[781] Eberstadt, “Der französische Gewerberecht und die Schaffung staatlicher Gesetzgebung und Verwaltung in Frankreich vom dreizehnten Jahrhundert bis 1581,” Schmoller’s Forschungen, XVII, Pt. II, 270. This is a pioneer work in the economic subject here briefly outlined. The reader will find Unwin’s Industrial Development in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, London, 1905, an admirable survey of the same subject, dealing chiefly with England, but with frequent reference to the continent, where the conditions were much the same. There is a copious bibliography prefixed to the work. The article by M. Hauser referred to in the American Historical Review, January, 1899, should also be examined.
[782] Weiss, La chambre ardente, cxlv. The early identification of the French nobility with Calvinism has been exaggerated. One must be cautious in the use of the term “nobility,” for it is to be remembered that the eldest son received the largest share of the inheritance and that younger sons and small nobles, in many instances, had much in common with the small farmers in the provinces. As Mr. Armstrong aptly says: “All that separated them from their neighbors was ‘privilege,’ and to this they clung all the more desperately.”—Armstrong, The French Wars of Religion, 4. In the decade between 1550 and 1560 there is an increase in the number of aristocratic names identified with French Protestantism, but it was not till 1557 that the first great noble espoused its cause and that covertly. This was Antoine of Bourbon. In the same year Coligny and D’Andelot also inclined to it (Whitehead, Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral of France, 63-66). On the whole matter, see Lavisse, Histoire de France, V, Pt. II, 238-42.
[783] Relazione IV, 242. The great store-house of information on this head is M. Noel Weiss, La chambre ardente, 1889—the trials for heresy during the years 1547-49 of the reign of Henry II—a book which has revolutionized the point of view of the history of the French Reformation (see a review of this work in English Hist. Review, VI, 770).
In the town of Provins there were but a few Huguenots. Among them were 1 doctor; 2 lawyers; a notary; 1 barber and surgeon; 1 dyer; 3 apothecaries; 1 draper; 1 fuller; 1 salt dealer.—Claude Haton, I, 124, 125.
[784] It would be a narrow view of the history of France at this time to infer that religious and economic changes were the only sort. The truth is, the reigns of Francis I and of Henry II, were an age of transition in religion, in institutions, even in manners.
“La corruption des bonnes mœurs a continué en tous estatz, tant ecclesiastique que aultres, depuis les cardinaux jusques aux simples prebstres, et depuis le roy jusques aux simples villagloix. Chascun a voulu suyvre son plaisir; on a délaissé mesme l’ancienne coustume de s’habiller. De temps immémorial, nul homme de France n’avoit esté tondu ni porté longue barbe avant le régne dudit feu roy; ains tous les hommes, garçons et campagnons portoient longs cheveux et la barbe rasée au menton.... Les prebstres et évesques se sont faict tondre des derniers; et ont porté longue barbe, ce qui a esté trouve fort estranger depuis le commencement du règne dudit feu roy, ont commencé les nouvelles façons aux habillemens toutes contraires à l’antiquité, et a semblé la France estre ung nouveau peuple ou ung monde renouvelé.”—Claude Haton, I, 112.
[785] The cahier of the estates of Orleans was published at the eve of the French Revolution (Recueil des cahiers généraux des trois ordres, chap. i).
[786] Isambert, XIV, 63 ff.
[787] I am indebted for much of this information to M. Henri Hauser, “Les questions industrielles et commercielles aux Etats de 1560,” Revue des cours, XIII, No. 6, December 15, 1904. Cf. Funck-Brentano, Introd. to Montchrétien, Traicté de l’œconomie politique, LXXIV-VI.
[788] Hauser, “The Reformation and the Popular Classes in France in the Sixteenth Century,” American Historical Review, January 1899, p. 223. “The trade-unions fell under the sway of the religious brotherhoods, which excluded the non-Catholics and were soon to lead the revolutionary movement of the League.”—Ibid., 227.