Johannes Salat (also Hans Salat, Hans Seiler, born 1498 in Sursee, died before 23 October 1561) was a Swiss chronicler, dramatist and mercenary.
Much of his life is documented in his diary entries, covering the years 1517 to 1550. A rope-maker by education, he may also have attended the Latin college in Sursee. He lived in Zürich during 1511 to 1519, and again in Sursee during 1519/20 before moving to Lucerne, where he lived during the 1520s and 1530s, during 1522 to 1527 intermittently participating in several military campaigns in French service in the Italian Wars as quartermaster, and in the Musso war in the service of Lucerne. He was also present in the Wars of Kappel against Protestant Zürich in 1529 and 1531.
He received Lucerne citizenship in 1529 (after the First War of Kappel), and from 1531 he worked as secretary to the Lucerne court of justice, a prestigious position earlier held by other notable Swiss chroniclers (Melchior Russ, Petermann Etterlin), and published literary works, often of a polemical and satirical nature. He also compiled historical works commissioned by the Catholic cantons of the Swiss Confederacy. He attacked the reformation in his 1531 Tanngrotz (a term for "fir-sprig", the badge of the Catholic troops). When Heinrich Bullinger reacted in a pamphlet Salz zum Salat (i.e. "salt for the salad", punning on Salat's surname), he followed up with the much more acrimonious Triumphus Herculis Helvetici which portrayed Zwingli and his Reformation as an obscene witches' sabbath. In 1537, Salat published a more conciliatory "book of warning to the Thirteen Cantons". Salat was also in charge of several dramatic performances during his time at Lucerne, the most notable of which was the Easter play at Lucerne in 1538.
He lost his employment in Lucerne due to fraud in 1540 and worked in Fribourg as school-master during the 1540s. He does not appear to have fared well in Fribourg, repeatedly imploring the Lucerne authorities to let him return, even threatening to change his allegiance to the Protestant camp should they refuse. In 1547 he lost his post as a school-master due to the performance of a students' play that was considered lewd. From that time, he survived offering his services as a leech, alchemist and astrologist, until he was allowed to return to Sursee in 1552 after which there are no more records of him. He was dead by October 1561.
Huldrych or Ulrich Zwingli was a leader of the Reformation in Switzerland, born during a time of emerging Swiss patriotism and increasing criticism of the Swiss mercenary system. He attended the University of Vienna and the University of Basel, a scholarly center of Renaissance humanism. He continued his studies while he served as a pastor in Glarus and later in Einsiedeln, where he was influenced by the writings of Erasmus.
Heinrich Bullinger was a Swiss Reformer and theologian, the successor of Huldrych Zwingli as head of the Church of Zürich and a pastor at the Grossmünster. One of the most important leaders of the Swiss Reformation, Bullinger co-authored the Helvetic Confessions and collaborated with John Calvin to work out a Reformed doctrine of the Lord's Supper.
Johannes Oecolampadius was a German Protestant reformer in the Calvinist tradition from the Electoral Palatinate. He was the leader of the Protestant faction in the Baden Disputation of 1526, and he was one of the founders of Protestant theology, engaging in disputes with Erasmus, Huldrych Zwingli, Martin Luther and Martin Bucer. Calvin adopted his view on the Eucharist dispute.
Felix Manz was an Anabaptist, a co-founder of the original Swiss Brethren congregation in Zürich, Switzerland, and an early martyr of the Radical Reformation.
Johannes Bugenhagen, also called Doctor Pomeranus by Martin Luther, was a German theologian and Lutheran priest who introduced the Protestant Reformation in the Duchy of Pomerania and Denmark in the 16th century. Among his major accomplishments was organization of Lutheran churches in Northern Germany and Scandinavia. He has also been called the "Second Apostle of the North".
The Protestant Reformation in Switzerland was promoted initially by Huldrych Zwingli, who gained the support of the magistrate, Mark Reust, and the population of Zürich in the 1520s. It led to significant changes in civil life and state matters in Zürich and spread to several other cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy. Seven cantons remained Catholic, however, which led to intercantonal wars known as the Wars of Kappel. After the victory of the Catholic cantons in 1531, they proceeded to institute Counter-Reformation policies in some regions. The schism and distrust between the Catholic and the Protestant cantons defined their interior politics and paralysed any common foreign policy until well into the 18th century.
Leo Jud, known to his contemporaries as Meister Leu, was a Swiss reformer who worked with Huldrych Zwingli in Zürich.
The First War of Kappel was an armed conflict in 1529 between the Protestant and the Catholic cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy during the Reformation in Switzerland. It ended, without any single battle having been fought, with the first peace of Kappel.
The Second War of Kappel was an armed conflict in 1531 between the Catholic and the Protestant cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy during the Reformation in Switzerland.
Konrad Pellikan was a German Protestant theologian, humanist, Protestant reformer and Christian Hebraist who worked chiefly in Switzerland.
The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), formerly named Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches until 31 December 2019, is a federation of 25 member churches – 24 cantonal churches and the Evangelical-Methodist Church of Switzerland. The PCS is not a church in a theological understanding, because every member is independent with its own theological and formal organisation. It serves as a legal umbrella before the federal government and represents the church in international relations. Except for the Evangelical-Methodist Church, which covers all of Switzerland, the member churches are restricted to a certain territory.
Simon Sulzer was a Reformed theologian, Reformer, and Antistes of the Basel church.
Johannes Fries was a Swiss theologian and lexicographer during the Reformation. He is also known for his work in music theory.
Michael Weiße or Weisse was a German theologian, Protestant reformer and hymn writer. First a Franciscan, he joined the Bohemian Brethren. He published the most extensive early Protestant hymnal in 1531, supplying most hymn texts and some tunes himself. One of his hymns was used in Johann Sebastian Bach's St John Passion.
Katharina von Zimmern, also known as the imperial abbess of Zürich and Katharina von Reischach, was the last abbess of the Fraumünster Abbey in Zürich.
The Reformation in Zürich was promoted initially by Huldrych Zwingli, who gained the support of the magistrates of the city of Zürich and the princess abbess Katharina von Zimmern of the Fraumünster Abbey, and the population of the city of Zürich and agriculture-oriented population of the present Canton of Zürich in the early 1520s. It led to significant changes in civil life and state matters in Zürich and spread to several other cantons of the Old Swiss Confederacy, and thus initiated the Reformation in Switzerland.
The Thurgau was a pagus of the Duchy of Alamannia in the early medieval period. A County of Thurgau existed from the 13th century until 1798. Parts of Thurgau were acquired by the Old Swiss Confederacy during the early 15th century, and the entire county passed to the Confederacy as a condominium in 1460.
Johann Jakob Hottinger was a Swiss historian. He was a great-grandson of philologist Johann Heinrich Hottinger (1620–1667).
Hans Jakob Stampfer was a gold smith and medalist of Zürich in the age of Bullinger . He was the son of gold smith Hans Ulrich Stampfer and of Regula Funk and learned the same trade both from his father and during journeyman years in Germany, likely Augsburg. Stampfer returned to Zürich in 1531. He is recorded as a member of the Kämbel guild in 1533, and as the guild's representative in the city council in 1544. He acted as the city's assayer from 1539. Zürich issued a thaler coin minted by Stampfer, the so-called Stampfertaler, during 1555–1560. He married Margaretha von Schönau . He was reeve of Wädenswil during 1570 to 1577.
Hans-Jürgen Hufeisen is a German recorder player and composer.