Research Guides: HIST 3337: The Bible and Reform in Europe: Find Books

Librarian

Contact:

936-294-1520
kclaunch@shsu.edu
Library (NGL) Room 223G

Purpose

This guide is intended to provide a starting point for researching topics in the history of religious and theological changes in 16-17th century Europe, a period that saw the fracturing of a unified Christendom, and the political, social, cultural, and economic impacts of these changes.

This guide is not comprehensive; it does not list all of the resources on this topic or in related disciplines owned by the Library or available on the Internet. This guide serves merely as a starting point for research.

Encyclopedias, Dictionaries, and Other Reference Books

The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation
Call Number: REF BR302.8 .O93 1996 vol. 1-4 (2nd floor)
Contemporary scholarship focusing on the complete range of religious and social changes wrought by the Reformation-- including not only issues of church polity and theology but also related developments in politics, economics, demographics, art, and literature. Contains information on the personalities and events of the era, with broad coverage ranging from biographies to extensive treatments of topics such as Lutheranism, women, law, the Augsburg Confession, music, the Holy Roman Empire, peasants, the Bible, persecution,and literacy. Interdisciplinary and international coverage of all aspects of the Reformation in western Europe and the British Isles, along with southern Europe, Scandinavia, and east-central Europe in the early modern period.
The Westminster Handbook to Theologies of the Reformation
Call Number: REF BR305.3 .W47 2010 (2nd floor)
This unique handbook to Reformation theologies provides an accurate and easily grasped entry into the main terms and issues that made this period so important theologically. A variety of Reformation experts succinctly summarize the ideas that led to such explosive changes throughout Europe and the New World.
A Companion to the Reformation World
Call Number: Read Online
29 new essays by leading international scholars, to provide an inclusive overview of recent work in Reformation history. Presents Catholic Renewal as a continuum of the Protestant Reformation. Examines Reformation in Eastern and Western Europe, Asia and the Americas. Takes a broad, inclusive approach, covering both traditional topics and cutting-edge areas of debate.
Reformation and Early Modern Europe: A Guide to Research
Call Number: Read Online
Written by expert scholars in the field, these eighteen essays explore the fundamental points of Reformation and early modern history in religious studies, European regional studies, and social and cultural studies. Each author reviews the present state of research in the field, new trends, key issues scholars are working with, and fundamental works in their subject area, including the wide range of electronic resources now available to researchers.
Historical Dictionary of Reformation and Counter-Reformation
Call Number: REF BR302.8 .H55 2010 (2nd floor)
Provides a comprehensive account of two chains of events--the Protestant Reformation and the Catholic Counter-Reformation--that have left an enduring imprint on Europe, America, and the world at large. This is done through a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and over 300 cross-referenced dictionary entries on persons, places, countries, institutions, doctrines, ideas, and events.
Renaissance and Reformation, 1500-1620: A Biographical Dictionary
Call Number: Read Online
Covering the period comprising the Renaissance and Reformation, this volume covers those who contributed to the fields of art and architecture, music, philosophy, religion, political and social thought, science, mathematics, literature, history, and education.
Renaissance and Reformation
Call Number: REF CB359 .R455 2007 vol. 1-6 (2nd floor)
Background on the historical period that bridged the medieval and modern worlds, roughly 1300–1700, with emphasis on 1350–1650. Includes More than a dozen articles concentrate on the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation, highlighting Calvinism, Church of England, Lutheranism, and ecclesiastical personalities.
Encyclopedia of the Renaissance and the Reformation
Call Number: CB359 .B47 2004 (4th floor)
Exploring the period of transition from medieval to modern times, Encyclopedia of the Renaissance and the Reformation, Revised Edition covers all aspects of the European Renaissance and Reformation, from visual arts and architecture to philosophy, religion, and politics. Scope is the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries, during which time the pivotal events of the Renaissance and Reformation occurred, irrevocably changing the future's course. as well as general interest topics such as the role of women, drawing, families, food and cookery, literacy, libraries, and travel. Includes chronology and bibliography.
Handbook of European History, 1400-1600: Late Middle Ages, Renaissance, and Reformation
Call Number: REF D203 .H36 1994 vol. 1-2 (2nd floor)
Forty-one leading scholars in this field of history present the state of knowledge about the grand themes, main controversies and fruitful directions for research of European history in this era. Volume 1 (Structures and Assertions) describes the people, lands, religions and political structures which define the setting for this historical period. Volume 2 (Visions, Programs, Outcomes) covers the early stages of the process by which newly established confessional structures began to work their way among the populace.
Encyclopedia of European Social History from 1350 to 2000
Call Number: Read Online
Covers the period from the beginning of the Renaissance to the present.
New Dictionary of Theology
Call Number: Read Online

Subject Headings

Subject headings allow you to find books according to broader and narrower topics.

Below are sample subjects. To browse for different, broader, or narrower subjects, go to the library catalog and click "Exact Search." Enter a term and click "subject."

You can start browsing for a broad subject like Education, then look for more specific subjects, such as Education England History 18th century.

Once you know some subject headings, you can also just use them as keywords during an advanced search, using the subject row.

Europe Church history 16th century
Europe Church history 17th century
Germany Church history 16th century
Germany Church history 17th century
England Church history 16th century
England Church history 17th century
Reformation
Reformation Sources
Reformation Europe
Reformation England
Reformation France
Reformation Germany
Reformation Germany Augsburg
Augsburg (Germany) History 16th century
Augsburg (Germany) Church history
Counter-Reformation
Counter-Reformation England
Counter-Reformation Germany
Counter-Reformation Italy
Counter-Reformation Spain
Bible History 16th century
Bible History 17th century
Bible Criticism, interpretation, etc. History 16th century
Bible Criticism, interpretation, etc. History 17th century
Theology doctrinal History 16th century
Theology doctrinal History 17th century
Lutheran Church
Lutheran Church Doctrines
Church of England
Church of England Doctrines
Calvinism England History
Jesuits History
Council of Trent
Luther, Martin, 1483-1546
Zwingli, Ulrich, 1484-1531
Melanchthon, Philipp, 1497-1560
Calvin, Jean, 1509-1564
- …or search for MANY other people as subjects, too, of course. Enter last name first. Years of birth/date are not required unless there are other people by the same name.

Browse the Collection

An excellent way to discover additional resources is to browse for books in relevant call number ranges.

For example:

DD175 - DD257.4 - History of Germany; Modern, 1519-
- DD176 - DD189 - 1519-1648, Reformation and Counter-reformation
DA300 - DA592 - History of Great Britain; Modern, 1485-
- DA310 - DA360 - Tudors, 1485-1603
  - DA350 - DA360 - Elizabeth I, 1558-1603. Elizabethan age
- DA385 - DA398 - Early Stuarts, 1603-1642
- DA400 - DA429 - Civil War and Commonwealth, 1642-1660

To discover the call number ranges for broader, narrower, or different subjects (e.g., the Reformation era in different countries), consult the Library of Congress Classification Outline.

Search the Library Catalog

A Sampling of Books in the Main Collection

The European Reformation, 2nd edition by Euan Cameron
Call Number: BR305.2 .C35 2012 (4th floor)
Since its first appearance in 1991, The European Reformation has offered a clear, integrated, and coherent analysis and explanation of how Christianity in Western and Central Europe from Iceland to Hungary, from the Baltic to the Pyrenees splintered into separate Protestant and Catholicidentities and movements. This new edition embraces and responds to developments in scholarship over the past twenty years.
The Voices of Morebath by Eamon Duffy
Call Number: Read Online - Or print is available: BR377.5.M67 D84 2001 (4th floor)
In the fifty years between 1530 and 1580, England moved from being one of the most lavishly Catholic countries in Europe to being a Protestant nation, a land of whitewashed churches and anti-papal preaching. What was the impact of this religious change in the countryside? In this book a reformation historian takes us inside the mind and heart of Morebath, a remote and tiny sheep farming village where thirty-three families worked the difficult land on the southern edge of Exmoor. A rare glimpse of the life and pre-reformation piety of a sixteenth-century English village.
The Cambridge Companion to Reformation Theology
Call Number: BR305.3 .C36 2004 (4th floor)
Provides a comprehensive guide to the theology and theologians of the Reformation period. Each of the eighteen chapters is written by a leading authority in the field and provides an up-to-date account and analysis of the thought associated with a particular figure or movement. There are chapters focusing on lesser reformers such as Martin Bucer, and on the Catholic and Radical Reformations, as well as the major Protestant reformers. A detailed bibliography and comprehensive index allows comparison of the treatment of specific themes by different figures.
A History of Lutheranism
Call Number: BX8065.3 .G75 2010 (4th floor)
In a clear, nontechnical way, this noted Reformation historian tells the story of how the nascent reforming and confessional movement sparked and led by Martin Luther survived its first battles with religious and political authorities to become institutionalized in its religious practices and teachings.
A Reformation Life: The European Reformation through the eyes of Philipp of Hesse
Call Number: BR350 .P45 W45 2015 (4th floor)
This title presents the European Reformation as seen through the life of an important but little-known participant-Philipp of Hesse, a nobleman who became a Reformation leader in Germany. Enables readers to understand how the events of the Reformation unfolded by viewing the events through the perspective of one man central to the cause and demonstrating how certain individuals' convictions led to the theology that followed.
Anti-Calvinists: The rise of English Arminianism, c. 1590-1640
Call Number: BX5073 .T93 1987 (4th floor)
Anti-Calvinists traces the rise of Arminianism from Elizabethan times, and argues that the subsequent proscription of Calvinism in the 1620s was a major cause of the civil war that broke out in 1642. A provocative reinterpretation of the divisions of the Church of England, this work throws new light on the origins of the civil war and the role played by religious rivalry.
Masculinity in the Reformation Era
Call Number: Read Online
The authors examine the ways in which sixteenth- and seventeenth-century authorities, both secular and religious, labored to turn boys and men into the Christian males they desired. Topics include disparities among gender paradigms that early modern models prescribed and the tension between the patriarchal model and the civic duties that men were expected to fulfill. Essays about Martin Luther, a prolific self-witness, look into the marriage relationship with its expected and actual gender roles.
Religious Thought in the Reformation
Call Number: Read Online
Most general accounts of the Reformation concentrate on its events and personalities, while recent scholarship has been largely devoted to its social and economic consequences. Benard Reardon's famous book has been designed specifically to reassert the role of religion in the study of reformation history and make the theological issues and arguments that fueled it accessible to non-specialists today.
Shaping the Bible in the Reformation: Books, scholars, and their readers in the sixteenth century
Call Number: Read Online
This volume collects significant new scholarship on the late mediaeval and early modern Bible, engaging with the work of theologians, the devotional needs of the laity and the shape their concerns gave to the most important book of the age.
Biblical Scholarship and the Church: A Sixteenth-Century Crisis of Authority
Call Number: Read Online
This book traces how the authority of the Septuagint and later that of the Vulgate was called into question by the return to the original languages of scripture, and how linguistic scholarship was seen to pose a challenge to the authority of the teaching and tradition of the church. It shows how issues that remained unresolved in the early church re-emerged in first half of the sixteenth century with the publication of Erasmus' Greek-Latin New Testament of 1516. After examining the differences between Erasmus and his critics, the authors contrast the situation in England, where Reformation issues were dominant, and Italy, where the authority of Rome was never in question. Focusing particularly on the dispute between Thomas More and William Tyndale in England, and between Ambrosius Catharinus and Cardinal Cajetan in Italy, this book brings together perspectives from biblical studies and church history and provides access to texts not previously translated into English.