Waldense

English

Etymology

Medieval Latin Waldensis (c. 1170), so called from Petrus Waldus, or Peter Waldo, a merchant of Lyon, who founded this sect around AD 1170. For the surname, see Waldo.

Noun

Waldense (plural Waldenses)

1. (historical, Christianity) A member of a sect of dissenters from the ecclesiastical system of the Roman Catholic Church, who in the 13th century were driven by persecution to the valleys of Piedmont.

Synonyms

• Vaudois
• Waldensian

Translations

member of a sect of dissenters

• German: Waldenser (de) m
• Italian: valdese (it) m or f
• Sicilian: vaudisi m or f

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “Waldense”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)