The first use in the English language of ‘reformation’ to specifically refer to the religious reform movement beginning in the sixteenth century was in 1531 by William Barlow, bishop of Chichester, a supporter of the Reformation, who wrote: ‘Martyn Luther was iugged to be syngulerly chosen of god…for a dew reformacion of the hole worlde.’
WHAT’S IN A NAME: REFORMATION IN HISTORY
