This collection of essays by prominent historians of the Reformation explores the experience of religious reform in 'national context', discussing similarities and differences between the reform movements in a dozen different countries of sixteenth-century Europe. Each author provides an interpretative essay emphasising local peculiarities and national variants on the broader theme of the Reformation as a European phenomenon. The individual essays thus emphasise the local preconditions and limitations which encountered the Reformation as it spread from Germany into most of the countries of western and central Europe. Together they present a picture of the many-sided nature of the Reformation as it grew up in each 'national context', both in countries where the Reformation was strikingly successful and where it failed to make an impact.

"...[the editors have] assembled a steller, all-European group of experts, each of whom presents both a summary and an interpretation of the Reformation in the light of the latest, confession-surmounting, often socially oriented, and inevitably revisionist historiography... College and university teachers would be well advised to adopt this excellent collection as a means of providing their students with a geographically and modally broader introduction to the Reformation than is normally possible." The Catholic Historical Review

"These interpretative essay by scholars noted for their work on various national contexts are an impressively comprehensive...exercise in social history." Sixteenth Century Journal

"...the volume offers a most valuable comparison of how in different 'national' settings the impetus for reform encountered and sometimes permeated the political and social movements of the time. All university, college, and seminary libraries should have this book." Religious Studies Review

"...appropriate to students and general readers, as well as scholars....by the very nature of the volume, no one who picks it up can leave it unenlightened, because no one can know much about everything including in it....The continuity of reform makes this book essential reading; its vigor and style usually make reading it a pleasure. One can fully appreciate the books many strengths and achievements, without condoning its venial omissions." Seventeenth-Century News