Analysis of the Relationship between German Pamphlets, Public Opinion Formation and Religious Conflicts in the Second Half of the Sixteenth Century

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This research analyzes how the religious conflicts transformed 'mass communication and public opinion formation by means of vernacular pamphlets' in the Lutheran areas of Germany in the second half of the 16th century. The results of the analysis show that the number of anti-Calvinist pamphlets using oral and visual transmission techniques increased in the 1580's and that the Peace of Augsburg(1555) and the introduction of Calvinism in some Lutheran territories(from the 1580's) occasioned strict censorship controls over pamphlets.