The Reformation is remembered as a struggle over theology and the Bible. The doctrines of sola fide and sola gratia form the core of the message of the Reformers. We also remember the great figures of Protestant history, individuals such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Thomas Cranmer.

A feature often missing in the story, however, is the land. The Reformation, in fact, can best be conceived not in abstraction, but down in the dust of history. To understand the land is to understand the emergence of Protestantism and how individual nations or cities embraced or rejected the Reformation.

The first stop in a survey of Reformation geography is in the regions of Germany, known then as the Holy Roman Empire. The German political nation as we know it today did not exist, and it would not exist until the nineteenth century. In 1500, it was a patchwork of various principalities and regions, all fiercely nationalistic to their German roots, yet also serving under the rule of the Holy Roman emperor. Still, there were tensions in the relationship between imperial and local rulers—tensions that would eventually create resistance to the condemnation of Luther.

The Holy Roman Empire is remembered by students as neither Roman nor as particularly holy. The name, however, stretches back to the formation of the empire in the 800s under Charlemagne, who was seen then as heir to ancient Rome and its emperors. By 1500, the Holy Roman emperor had become an elected office, chosen by seven electors scattered throughout Germany. If the electors took their role seriously, they nevertheless seemed to be increasingly forced to submit to the claim of one family: the Habsburg dynasty. This dynasty had influenced or held the imperial title for centuries by Luther’s day—and they would continue to hold it until the time of Napoleon.

We could focus a lot of attention on the imperial court of Charles V, the man who would sit at the Diet of Worms to hear Luther’s trial. But the reality is that the Holy Roman Empire was often driven more by local or regional authorities. In Saxony, for example, there was Frederick—an elector who nevertheless blanched at the thought of bending the knee to imperial will. Frederick instead spent his days expanding his own influence. He even took a unique step to found a new university in Wittenberg and to pay for the transfer of German professors such as Luther to come there and teach. Frederick may have been part of the empire, but he viewed himself as no man’s toady.