Protestants

On this day in 1526, the citizens of Strasburg, Nuremburg, Ulm, and nine other cities with the support of a few electors and princes, officially protested a decree of religious repression from the Hapsburg Imperial Diet. They petitioned the emperor, Charles V, to both revoke what the assembly of the German states had ordered as well as to issue a decree of toleration--in order to protect and promote fledgling Lutheran congregations. These reformers of both church and society were thus first given the name "Protestants."