The 1520s was a very busy decade for world history. The decade begins with such events as the first passage through the straits of Magellan and the Field of Cloth of Gold (see 1520: Henry VIII wrestles Francis I) and, in 1521, The Diet of Worms. The words ‘Diet of Worms’ have resulted in centuries of giggles among English speakers, as in Hamlet’s quip (Shakespeare loved a bad pun) ‘Your worm is your only emperor for diet’. The Diet was a general assembly of the ruling estates of the Holy Roman Empire, presided over by the Emperor Charles V (by this point in history, the empire was as Voltaire was to describe it, neither holy, nor roman nor really an empire).
The main purpose of the Diet was to rein in Martin Luther and the growing Protestant demand for church reformation. In 1520, Pope Leo X had issued a demand that Luther retract his theses attacking the selling of indulgences, and Luther was called before the assembly to retract the heretical errors in his displayed books. It was Luther’s good fortune (or perhaps providence) that there were other major issues facing the European powers at the time, and present also at the Diet was Luther’s temporal lord, the Elector of Saxony, Frederick III, ‘Frederick the Wise’. Frederick was the founder of the University of Wittenberg (Shakespeare makes Hamlet a student at this humanist institution), where Luther taught, and, though a quite traditional Catholic (he owned over 19,000 relics, including straw from Jesus’ manger) Frederick was becoming increasingly convinced of the need for some measure of reform. He had also obtained a guarantee that Luther would have safe passage to and from the assembly.
The two men did not actually speak to each other, but when Luther was called upon to speak it is inconceivable that they did not exchange looks. Frederick would later say that he found Luther ‘too bold’. And while Luther probably did not actually say ‘Here I stand. I can do no other’, his bravery and articulacy seemed plain enough to most observers, Luther told the assembly that if his work was not ‘from God’ then it would perish soon enough, without the Diet’s aid. He clearly impressed Frederick despite his ‘boldness’- if he had not, then that would have been Luther’s last public appearance until brought to the stake.
What Happened Next
All concerned knew that the safe conduct for Luther was pretty worthless, and when Luther left the assembly he was abducted by a gang of armed men. When the artist Albrecht Durer (who was to remain a Catholic) heard the news he exclaimed that if Luther was dead, there would be no one to explain the gospel. But Luther was not dead. He had been abducted by Frederick’s men and spent a year in safety, disguised as a knight (Frederick never visited Luther, possibly fearing being told off for his beloved relic collection). The rest of the 1520s brought disorder on an unprecedented scale: peasant armies expecting the end of the world ravaged Germany, and in 1527 Rome was ecumenically sacked by Charles V’s army of Spanish Catholics and German Lutherans. Charles himself was horrified by the sack, but by then it was clear that the old Europe was breaking up in a manner unforeseen at the start of the 1520s. See also 1529: Zwingli and Luther argue about Communion.