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the program. Hello nestled on a bend of the river Rhine in the southwest corner of

Germany is the city of Worms or Vorms. It's one of the oldest

cities in Central Europe. It still has its early city walls, its 11th century Romanes

cathedral and a 500 year old printing industry. But in its center is a statue of a monk branded as a heretic,

the founder of the Protestant Reformation Martin Luther. In 1521, Luther came to Vorms to explain his attack on the Catholic Church to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.

And they gathered dignitaries of the German lands.

What happened at that assembly, called the Diet of Vormsoms was key to a movement which tore countries apart set nation against nation felled kings and plunged dynasties into suicidal bouts of infighting.

But why did Martin Luther risk execution to go to the diet? What was at stake

for the big players of medieval Europe and how did events of the Daydovorms irrevocably change

the history of Europe? With me to discuss the Daydovade forms of the Reverend Dr Charlotte Methuen, lecturer in

Reformation History at the University of Oxford, David Barche, lecturer in the history of

Christian thought at the University of Hull, and Durbin McCulloch the History of the Church at Oxford University.

Durbin and McCulloch, in the spring of 1521, Martin Luther, who had been excommunicated,

answered the summons of his emperor to explain his actions.

...