The Reformation

1517 CE — Central Europe, Holy Roman Empire

Today: Germany (Wittenberg) and across Europe

When the monk Martin Luther publicly attacked the Catholic Church's corruption — legend says by nailing 95 arguments to a church door — the new printing press spread his protest across Europe faster than the Church could suppress it. Christianity fractured, unleashing over a century of religious war and permanently breaking the Church's monopoly on Western truth.

Worth knowing: Luther meant to spark a scholarly debate, not a revolution — but within two months printers had copied his 95 theses across Germany, turning a local grievance into a continental firestorm he could no longer control.

Pattern: Ideological movement — A belief system rises, spreads, institutionalizes, and then schisms — changing the rules people accept as legitimate.

Entry 154 of 240 in Precedent, a walk through the whole human story in order.