Jean Taffin

[1] He had to flee the contra-reformers and travelled to Aken and on to Worms, and after receiving his doctorate in Geneva became a pastor in Metz and in 1562 he got his own church there.

In 1564 he was invited to a secret conference by William the Silent to talk about a union of Protestant churches with Carolus Niellius, François Baudouin and Guy de Bres.

He had become chaplain to William the Silent in 1574 and presided over his marriage on 15 July 1575 to Charlotte de Bourbon, in the Grote Kerk, Den Briel.

On his request, he also was peacekeeper between Caspar Coolhaes and Pieter Cornelisz uyten Briel, whose arguments about the Protestant faith had reached a boiling point in 1578.

After William the Silent was assassinated in 1584, Taffin followed mayor Marnix but fled north to Leiden where he presided over the Wallonian Synod from 18 to 20 September 1587.