Francuski przekład Teatru okrucieństw heretyków (1588) Richarda Verstegana – czyli podróż do warsztatu XVI-wiecznego polemisty

Title: French translation of the Theatrum crudelitatum haereticorum (1588) by Richard Verstegan: a visit to the workshop of a sixteenth-century polemist Abstract: This paper aims to understand and explain the motivations that drove Richard Verstegan to propose in one volume a double translation of his famous work Theatrum crudelitatum hereticorum nostri temporis (original edition of 1587, French translation of 1588). It will constitute a kind of visit in the workshop of a Catholic polemicist installed in Antwerp and destining his writings to be diffused especially in England of Elisabeth I and in France of Henri III. It will explain that it was not only the financial, political and polemical factors which pushed the author to publish such an editorial oddity, but also aesthetic, which influence the reception of the message transmitted by the book. Keywords: Richard Verstegan, polemical literature, French religious wars, illustrated literature, sixteenth-century religious propaganda