Geneva (1400–1600)

The settlement of human societies on the shore of Lake Geneva, at the mouth of the river Rhône, dates back to prehistorical times. Due to its strategic location and the fact that a bishopric was installed in the city at the beginning of the fifth century, Geneva rapidly developed into an important economic and political center. During the late Middle Ages, and especially from the fifteenth century, the city took advantage of the dominion of the House of Savoy and of the absence of wars in the region. The commercial development promoted by the dukes of Savoy, who supported and protected commercial traffic over the Alps, boosted Geneva’s economic growth. The subsequent development of international trade fairs and the presence of many Italian merchant-bankers (Milanese and Tuscans in particular) made Geneva one of the most important centers of the European Renaissance economy. The city’s economic development was accompanied by substantial demographic growth. The city of 5,000 inhabitants at the beginning of the fifteenth century grew to 10,000 people by the 1460s. The growth continued during the sixteenth century as a result of Protestants taking refuge in the Reformed Republic, and by the beginning of the seventeenth century, Geneva had 17,000 to 18,000 inhabitants. Difficulties faced by the duchy of Savoy and the expansion of the Swiss Confederacy plunged the city, by the 1470s, into economic and political crisis. During the 1520s and 1530s, Geneva allied to the Swiss Cantons, acquired political independence from the bishop, and adopted the Reformed faith (1536). The institution of Calvin’s Church, and the city’s conflicts with Bern and the duchy of Savoy, created a climate of great uncertainty and many conflicts, which ended only with the Peace of Saint-Julien (1603). Traditional Swiss scholarship considers the Reformation to have been the watershed between the medieval city and the early modern independent Republic. This dividing line has influenced historiographic production, with only a few works analyzing a given topic across the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. While economic history generated many important studies during the 1960s and 1970s, religious and social history, especially related to Calvin’s Geneva (roughly 1540–1570), have largely dominated the Genevan bibliography. More recently, political and urban history, especially concerning the late medieval period, have received renewed attention. For more resources on Calvin’s Geneva, see the Oxford Bibliographies article in Renaissance and Reformation on “John Calvin” and “Calvinism.” Given the city’s close ties with the Swiss Confederacy, a valuable bibliography is also provided by the Oxford Bibliographies article in Renaissance and Reformation on “Switzerland.”