ABSTRACT
The experiences of the towns of Champagne throughout three decades of religious and civil war must cause us to qualify the assertion. What the experience of the towns examined demonstrates is that the quest for urban autonomy operated at a much more immediate level. Urban governments’ assessments of threats to their power and autonomy were inevitably influenced by their and their towns’ past experiences. The distinction between the League movement in Paris and provincial cities is not new, the events analysed bring another perspective to relations between the capital and the provinces. Chaumont was one of the very few cities examined which voluntarily agreed to the articles of the Catholic League of 1576. Throughout the 1580s, the city government managed to deceive Dinteville that they remained loyal to the king. Even more than Chaumont, Saint-Dizier was dominated by its proximity to the Guises in Joinville.
