Editing Huguenots (section)

==Demographics==
[[File:Protestant France.svg|300px|thumb|16th-century religious geopolitics on a map of modern France.
{{legend|#800080|Controlled by Huguenot nobility}}
{{legend|#AA87DE|Contested between Huguenots and Catholics}}
{{legend|#B3B3B3|Controlled by Catholic nobility}}
{{legend|MediumSlateBlue|Lutheran-majority area}}]]
The issue of demographic strength and geographical spread of the [[Calvinism|Reformed tradition]] in France has been covered in a variety of sources. Most of them agree that the Huguenot population reached as many as 10% of the total population, or roughly 2&nbsp;million people, on the eve of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in 1572.<ref name="ReferenceA">Hans J. Hillerbrand, ''Encyclopedia of Protestantism: 4-volume Set'', paragraphs "France" and "Huguenots"</ref><ref>The Huguenot Population of France, 1600–1685: The Demographic Fate and Customs of a Religious Minority by Philip Benedict; American Philosophical Society, 1991. p. 164</ref>

===Links to nobility===
The new teaching of [[John Calvin]] attracted sizeable portions of the [[French nobility|nobility]] and urban [[bourgeoisie]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Gwynn |first1=R. |title=England's 'First Refugees' Robin Gwynn examines the arrival of Huguenot French to England in the 17th century |url=https://www.historytoday.com/archive/englands-first-refugees |publisher=History Today |access-date=24 October 2023 |date=1985}}</ref> After John Calvin introduced the [[Reformation]] in France, the number of [[Protestantism in France|French Protestants]] steadily swelled to ten percent of the population, or roughly 1.8&nbsp;million people, in the decade between 1560 and 1570.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> During the same period there were some 1,400 Reformed churches operating in France.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> Hans J. Hillerbrand, an expert on the subject, in his ''Encyclopedia of Protestantism: 4-volume Set'' claims the Huguenot community reached as much as 10% of the French population on the eve of the [[St. Bartholomew's Day massacre]], declining to 7 to 8% by the end of the 16th century, and further after heavy persecution began once again with the [[Edict of Fontainebleau|Revocation of the Edict of Nantes]] by [[Louis XIV]] in 1685.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> Among the nobles, Calvinism peaked on the eve of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre. Since then, it sharply decreased as the Huguenots were no longer tolerated by both the French royalty and the Catholic masses. By the end of the sixteenth century, Huguenots constituted 7–8% of the whole population, or 1.2&nbsp;million people. By the time Louis XIV revoked the [[Edict of Nantes]] in 1685, Huguenots accounted for 800,000 to 1&nbsp;million people.<ref name="ReferenceA"/>

Huguenots controlled sizeable areas in [[Occitania|southern]] and western France. In addition, many areas, especially in the central part of the country, were also contested between the French Reformed and Catholic nobles. Demographically, there were some areas in which the whole populations had been Reformed. These included villages in and around the [[Massif Central]], as well as the area around [[Dordogne]], which used to be almost entirely Reformed too. John Calvin was a Frenchman and himself largely responsible for the introduction and spread of the Reformed tradition in France.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.huguenot.netnation.com/general/huguenot.htm|title=The National Huguenot Society – Who Were the Huguenots?|access-date=29 December 2006|archive-date=28 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171228135500/http://www.huguenot.netnation.com/general/huguenot.htm|url-status=dead}}</ref> He wrote in French, but unlike the [[Protestantism in Germany|Protestant development in Germany]], where [[Lutheranism|Lutheran]] writings were [[Printing press|widely distributed]] and [[Literacy|could be read]] by the common man, it was not the case in France, where only nobles adopted the new faith and the folk remained Catholic.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> This is true for many areas in the west and south controlled by the Huguenot nobility. Although relatively large portions of the peasant population became Reformed there, the people, altogether, still remained majority Catholic.<ref name="ReferenceA"/><ref>''The Huguenots: Or, Reformed French Church. Their Principles Delineated; Their Character Illustrated; Their Sufferings and Successes'' Recorded by William Henry Foote; Presbyterian Committee of Publication, 1870. p. 627</ref>

Overall, Huguenot presence was heavily concentrated in the western and southern portions of the French kingdom, as nobles there secured practise of the new faith. These included [[Languedoc-Roussillon]], [[Gascony]] and even a strip of land that stretched into the [[Dauphiné]]. Huguenots lived on the Atlantic coast in [[La Rochelle]], and also spread across provinces of [[Normandy]] and [[Poitou]]. In the south, towns like [[Castres]], [[Montauban]], [[Montpellier]] and [[Nîmes]] were Huguenot strongholds. In addition, a dense network of Protestant villages permeated the rural mountainous region of the [[Cevennes]]. Inhabited by [[Camisard]]s, it continues to be the backbone of [[French Protestant]]ism. Historians estimate that roughly 80% of all Huguenots lived in the western and southern areas of France.

Today, there are some Reformed communities around the world that still retain their Huguenot identity. In France, Calvinists in the [[United Protestant Church of France]] and also some in the [[Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine]] consider themselves Huguenots. A rural Huguenot community in the [[Cevennes]] that rebelled in 1702 is still called ''[[Camisard]]s'', especially in historical contexts. Huguenot exiles in the [[United Kingdom]], the [[United States]], [[South Africa]], [[Australia]], and a number of other countries still retain their identity.<ref>''The Huguenots: History and Memory in Transnational Context: Essays in Honour and Memory of by Walter C. Utt''</ref><ref>''From a Far Country: Camisards and Huguenots in the Atlantic World'' by Catharine Randall</ref>