The Reformation in Basel

chapter 4 The Reformation in Basel

Amy Nelson Burnett

4.1 Introduction

Studies of the evangelical movements in the cities of south Germany and Swit- zerland have emphasized several features common to the urban Reformation.1 Evangelical ideas were first introduced through the printing press and by indi- vidual preachers in the early 1520s. By the end of 1524, growing popular support for the evangelical movement merged with social and political unrest in the countryside, pressuring city governments to introduce liturgical changes and extend their control over the property and personnel of the church. In these cities the official adoption of the Reformation was marked by the abolition of the mass and issuance of legislation that established new ecclesiastical structures and practices, but the consolidation of the new church would extend over the next several decades. The Reformation in Basel followed this general pattern, but the particular form it took also reflected Basel’s situation as a relatively new member of the Swiss Confederation, as home to the Confederation’s only university, and as a major printing center closely linked with the biblical humanism of Erasmus. These factors initially accelerated the spread of evangelical ideas but eventu- ally hindered the official adoption of the Reformation. Basel too would introduce new church structures and religious practices, but the shaping of a new religious identity would be complicated by the city’s position on the border between the Holy Roman Empire and the Swiss Confederation. In an effort to maintain ties with both sides of the growing religious and political divide, Basel held a confessionally open position until the last quarter of the century, when it finally embraced Reformed Orthodoxy. The official rejection of the Ro- man church in 1529 was an important turning point in Basel’s Reformation, for it marked the culmination of developments over the previous decade and was the beginning of a longer process of religious change that extended through the rest of the century.

1 For an overview of older research, Kaspar von Greyerz, “Stadt und Reformation: Stand und Aufgaben der Forschung,” arg 76 (1985), 6–63; of more recent work, Matthias Pohlig and Vera Isaiasz, “Social Ordnung und ihre Repräsentationen: Perspektiven der Forschungsrichtung ‘Stadt und Religion,’” in Stadt und Religion in der frühen Neuzeit: soziale Ordnungen und ihre Repräsentationen, (ed.) Vera Isaiasz (Frankfurt/Main: Campus, 2007), 9–32.

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4.2 Basel on the Eve of the Reformation

4.2.1 Church and State Basel’s path to the establishment of Reformed Orthodoxy at the end of the 16th century differed significantly from that of the other Swiss Reformed cities, but that path followed naturally from the city’s geographical, political, ecclesiastical, and intellectual situation at the beginning of the 16th century.2 Basel became a member of the Swiss Confederation in 1501, and at the beginning of the 16th century it had much more in common with the free imperial cities of the Holy Roman Empire than it did with the other urban members of the Swiss Confederation. With a population of about ten thousand, Basel was almost twice the size of either Zurich or Bern and almost three times big- ger than Lucerne. While each of the latter cities controlled a significant rural hinterland already in the fourteenth century, Basel’s territorial expansion came only in the second half of the fifteenth century and was limited to a relatively small area southeast of the city. Its economic ties at the beginning of the century were stronger with the margraviate of Baden and Habsburg-ruled Outer Austria (Vorderösterreich) to the north than they were with the other members of the Swiss Confederation. This would change over the course of the 16th century, as political and religious developments strengthened Basel’s links with the other Reformed Orte, but Basel’s full political and economic integration into the Swiss Confederation was a gradual process that formed the backdrop to the formation of its confessional identity over the course of the 16th century.3

2 There are several older accounts of the early Reformation in Basel that are particularly valuable because of their authors’ profound familiarity with the primary sources. They underlie much of the first half of this article and so are listed here, and they will be cited below only where they provide additional detail: Paul Roth, Die Reformation in Basel, i. Teil: Die Vorbereitungs jahre (1525–1528) (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1936); Paul Roth, Die Durchführung der Ref ormation in Basel 1529–1530 (Die Reformation in Basel ii) (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1943); Paul Roth, Durchbruch und Festsetzung der Reformation in Basel. Eine Darstellung der Politik der Stadt Basel im Jahre 1529 auf Grund der öffentlichen Akten (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1942); Paul Burckhardt, Basel in den ersten Jahren nach der Reformation (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1946); and Rudolf Wackernagel, Geschichte der Stadt Basel, 3 vol. (Basel: Helbing & Lichtenhahn, 1907–1925), 3: 317–524. The most important printed sources are contained in absr and bc. Alfred Ehrensperger, Der Gottesdienst in Stadt und Landschaft Basel im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert (Zurich: tvz, 2010), is the most recent overview of the Basel Reformation. 3 Edgar Bonjour and Albert Bruckner, Basel und die Eidgenossen. Geschichte ihrer Beziehun gen: Zur Erinnerung an Basels Eintritt in den Schweizerbund, 1501 (Basel: Birkhäuser, 1951); Gordon, Swiss Reformation, 6–25; Julia Gauss, “Basels politisches Dilemma in der Reforma- tionszeit,” Zwingliana 15 (1982), 509–48; Wolfgang Kaiser, “Gesellige Rivalität. Zum Umgang mit Grenzen im Basler Raum (16.–17. Jahrhundert),” bzga 102 (2002), 23–36.