under
one of the most brutal leaders, Jaecklein Rohrbach, attacked Weinsberg.
The count and his small garrison of eighteen knights surrendered and
were massacred by the insurgents, who visited mockery and insult upon
the countess and her daughters. Many of the cities joined the
peasants, and for a short time it seemed as if the rebellion might be
successful.

[Sidenote: Suppression of the rising]

But in fact the insurgents were poorly equipped, untrained, without
cooeperation or leadership. As soon as the troops which won the battle
of Pavia in Italy were sent back to Germany the whole movement
collapsed. [Sidenote: February 24, 1525] The Swabian League inflicted
decisive {95} defeats upon the rebels at Leipheim on April 4, and at
Wurzach ten days later. Other blows followed in May. In the center of
Germany the Saxon Electorate lay supine. Frederic the Wise died in the
midst of the tumult [Sidenote: May 5, 1525] after expressing his
opinion that it was God's will that the common man should rule, and
that it would be wrong to resist the divine decree. His young
neighbor, Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, acted vigorously. After coming
to terms with his own subjects by negotiations, he raised troops and
met a band of insurgents at Frankenhausen. He wished to treat with
them also, but Muenzer's fanaticism, promising the deluded men
supernatural aid, nerved them to reject all terms. In the very ancient
German style they built a barricade of wagons, and calmly awaited the
attack of the soldiers. [Sidenote: May 15] Undisciplined and poorly
armed, almost at the first shot they broke and fled in panic, more than
half of them perishing on the field. Muenzer was captured, and, after
having been forced by torture to sign a confession of his misdeeds, was
executed. After this there was no strength left in the peasant cause.
The lords, having gained the upper hand, put down the rising with great
cruelty. The estimates of the numbers of peasants slain vary so widely
as to make certainty impossible. Perhaps a hundred thousand in all
perished. The soldiers far outdid the rebels in savage reprisals. The
laborers sank back into a more wretched state than before; oppression
stalked with less rebuke than ever through the land.

SECTION 3. THE FORMATION or THE PROTESTANT PARTY

[Sidenote: Defections from Luther]

In the sixteenth century politics were theological. The groups into
which men divided had religious sloga