Institutes of the Christian Religion
Calvin publishes his French Institution of the Christian Religion
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Original prompt & settings (JSON) ↗The title page advertises an unusual double credit: composed in Latin by Jean Calvin, and translated into French by the same man.
1541: Institution de la religion chrestienne
In 1541 an edition titled Institution de la religion chrestienne appeared in French, attributed by the surviving book to Jean Calvin as both Latin author and French translator.
Having enlarged his original 1536 Latin treatise in 1539, Calvin prepared a French version so that readers outside the Latin-educated elite could use the work.
The edition kept his prefatory address to Francis I of France, offering the book as a confession of faith.
Based on the 1539 Latin, not traced from it
Calvin worked principally from the much-enlarged Latin text of 1539, reworking it rather than mechanically reproducing it word for word.
The result runs to 17 main chapters across 822 numbered pages in quarto, with 44 preliminary pages and 2 at the end.
What the book does not tell you
The surviving edition names neither its place nor its printer. Modern cataloguing assigns it to Geneva and to Michel du Bois.
No exact day or month of publication is established by the consulted catalogue; only the year is secure.
A 1536 letter indicates Calvin had already begun French translation work, and scholars have debated whether a lost French version existed before this one. The 1541 volume remains the earliest surviving French edition.
Sources
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What the sources leave uncertain
- No exact day or month of publication is established by the consulted catalogue; only the year 1541 is secure.
- The surviving edition does not name its place or printer; Geneva and Michel du Bois are bibliographical attributions.
- A 1536 letter indicates Calvin had begun French translation work, and scholars have debated whether a lost French version might have existed before 1541. The 1541 volume remains the earliest surviving French edition.