Imperial Cities and the Reformation: Three Essays

A new and dynamic view of the Reformation unfolds in these essays. Bernd Moeller, a leading German historian, breaks away from traditional approaches to examine the Reformation in the context of secular history. The result is a masterful weaving of insights from the fields of urban history, sociology, political science, and church history. In the sixtieth century, says Moeller, groups of humanists and the German imperial cities played decisive roles in the spread of the Reformation beyond Luther's Wittenberg. The author delves into these factors, touching on many provocative issues: Why were the cities attracted to Protestantism? How does the Reformation relate to the Middle Ages and to the Renaissance? What drew some humanists, and not others, into Luther's camp? Moeller outlines his basic approach to this historical period, and also tackles specific problems in Reformation studies. These essays have remained at the center of a vigorous debate carried on in recent years by such English-speacking historians as Steven Ozment, Thomas Brady, Robert Scribner and William Monter. They will appeal today as they did when they first appeared in the early 1960's to students of Europeans history and culture, the development of cities, or religious history.