The period known as the Enlightenment began in 1685 with two major events in England and France. The first was the accession of James II, an avowed Catholic, to the throne of Protestant England. The second was Louis XIV’s revocation of his grandfather Henry IV’s Edict of Nantes, which had given official toleration to Protestants in France. Louis XIV’s action drove French Protestants out of the country, forcing them to find refuge in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and even the British American colonies. In England, the birth of a male heir to James and his Catholic wife—and the announcement that the boy would be raised Catholic—provoked a political crisis.