François Bonivard and his <i>Difformes Reformateurs</i>

Abstract

This article presents François Bonivard (the pre-Reformation Prior of Geneva's Cluniac monastery) and his Des Difformes Reformateurs, the premier example of his satirical and polemical skills. In this, he attacks the violence and immorality accompanying and undermining the Reformation. Opposed to the corruption of the "old" faith, he was a strong critic of the inflammatory preachers of the "new" as well as their followers' violence and avarice. This work emphasises that the desire for an ethical, non-violent Reformation (e.g. Erasmus and Castellio) could be found even in Calvin's Geneva.