influence was growing. This was an obvious
problem in bargaining for the Catholics and the Protestants. The monarchy was in a constant
power shift and Protestants found out the hard way that the deals they were making were not
ironclad due to the tumultuous political climate (the Edict of Saint-Germaine). Protestants
realized that going to war was the only way to reach the political results they wanted. The
Catholic faction could not effectively bargain because power and opinions kept shifting
internally and the Protestants could not commit to any agreements that the Catholics proposed
(allowing Protestants to have their own churches or a seize fire) because the commitment
problems and incentives to misrepresent were too great.
Additionally, there was a commitment problem over sources at the end of the war, which
undeniably caused the French Wars of Religion to be a thirty-year conflict instead of a three-year
one. At the end of the war very few of the peace settlements were followed. Then, in addition to
still having heavily armed Protestants ruling certain areas of France, Catherine goes to meet with
her daughter the Queen of Spain. Whether Catherine did or did not vow to destroy the
Protestants in the meeting has been lost to history. Regardless, Protestants were very suspicious
of Catherine after that meeting and definitely were no longer willing to cooperate with the peace.
Protestants feared that by committing to peace they would only ensure that the Catholics would
exterminate them when they were unarmed. Protestants could not give over control of their
towns or lay down their weapons because those things were sources of future bargaining power.
This unwillingness to cooperate with each other is what would lead the two factions into the
Second War of Religion only two years later.
It is important when discussing why peace failed in 1562 to recognize that France was
ripe for a civil war. The religious grievances in France were reaching a new level. There were

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undeniable bargaining failures between the two sides that the absence of which may have
prevented war. But the reality was that Catholics and Protestants truly despised each other. Civil
wars can be linked to ethnic grievances and ancient hatreds (Frieden, Lake, and Schultz 220).
While these conditions do not change the way that peace ultimately disintegrated in France, hate
did play a role in causing that disintegration. The hatred throughout all factions of French life
towards the other religion created a climate where a war based out of hatred could occur. It is
easy to say that the issue of religion was simply a cover for political hatred within the French
nobility. That explanation is a very simplistic way of viewing the conflict. For those actually
fighting, religious tensions were very real, very political, and very deadly.
While the bargaining perspective is a useful tool for analyzing what actions caused peace
to fail in France in 1562, there are some conditions within France for which bargaining failures
simply do not account. The bargaining model does not account for the domestic politics that
were at play during the First War of Religion. Unsurprisingly, the War of Religion was not
simply about religion. While it is very true that the primary aim of both sides was the triumph of
either Catholicism or Protestantism, there were also some very important domestic influences.
As previously stated, the First War of Religion took place during a very turbulent time in French
politics. With two young kings reigning, the nobility saw this time as an opportunity to increase
the power of their factions. The Guises first sought this power and later the Mortemencys and the
Bourbons joined in the political games. After the death of Francis II and the outing of the Guises.
The Guises wanted revenge on the Bourbons who were elevated to new power by the shift. The
Bourbons were also ready and willing to crush the Guises. Therefore, both sides wanted to fight
in order to take their revenge and win more power. These sentiments in many ways shrunk the
bargaining range as illustrated here:

Crown Ideal Point

(Catholic)

p-a

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p+b

Rebel Ideal Point

(Protestant)

Bargaining Range
When individual incentive to go to war introduced.

Crown Ideal Point

p-a

p+b

Rebel Ideal Point

Bargaining Range

The illustrated logic would be similar to that of a diversionary incentive. The bargaining range
shrinks because leaders see gains by taking their people to war that offset the costs of war. In
order for war to happen there still had to be the bargaining failures that were highlighted above.
But those failures had to be much less severe to start a war that factions on both sides wanted to
fight.
There are also some problems in assessing a conflict that happened so long ago. First,
much of the information on the topic is unreliable. Besides the fact that all information
concerning the French Wars of Religion is over four hundred years old and written in French,
there are also discrepancies in accounts of people and events. There is no way for a modern
audience to have an objective perspective on the relationships between the French Catholics and
the Huguenots. Many of the documents that may have enlightened what truly happened in 1562

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have been lost to time. Therefore it can be very hard to access the exact events that led to the
deterioration of peace in France.
Regardless, 1563 was not the end of war in France. There were seven so-called Wars of
Religion in France lasting from 1562 1598. In the course of the nearly forty-year long conflict
approximately 3 million people were killed (White). Eventually similar religious tensions would
lead to the Thirty Years War yet again involving France in another war based around the issue of
Protestantism.
The French Wars of Religion are a serious civil war conflict of which generally only the
French and French historians have a clear understanding. Peace failed in France due to a variety
of bargaining problems that are partially explained via the bargaining perspective on what causes
war. There are additional factors such as the climate of hatred and the power grabs by the
political elite that the bargaining model may not account for. Is that a failure of the model,
probably not. But what it does signal is that often reality is too complex to be explained by
theories and that human reasoning and behavior cannot be accurately graphed, calculated or
replicated.

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Works Cited
Frieden, Jeffry A., David A. Lake, and Kenneth A. Schultz. World Politics: Interests, Interactions,
Institutions. New York: W.W. Norton, 2010. Print.
Lemke, Douglas. "Lecture 16: Civil Wars, Part 1." 25 Feb. 2015. Lecture.
Lemke, Douglas. "Lecture 5: What Is War." 26 Jan. 2015. Lecture.
Lemke, Douglas. "Lecture 6: Bargaining and War 1." 28 Jan. 2015. Lecture.
"The Massacre at Vassy." The Huguenot Society of Maryland. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://huguenotmd.com/who-were-the-huguenots/the-massacre-at-vassy/>.
Potter, David. The French Wars of Religion: Selected Documents. New York: St. Martin's, 1997. Print.
"The Wars of Religion, Part I." Wars of Religion. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://www.lepg.org/wars.htm>.
White, Matthew. "Selected Death Tolls for Wars, Massacres and Atrocities Before the 20th
Century." Twentieth Century Atlas. N.p., Jan. 2012. Web.
<http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#Huguenot>.