These unions of disparate qualities shocked Guichardin but also stimulated him. He was a man to enjoy laughter and satire. The ‘Festival of the Fools’, or the ‘Festival of the Ass’, celebrated on the day of the Holy Innocents, even profaned the Church. The pope, the bishop and the priest of the fools and their followers participated in a countless number of eccentric acts on the day of Mardi Gras. It was the custom for the fool to play an important role in the performances, games and processions organised by the chambers of rhetoric. He would jeer at the crowd and their faults with singularly trivial eloquence, and served as the medium through which public opinion was voiced. His subversive zeal, however, was not overly appreciated by the authorities and consequently edicts were soon passed in an attempt to curb his influence.

      In order to maintain the traditional aspect of the public festivities, the chambers of rhetoric (i.e., the associations of the rich petit bourgeois) like the Landjuweel of 1561 in Antwerp, deployed unheard of amounts of money, yet their desire to placate the powers from which they derived their privileges is tangible. The rules imposed upon the contests strictly forbade the use of obscenities and disrespectful allusions to the Church, and the texts of the rhetoricians became generally pedantic, casting doubt upon the idea that their heavy-handed allegories mixed with naïve humanism truly corresponded to the true tastes of the popular classes. In contrast, the populace identified with the legend of Ulenspiegel, whose hero entertained them with the crudest of farces. Ulenspeigel’s favourite joke was to throw up into a dish which would then be served to a priest, a detail that provides a clear instance of what constituted the humour enjoyed at village feasts and marriages like those attended by Bruegel in the company of his merchant friend Franckert.

      The story of Ulenspeigel, the circumstances of whose birth remained mysterious, was especially popular at the beginning of the sixteenth century when it was translated into French, Latin and English. It takes up the biting satire of the great fourteenth-century Flemish poet Jacob Van Maerlandt, in which a lazy and ignorant bawd of a clergyman is mercilessly ridiculed. Sometimes, however, the laughter would give way to indignation, for religious faith was deeply seated and alive in the hearts of the spectators. This was the eve of the great religious upheavals that marked this ardent and impassioned era.

      Beginning in 1520, Lutheranism began to spread in Holland, in particular making astonishing progress in the city of Antwerp where German merchants helped to propagate it and where the Portuguese Maranos (Jews who had been forced to convert to Christianity) encouraged it out of their spite for Catholicism.[3] In response, Emperor Charles V increased the number and severity of his edicts, and the famous inquisitor François Van der Hulst imprisoned suspects. While the admirers of Erasmus, the humanists, were careful not to profess the new doctrines publicly, the popular classes eagerly attended secret meetings, where they analysed the Gospels, and outdoor sermons held by defrocked monks at the very gates of the city. The spirits of the people were carried away by a sort of frenzy, and dogmas were even discussed in workshops and taverns. In an attempt to discourage the heretics with fire, the executioner publicly burned their books and tortured their printers. Others were forced to wear a yellow cross to identify them publicly, but the sight of them only stimulated pity and anger.

      The Convent of the Augustines in Antwerp was a hotbed of agitation for the Reformation, and in consequence Henri de Zutphen, the Father Superior, was arrested, taken to the Abbey of Saint-Michel and locked in a cell. However, here he was rescued by a group of women “who undertook in that room such violence that they succeeded in pulling him out”.[4] In were the women who proved themselves most ardent. One, named Marguerite Boonams, was condemned to be buried alive for having insulted the representatives of the law undertaking an investigation in the same Convent, but her sentence was commuted on the condition that she undertake a pilgrimage. Soon the judges became less lenient. The regent, Margaret of Austria, who Henri de Zutphen called “the atheist Jezebel” in a letter from Bremen, had the Convent of the Augustines razed and its occupants taken to Brussels where they were tried. Two were burned at the stake on 1 July 1523, dying with composure. Van der Hulst, who was dismissed as an impostor after the death of Pope Adrian VI, was replaced by ecclesiastical inquisitors.

      11. Albrecht Dürer, The Adoration of the Magi, 1504.

      Oil on wood panel, 98 × 112 cm.

      Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

      12. Rogier Van der Weyden, The Adoration of the Magi, central panel, ca. 1455.

      Tempera on wood, 138 × 153 cm.

      Alte Pinakothek, Munich.

      Alongside Lutheranism, the people became increasingly interested in theology and other faiths developed. Eloi Pruystinck, who was a simple slate roof-maker and a native of Antwerp, founded the faith of the Spiritual Libertines, ‘Loistes’ who believed that the Holy Spirit was nothing more than pure reason. “Spiritum Sanctum nihil aliud esse quant ingenium et rationem naturalem!” cried Luther in indignant response.

      Not much later, Anabaptism from southern Germany made its appearance. Melchior Hoffman, its prophet, announced the end of the world and the Advent of the Reign of God. He preached a libertarian idealism that the baker Jan Matthys of Haarlem tried to make reality through the use of force but the fall of the city of Munster, which was the New Jerusalem and the stronghold of the leaders of the movement, did not put an end to the crisis. The Anabaptists were hunted down like wild animals by Protestants and Catholics alike, who united their efforts against the sect that desired the downfall of society. A notice condemned all Anabaptists, even the repentant, to death, but the heroism of their martyrs only succeeded in inspiring new followers. Although persecution had rendered public and communal confession of the new faith impossible, it was professed in hiding. Hundreds of heretical writings and songs against the Pope, the Church and its priests, and others that exalted the courage of the executed were circulated under the cover of darkness. In response, the number of edicts against the Anabaptists increased and threatened the penalty of death in each article.

      A third doctrine, Calvinism, which would ultimately recruit the greatest number of worshipers, began to spread from 1544. Yet again, in the Low Countries Antwerp became the centre of agitation for the new faith. The cosmopolitan port served as a refuge for exiles, particularly to the French Huguenots who were relatively safe there. Even Philip II of Spain did not dare enforce the edicts to the letter for fear of ruining the commerce that lay at the source of the country’s prosperity. A deep political discontent grew out of the religious crisis, for the Flemish felt increasingly oppressed by their Spanish rulers. A revolution was brewing. Angry hordes freed prisoners and chased down inquisitors and representatives of the law. In Brussels on 5 April 1566, the drafters of the famous ‘Compromise’ gathered for a banquet at the Hotel de Culembourg and shouted the rebellious “Vive le gueux!” (Long live the poor, though the term gueux had an anti-papist connotation, and later came to signify the Protestants of the Netherlands) for the first time in history. The outbreak of the Reformation carried everyone away. Priests publicly abandoned the Church from their pulpits and the authorities were powerless to stop the iconoclasts who spread throughout the country.

      13. Hugo Van der Goes, The Adoration of the Shepherds, central panel of the Portinary triptych, 1476–1478.

      Oil on wood panel, 250 × 310 cm.

      Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

      14. Joachim Patinir, Saint Jerome in a Landscape, ca. 1530.

      Oil on wood, 74 × 91 cm.

      Museo del Prado, Madrid.

      15. Quentin Metsys, Portrait of a Man, 1510–1520.

      Oil on wood, 80 × 64.5 cm.

      National

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