Diet of Worms
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The Diet of Worms of 1521 was an imperial diet of the Holy Roman Empire called by Emperor Charles V and conducted in the Imperial Free City of Worms. Martin Luther was summoned to the diet in order to renounce or reaffirm his views in response to a Papal bull of Pope Leo X. In answer to questioning, he defended these views and refused to recant them. At the end of the diet, the Emperor issued the Edict of Worms, a decree which condemned Luther as "a notorious heretic" and banned citizens of the Empire from propagating his ideas. Although the Protestant Reformation is usually considered to have begun in 1517, the edict signals the first overt schism.
Luther at the Diet of Worms, an 1877 portrait depicting Martin Luther by Anton von Werner
Summons for Luther to appear at the Diet of Worms signed by Emperor Charles V; the text on the left was on the reverse side.
Luther in Worms, a 1577 colorized woodcut
The Luther statue in Worms, Germany
Imperial Diet (Holy Roman Empire)
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The Imperial Diet was the deliberative body of the Holy Roman Empire. It was not a legislative body in the contemporary sense; its members envisioned it more like a central forum where it was more important to negotiate than to decide.
Seating plan for an inauguration of the Imperial Diet in the Regensburg Town Hall from a 1675 engraving: Emperor and prince-electors at the head, secular princes to the left, ecclesiastical to the right, deputies of imperial cities in the foreground.
The summons for Luther to appear at the Diet of Worms, signed by Charles V. The text on the left was on the reverse side.
"Here I stand": Martin Luther at the Diet of Worms, 1521 19th-century painting by Hermann Wislicenus
The coats of arms of prince electors surround the Holy Roman Emperor's, from flags book of Jacob Köbel (1545).