Consider the following from McClintock and Strong's:
"Waldo (or Valdo), Peter the founder or ally of the Vaudois or Waldenses (q.v.), a body of Christians who separated themselves from the Church of Rome in the 12th century, was born at Vaux, in Daluphiny, on the banks of the Rhone. He acquired a large fortune by commercial pursuits in Lyons, France; and when he resolved to retire from business, not only devoted himself to the spiritual instruction of the poor, but distributed his goods among them, and in all respects treated them as his children or brothers. The only translation of the Bible then in use was that made by Jerome, called the Latin Vulgate; but Waldo, who was a learned as well as a benevolent man, translated the four gospels into French, this being the first appearance of the Scriptures in any modern language. The possession of these books soon discovered to Waldo and his people that the Church was never designed to be dependent on a priesthood, even for the administration of the sacraments; and his instruction, boldly followed by practice, became so obnoxious to the Church that he was first persecuted by the archbishop of Lyons, and at length anathematized by the pope. No longer safe at Lyons, Waldo and his friends took refuge in the mountains of Dauphiny and Piedmont, and there formed those communities which grew in peace and flourished in rustic simplicity "pure as a flower amid the Alpine snows." From these mountains and valleys the simple doctrines of Christianity flowed out in multiplied rivulets all over Europe. Provence, Languedoc, Flanders, Germany, one after another tasted of the refreshing waters, until, in the course of ages, they swelled into a flood which swept over all lands. Waldo is understood to have traveled in Picardy, teaching his Reformation doctrines hundreds of years before Luther was born. He finally settled in Bohemia, where he died in 1179, the same year in which his tenets were denounced by an ecumenical council. The Waldensian Church was a light on the mountains during the Dark Ages, and, amid all the corruptions of the Church, it held its open Bible and pure doctrines; and that same Church still survives, the: basis of all reformatory movements in Italy. (W. P. S.) "
(w�lden�sez) or Waldensians, Protestant religious group of medieval origin, called in French Vaudois. They originated in the late 12th cent. as the Poor Men of Lyons, a band organized by Peter Waldo, a wealthy merchant of Lyons, who gave away his property (c.1176) and went about preaching apostolic poverty as the way to perfection. Being laymen, they were forbidden to preach. They went to Rome, where Pope Alexander III blessed their life but forbade preaching (1179) without authorization from the local clergy. They disobeyed and began to teach unorthodox doctrines; they were formally declared heretics by Pope Lucius III in 1184 and by the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215. In 1211 more than 80 were burned as heretics at Strasbourg, beginning several centuries of persecution.
The Waldenses proclaimed the Bible as the sole rule of life and faith. They rejected the papacy, purgatory, indulgences, and the mass, and laid great stress on gospel simplicity. Worship services consisted of readings from the Bible, the Lord's Prayer, and sermons, which they believed could be preached by all Christians as depositaries of the Holy Spirit. Their distinctive pre-Reformation doctrines are set forth in the Waldensian Catechism (c.1489). They had contact with other similar groups, especially the Humiliati.
The Waldenses were most successful in Dauphin� and Piedmont and had permanent communities in the Cottian Alps SW of Turin. In 1487 at the instance of Pope Innocent VIII a persecution overwhelmed the Dauphin� Waldenses, but those in Piedmont defended themselves successfully. In 1532 they met with German and Swiss Protestants and ultimately adapted their beliefs to those of the Reformed Church. In 1655 the French and Charles Emmanuel II of Savoy began a campaign against them. Oliver Cromwell sent a mission of protest; that occasion also prompted John Milton's famous poem on the Waldenses. At the time of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), the Waldensian leader, Henri Arnaud , led a band into Switzerland; he later led them back to their valleys.
After the French Revolution the Waldenses of Piedmont were assured liberty of conscience, and in 1848, King Charles Albert of Savoy granted them full religious and civil rights. A group of Waldensians settled in the United States at Valdese, N.C. The Waldensian Church is included in the Alliance of Reformed Churches of the Presbyterian Order. The principal Waldensian writer was Arnaud.
(hoomile�te) [Lat.,=the humbled ones], Roman Catholic association of laymen formed in the 11th cent. in Lombardy. They wore plain clothes and lived under special vows, but mingled freely with the world. They were protected by the papacy in most of the 12th cent., and some of them were organized into an order or joined other orders. There were occasional defections from the Humiliati to the Waldensians, and some conversions in the other direction. The Humiliati were finally suppressed in the 16th cent. after their orthodoxy had long been questioned.
(�Nre� �rno�) , 1641-1721, pastor and leader of the Waldenses. When Victor Amadeus II, duke of Savoy, in league with the French, set out to expel the Waldenses, Arnaud led (1686) a band of the Waldenses into Switzerland. In 1689 he led some of them back to their Piedmont valleys, where they withstood a combined French-Savoyard attack. In 1690, Victor Amadeus turned against the French, and Arnaud gained the favor of the duke and acted as his agent while the Waldenses fought on the side of the Savoyards and were repatriated. A new political turn sent Arnaud into exile again, and after 1699 he lived in W�rttemberg. He wrote an account of the return of the Waldenses, Histoire de la glorieuse rentr�e des vaudois dans leurs vall�es (1710, tr. 1827).