From sounding the tocsin to ringing the doorbell: some reflections on Saint Bartholomew as a neighbourhood massacre

Abstract

Abstract What do we know, after so many pages devoted to the lieu de mémoire ‘Saint-Barthélemy’, of the thousands of Protestants thrown into the Seine or flung into the Saône, of those anonymous men, women and children exterminated in the summer and autumn of 1572? What do we know about the executioners during those nights, about those rare people who put their heart and soul into massacring their Huguenot neighbours? The responsibility of Catherine de Médicis or the Guise has been the subject of much interest; the torments of Charles IX and Spanish manipulation have long been scrutinized. This article will eschew these legitimate investigations in order to focus on the humble lives behind that night, the faces of the victims and the names of the killers, to discover who the ordinary actors were in this extraordinary event.