Trial and execution of Anne du Bourg
The trial and execution of Anne du Bourg was a critical event in the history of religious conflict in Paris, prior to the outbreak of the French Wars of Religion three years later.
Anne du Bourg, a judge in the Parlement of Paris, would be executed, after calling King Henry II an adulterer and blasphemer, and refusing to affirm the Real presence.
His trial would inflame religious tensions in Paris, leading directly to the assassination of President Minard, and contributing to the powder keg that exploded in the riot of Saint Medard a few months later.
[4] However, Henry II remained unsatisfied with their progress, and their reticence to register the Edict of Ecouen into law, but was not able to push them into more aggressive action, until the conclusion of peace with the Habsburgs and English in the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis.
[6] Shortly thereafter an angry crowd surrounded a secret Protestant site of worship on the rue St Jacques, threatening and throwing stones at those who tried to leave.
[9] The gens du roi convened a mercuriale session in the hope of restoring discipline among the judges, and healing any potential breach that might be forming.
[10] Whilst Anne du Bourg took a more personal line, contrasting the widespread prosperous condition of blasphemers and adulterers, with the pure community of reformers, who desired only to cleanse the church.
[10] After the conseillers had spoken, it was the turn of the Presidents; de Hurley, and Seguier offered a defence of the courts conduct, and thus implicitly the moderates, Minard meanwhile emphasised that royal edicts such as those on heresy should be obeyed.
[14] Le Maistre went furthest, praising Philip II for his extermination of the Cathars, with the implicit comparison that Henry should do likewise for Protestants.
[14] The King vowed to see du Bourg burn with his own eyes, however he would be killed at a joust celebrating the peace of Cateau-Cambrésis on July 10, succeeded by his young son Francis II who was governed by his maternal uncles, the Guise.
[19] De Foix found his trial complicated by the fact he'd distinguished Sacramentarians from Lutherans in terms of who should receive the death penalty.
[20] The trial of Anne du Bourg gripped Paris, as he alone broke against outward conformity, in admitting to attending services and denying the miracle of mass when pressed by his judges.
[23] To avoid any escape on the day of the execution, guards would be added around du Bourg, as he was transferred to the Place de Greve on December 23.
[25] The Cardinal of Lorraine wrote to the French ambassador in Rome of his hope that this execution would act as a deterrent against Protestantism, yet for the Protestants he would be a prime martyr justifying resistance.
