Duke Pierre de la Place was a French Huguenot

Huguenot

The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...

 martyr, who died a few days after the 1572 St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre

St. Bartholomew's Day massacre

The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in 1572 was a targeted group of assassinations, followed by a wave of Roman Catholic mob violence, both directed against the Huguenots , during the French Wars of Religion...

 of the Huguenots. According to Foxe

Foxe's Book of Martyrs

The Book of Martyrs, by John Foxe, more accurately Acts and Monuments, is an account from a Protestant point of view of Christian church history and martyrology...

, he was informed of the massacre, and ordered to report to the King, to await the King's pleasure. He fled, but was unable to find shelter with any Catholics, and eventually returned to his house and fortified himself in, leading his wife and servants in prayer while he waited. He was eventually obliged to leave with the King's men, who led him into the clutches of assassins who killed him. His corpse was placed in a stable, where it was desecrated with horse dung (later thrown into the river), and his house was plundered.

Family

Pierre de La Place was the cousin of French Protestant theologian Josué de la Place

Josué de la Place

Josué de la Place was a French theologian who was born at Saumur. He became pastor at Nantes in 1625 and was professor of theology at the Academy of Saumur from 1633 till his death....

 and the great-great-great-grandfather of eighteenth century writer and playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

 Pierre-Antoine de La Place, the first French translator of Shakespeare.

Works

• Paraphrase de quelques titres des Institutes, Paris, 1542.
• Paraphrase In titulos institutionum imperialium de actionibus, exceptionibus et interdictis, Paris, 1548.
• Treatise De la vocation et manière de vivre à laquelle chacun est appelé, Paris, 1561 and 1574.
• Treatise Du droit usage de la philosophie morale avec la doctrine chrétienne, Paris, 1562 and Leyde, 1568.
• Commentaires de l’état de la religion et de la république sous les rois Henri & François seconds & Charles neuvième (in 7 editions), 1565 (translated in latin in 2 volumes in 1575-77 and inserted in Mémoires sur l’histoire de France).
• Treatise De l’excellence de l’homme chrétien et manière de le connaître, 1572 (or 1575?), published by P. de Farnace.
• Discours politiques sur la voie d’entrer dûment aux États et manière de constamment s’y maintenir et gouverner (adapted from "De la vocation et manière de vivre à laquelle chacun est appelé"), english translation, London, 1578.