St. Bartholomew's Day massacre St. Bartholomew's Day massacre The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre () in 1572 was a targeted group of assassinations and a wave of Catholic mob violence, directed against the Huguenots (French Calvinist Protestants) during the French Wars of Religion. Traditionally believed to have been instigated by Queen Catherine de' Medici, the mother of King Charles IX, the massacre took place a few days after the wedding day (18 August) of the king's sister Margaret to the Protestant Henry III of Navarre (the future Henry IV of France). Many of the most wealthy and prominent Huguenots had gathered in largely Catholic Paris
Paris in the 16th century "La Grève", in front of the modern City Hall, developed in the 11th century. The headquarters of the guild of merchants was located next to the port, and became the city hall. Another important early port was located on the north side of the Île-de-la-Cité, where the flower market is located today. Les Halles, the central market of Paris, had been founded in 1137 by King Louis VI. By the 16th century it was overcrowded and inefficient. Between 1543 and 1572, King rancis I and his successors gradually rebuilt the market into the form it kept until the time of