Francis I (French: François I^er) (12 September 1494 – 31 March 1547) was King of France from 1515 until his death. During his reign, huge cultural changes took place in France and he has been called France's original Renaissance monarch.^[1] His permanent rivalry with the Emperor Charles V for hegemony in Europe was the origin of a long and ruinous military conflict that gave rise to the Protestant revolution.

It was during Francis' reign that divisions in the Christian religion in Western Europe erupted. Martin Luther's preaching and writing led to the formation of the Protestant movement which spread through much of Europe, including France. Initially, under the influence of his beloved sister Marguerite de Navarre, Francis was relatively tolerant of the new movement, and even considered it politically useful, as it caused many German princes to turn against his enemy, Charles V. In 1533 he even dared to suggest to Pope Clement VII the convening of a church council where Catholic and Protestant rulers will have equal vote in order to settle their differences - an offer rejected by both the Pope and Charles V. However, Francis' attitude toward Protestantism changed following the "Affair of the Placards", on the night of 17 October 1534, in which notices appeared on the streets of Paris and other major cities denouncing Mass. A notice was even posted on the door to the king's room, and, it is said, the box in which he kept his handkerchief. Antoine Marcourt, a Protestant pastor, was responsible for the notices. Massacre of Mérindol in 1545. The most fervent Catholics were outraged by the notice's allegations. Francis himself came to view the movement as a plot against him, and began to persecute its followers. Protestants were jailed and executed. In some areas whole villages were destroyed. Printing was censored and leading Protestants like John Calvin were forced into exile. The persecutions soon numbered tens of thousands of homeless people.[citation needed] These persecutions against Protestants were codified in the Edict of Fontainebleau (1540) issued by Francis. Major persecutions continued, as when Francis I ordered the massacre of the Waldensians at the Massacre of Mérindol in 1545.

Charles V (Spanish: Carlos I; Dutch: Karel V; German: Karl V.; Italian: Carlo V; 24 February 1500 – 21 September 1558) was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I, of the Spanish Empire from 1516 until his voluntary retirement and abdication in favor of his younger brother Ferdinand I and his son Philip II in 1556. As the heir of three of Europe's leading dynasties—the House of Habsburg of the Habsburg Monarchy; the House of Valois-Burgundy of the Burgundian Netherlands; and the House of Trastámara of the Crowns of Castile and Aragon—he ruled over extensive domains in Central, Western, and Southern Europe; and the Spanish colonies in the Americas and Asia.Aside from this, Charles is best known for his role in opposing the Protestant Reformation.[6] In addition to the German Peasants' War against the Empire, several German princes abandoned the Catholic Church and formed the Schmalkaldic League in order to challenge Charles' authority with military force. Unwilling to allow the same religious wars to come to his other domains, Charles pushed for the convocation of the Council of Trent, which began the Counter-Reformation. The Society of Jesus was established by St. Ignacio de Loyola during Charles' reign in order to peacefully and intellectually combat Protestantism, and continental Spain was spared from religious conflict largely by Charles' nonviolent measures.[7] In Germany, although the Lutheran princes were personally defeated by Charles at the Battle of Mühlberg in 1547, he legalized Lutheranism within the Holy Roman Empire with the Peace of Augsburg. Charles also maintained his alliance with Henry VIII of England, despite the latter splitting the Church of England from Rome and violently persecuting Catholics.

The Holy Roman Empire explicitly proclaimed itself to be the successor of the Western Roman Empire under the doctrine oftranslatio imperii.^[4] In 962 Otto I was crowned Holy Roman Emperor (German: Römisch-Deutscher Kaiser), although the Roman imperial title was first restored to Charlemagne by the Pope in 800. Otto was the first emperor of the realm who was not a member of the earlier Carolingian dynasty.^[5] The last Holy Roman Emperor was Francis II, who abdicated and dissolved the Empire in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars.^[6

Protestant Reformers criticized the papacy as corrupt and characterized the pope as the antichrist.

Popes instituted a Catholic Reformation^[6] (1560–1648), which addressed the challenges of the Protestant Reformation and instituted internal reforms. Pope Paul III initiated the Council of Trent, whose definitions of doctrine and whose reforms sealed the triumph of the papacy over elements in the church that sought conciliation with Protestants and opposed papal claims.^[71]

Gradually forced to give up secular power, the popes focused on spiritual issues.^[6

A hierarchy (Greek: hierarchia (ἱεραρχία), from hierarches, "leader of sacred rites") is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) in which the items are represented as being "above," "below," or "at the same level as" one another. Abstractly, a hierarchy is simply an ordered set or an acyclic directed graph.

Renaissance