On August 10th 1566 an enraged crowd of Huguenots burst into the Chapel of St. Lawrence in Steenvorde France and proceeded to destroy with hammers and picks any ecclesiastical art that they came across. They toppled statues of Mary and the saints, destroyed crucifixes, smashed stain glassed windows, and defaced tombs. It was not an isolated incident, indeed it triggered a wave of iconoclastic fury that radiated north from France into the Low Countries, with cathedrals, churches, monasteries, and hospitals all targeted for destruction.
One witness wrote: “They tore the curtains, dashed in pieces the carved work of brass and stone, brake the altars, … [they] burned and rent not only all kind of Church books, but, moreover, destroyed whole libraries of books…”
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