Huldrych Zwingli

Huldrych Zwingli (1484–1531) was the Zurich priest who began the Reformation in German-speaking Switzerland. He studied at Vienna and Basel and pastored at Glarus and Einsiedeln, where he read Erasmus. In 1519 he became people’s priest of the Grossmünster in Zurich and preached through the Gospel of Matthew instead of the Sunday readings, and nearly died in that year’s plague.

In 1522 he and others ate smoked sausages in Lent; the Affair of the Sausages is counted as the start of the Swiss Reformation. After the 1523 disputations images were removed, and on 13 April 1525 he celebrated communion with wooden cups and a German liturgy.

At Marburg in 1529 he and Luther agreed on fourteen of fifteen articles, but parted over the Eucharist. In 1531 the Catholic Five States routed Zurich’s 3500 men near Kappel, and Zwingli was among about 500 dead. Heinrich Bullinger succeeded him.