Ideas · 1517
Luther's Ninety-five Theses and the Reformation
Wittenberg, Electorate of Saxony (Germany)
On 31 October 1517 the theologian Martin Luther sent his Ninety-five Theses, an attack on the sale of indulgences, to the Archbishop of Mainz; by tradition he also posted them on the door of All Saints' Church in Wittenberg. Several hundred printed copies circulated in Germany that year, and Luther's challenge to papal authority grew into the Protestant Reformation, carried further by reformers such as Huldrych Zwingli and John Calvin and, in England, under Henry VIII.
Why it mattered
The Reformation split Western Christianity into Catholic and Protestant churches, used the printing press to spread religious writing in everyday languages, and fed the European wars of religion, which killed an estimated 7 to 17 million people.
Related
- The world in 1500: Sea Roads Open chapter
- The Columbian Exchange previous moment · 1492 onwards
- First circumnavigation of the Earth next moment · 1519–1522