page_title: Holy Roman Empire
section_title: Religion
hierarchical_section_title: Holy Roman Empire / Demographics / Religion
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: &#160; Titelblatt des Drucks des Augsburger Reichs- und Religionsfriedens Abschiedt der Röm. Königl. Majestat und gemeiner Stendt auf dem Reichßtag zu Augspurg a. D. 1555 auffgericht ..., Meyntz 1555 Mainz 1555
context_page_description: The Holy Roman Empire, occasionally but unofficially referred to as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, was a multi-ethnic complex of territories in Western and Central Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars. The largest territory of the empire after 962 was the Kingdom of Germany, though it also included the neighboring Kingdom of Bohemia and Kingdom of Italy, plus numerous other territories, and soon after the Kingdom of Burgundy was added. However, while by the 15th century the Empire was still in theory composed of three major blocks – Italy, Germany, and Burgundy – in practice, the links between these blocks had become so unsubstantial that only the Kingdom of Germany remained, nearly all the Italian territories for instance having become in effect part of a narrowly-defined Habsburg dynastic patrimony, unconnected to the Empire. The external borders of the Empire did not change noticeably from the Peace of Westphalia – which acknowledged the exclusion of Switzerland and the Northern Netherlands, and the French protectorate over Alsace – to the dissolution of the Empire.
context_section_description: Roman Catholicism constituted the single official religion of the Empire until 1555. The Holy Roman Emperor was always a Roman Catholic.
  Lutheranism was officially recognized in the Peace of Augsburg of 1555, and Calvinism in the Peace of Westphalia of 1648. Those two constituted the only officially recognized Protestant denominations, while various other Protestant confessions such as Anabaptism, Arminianism, etc. coexisted illegally within the Empire. Anabaptism came in a variety of denominations, including Mennonites, Schwarzenau Brethren, Hutterites, the Amish, and multiple other groups.
  Following the Peace of Augsburg, the official religion of a territory was determined by the principle cujus regio, ejus religio according to which a ruler's religion determined that of his subjects. The Peace of Westphalia abrogated that principle by stipulating that the official religion of a territory was to be what it had been on 1 January 1624, considered to have been a "normal year". Henceforth, the conversion of a ruler to another faith did not entail the conversion of his subjects. In addition, all Protestant subjects of a Catholic ruler and vice versa were guaranteed the rights that they had enjoyed on that date. While the adherents of a territory's official religion enjoyed the right of public worship, the others were allowed the right of private worship (in chapels without either spires or bells). In theory, no one was to be discriminated against or excluded from commerce, trade, craft or public burial on grounds of religion. For the first time, the permanent nature of the division between the Christian Churches of the empire was more or less assumed.
  In addition, a Jewish minority existed in the Holy Roman Empire.
caption: Front page of the Peace of Augsburg, which laid the legal groundwork for two co-existing religious confessions (Roman Catholicism and Lutheranism) in the German-speaking states of the Holy Roman Empire
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