[41] See the interesting analysis of public opinion by La Planche, 203. On p. 208 he gives a highly drawn picture of the venality of the parlements, whose “ancienne splendeur estoit desja esvannoye peu à peu,” while they were frequented by “les soliciteurs des courtisans, et les advocats favoris des grands,” in whose precincts justice was not possible for simple, honest folk. He is as bitter in speaking of the conseil des affaires and the conseil privé, but it must be remembered that the author was a Protestant and imbued with hatred against the government because of its persecution of the Huguenots. See Tavannes’ (p. 243) eulogy of the French bar which is nearer the truth.
[42] For Henry II’s policy toward Protestantism see De Crue, Anne de Montmorency, 244-48; Weiss, La chambre ardente, Introd.; Hauser, “De l’humanisme et de la réforme en France,” Rev. hist., LXIV (1897), 258, minimizes the intellectual causes of the French Reformation.
[43] The origin of this word has been much discussed. In the early period of the Reformation in France, all religious schismatics save the Vaudois, whose historical identity was different and familiar, were called “Lutherans.” The Venetian ambassador so characterized the French Protestants in a dispatch to the signory in 1558 (Relazione de Giovanni Sorano, ed. Alberi, I, 2, 409). Boyvin du Villars (Book XII, 204) employs this same term in 1560.
The etymology of the word “Huguenot,” most commonly accepted is that which derives it from the German word Eidgenossen (confederacy) which designated the Swiss Confederates (see Papiers d’état du cardinal de Granvelle, VII, 660). The word in Geneva was naturally not German but French or Savoyard. It is variously spelled—Eydgenots, Eygenots, Eyguenots. But this derivation, though the best supported, is opposed by the eminent philologist, Littré. Grandmaison, Bulletin Soc. hist. prot. franç., LI (January, 1902), argues against the German origin of the word and gives examples of its appearance as a French surname from the fourteenth century onward. But how it came to be applied to the French Protestants he is unable to say. Cf. Weiss: “La dérivation du nom Huguenot,” Bull. Soc. hist. prot. franç., XLVIII, 12 (December, 1898). A note by A. Mazel states that in Languedoc the word was pronounced “Duganau,” which he conjectures to be a diminutive of “Fugou,” the great owl. If this is so, the origin of the word is akin to that of “Chouan” in the French Revolution. The earliest use of the word “Huguenot” in Languedoc is in Devic and Vaisette, Histoire du Languedoc, XI, 342. It undoubtedly was a term of reproach, ibid., XI, 374, note; cf. Claude Haton, I, 121. Without attempting to pronounce upon the origin of the word, I subjoin some allusions which I have come upon. Castelnau, Book II, chap, vii, says: “qui depuis s’appelèrent huguenots en France, dont l’étymologie fut prise à la conjuration d’Amboise, lors que ceux qui devoient présenter la requeste, comme éperdus de crainte, fuyoient de tous costés. Quelques femmes des villages dirent que c’estoient pauvres gens, qui ne valloient pas des huguenots, qui estoient une forte petite monnoye, encore pire que des mailles, du temps de Hugues Capet d’où vint en usage que par moquerie l’on les appelloit huguenots.” Henri Estienne and La Place, 34, say the word arose from the circumstance that the Calvinists of Tours used to go outside of the Porte du roy Huguon to worship. La Planche’s derivation is a study in folklore (p. 262, col. i).
The Venetian ambassador wrote in 1563: “In quel tempo medesimo fu tra questi principalmente, che cercorno di seminar la false dottrina un predicator della regina di Navarra, madre del presente re di Navarra, nominate Ugo, il quale alienò prima l’animo di quella regina dalla religion cattolica, e poi cercò d’alienare e di corromper, come fece, infiniti altri uomini e donne delli più grandi.”—Rel. vén., II, 50. A unique explanation, which I have not found noticed elsewhere is preserved by Jean de Gaufreton, Chronique bordelaise (1877), I, 92: “En cette année les catholiques commencèrent d’appeller les Luthériens et protestants ‘Huguenots,’ et les autres nomèrent les catholicques papistes à cause, qu’ils tenoyent le parti du pape, et qu’ils soustenoyent son authorité. Mais la raison pourquoy les Luthériens furent appellées Huguenots procède de ce que les princes protestants d’Allemagne et Luthériens ayant envoyé une solemnelle ambassade au roy, à la requête des Luthériens et protestants de France pour demander libre exercice du Luthéranisme en son royaume, en faveur des dits Luthériens français, comme le chef de cette ambassade voulut en sa première audience parler latin devant le roy, assisté des messieurs de son conseil, il ne put jamais dire que les deux mots à sçavait ‘hue nos’ et s’arresta tout court. Despuis les courtisans appellèrent les Luthériens françois ‘hue nos,’ et en suite ‘Huguenots.’”
[44] Isambert, XIII, 494.
[45] Weiss, La chambre ardente, Paris, 1889, a study of liberty of conscience under Henry II, based upon about five hundred arrêts rendered by the Parlement of Paris between May, 1547, and March, 1550. Before its creation heresy was dealt with by the regular courts. In Bulletin des comités historiques (1850), 173 (“Inventaire des lettres relatives à l’histoire de France aux archives de Bâle”), there is noted a letter of the King written in 1552 to the effect that those who have been arrested for heresy at Lyons shall not be dealt with unjustly; but the King reiterates his determination not to permit any new religious doctrine to obtain. In the very month before his death, in June, 1559, the edict of Ecouan prescribed the death penalty for all heretics, without the least limitation or restriction, and with injunctions to the judges not to mitigate the punishment, as they had done for some years (Castelnau, Book I, chap. iii). The Huguenots regarded Henry II’s death as a judgment of God.—C. S. P. For., No. 899, June 30, 1559: “They let not openly to say the King’s dissolute life and his tyranny to the professors of the gospel hath procured God’s vengeance.” A letter of Diane de Poitiers in the Catalogue de la collection Trémont, No. 424, proves that some of the property confiscated from the Huguenots was given by the King to his favorite.
[46] Vargas, Histoire de François II, 314.
[47] Granvella to Philip II, June 14, 1561—Papiers d’état du cardinal de Granvelle, VI, 569.
[48] Armstrong, Wars of Religion in France, 4, 5. Cf. De Crue, Anne de Montmorency, 246. The establishment of the Jesuits was not approved in France until after the death of Henry II, owing to the resistance of the mendicant orders and the Sorbonne.—Claude Haton, II, 636.