The Means to Rebuild the Church: Franco-Italian Networks, Lay Piety, and Religious Patronage in Counter-Reformation France

Catholic churches throughout southern France suffered the ravages of religious violence during the French Wars of Religion (1559-1629). Around the turn of the seventeenth century, the provinces of southern France became the focus of Catholic renewal within France, and one of the most important areas of Catholic Reformation in all of Europe. The Catholic revival in southern France involved a broad transnational movement, led to a great extent by noblemen and noblewomen who provided the means to rebuild the church. This article explores the networks of Italian and French Catholic noblewomen and noblemen who promoted the Counter-Reformation movement in southern France. Tuscan-French connections in noble culture, religiosity, and religious patronage seem particularly intriguing during the dynamic expansion of the Catholic reform in southern France during latter stages of the French Wars of Religion, from around 1588 to 1629.