German nobles in the three Slovenian provinces clamor in the tumult of the sixteenth century for greater autonomy, embrace the Protestant Reformation, and draw many Slovenes away from the Catholic Church.

The Reformation sparks the Slovenes' first cultural awakening.

In 1550 Primoz Trubar publishes the first Slovenian-language book, a catechism.

He later produces a translation of the New Testament and prints other Slovenian religious books in the Latin and Cyrillic scripts.

Ljubljana has a printing press by 1575, but the authorities close  it when Jurij Dalmatin tries to publish a translation of the Bible.

Slovenian publishing activity then shifts to Germany, where Dalmatin publishes his Bible with a glossary enabling Croats to read it.

The Counterreformation accelerates in Austria in the early seventeenth century, and in 1628 the emperor forces Protestants to choose between Catholicism and exile.

Jesuit counterreformers burn Slovenian Protestant literature and take other measures that retard diversification of Slovenian culture but fail to stifle it completely.

Some Jesuits preach and compose hymns in Slovenian, opened schools, teach from an expurgated edition of Dalmatin's Bible, and send Slovenian students to Austrian universities.

Nonetheless, Slovenian remains a peasant idiom, and the higher social classes speak German or Italian.