Thomas Muentzer Butchered at Frankenhausen

May 15, 1525

The apocalyptic preacher Thomas Muentzer led his peasant followers under a rainbow banner against the troops of Philip of Hesse at Frankenhausen. The cannon fire scattered them in minutes. Muentzer was captured hiding in a cellar, tortured, and beheaded. Luther, appalled, had urged the princes to strike hard. His radical theology, interpreting the Gospel as social revolution, was later adopted by Marxist historians as evidence of class struggle within the Reformation.