Protestantism in France

Hans J. Hillerbrand in his Encyclopedia of Protestantism claims the Huguenots reached as much as 15% of the French population on the eve of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, declining to 10-12% by the end of the 16th century, and further after heavy persecution began once again with the revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis XIV.

The Protestant minority was persecuted, and a majority of Huguenots fled the country, leaving isolated communities like the one in the Cevennes region, which survives to this day.

A Christian sect or movement, sometimes characterized as proto-Protestant, organized around the teachings of Peter Waldo, a wealthy merchant of Lyon who lived in the 12th century.

In the Duchy of Savoy, the Waldensians frequently faced persecution when "Sun King" Louis XIV of France put the dukes under pressure to eradicate all Protestant presence across his borders during the Savoyard–Waldensian wars (1655–1690).

Today, the Huguenots number about one million, or about two percent of the population; They are most concentrated in southeastern France and the Cévennes region in the south.

With the French conquest of German-speaking regions along the Rhine beginning in the 17th century, the Kingdom acquired significant Lutheran populations.

In October 1985, to commemorate the tercentenary of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, François Mitterrand as president of France formally apologised to the descendants of Huguenots around the world for past governmental persecution of their forebears.

On the other hand, Calvinists and Lutherans are declining, and in 2013 large parts of these groups merged into the United Protestant Church of France.