ABSTRACT
The Europe of 1300 was in many ways very different from that of 1550. The unifying single Church based in Rome had been challenged by reformers of different types, and by 1550 these were undermining and rebelling against the Roman Catholic doctrines and traditions. The Reformers varied in style, from the strict Protestant followers of John Calvin, to the more nuanced English Reformation that eventually emerged under Elizabeth I. A comparison of maps between 1330 and 1550 would also show how the borders of many countries, duchies and empires had changed in this period. General trends can be seen: the strengthening and centralisation of the power of the French kings, the changing of the Iberian Peninsula to a wholly Christian area under only two kings, the end of Swedish involvement in the Kalmar Union and the union of Poland and Lithuania in the east.
