\Wal*den"ses\ (?; 277), n. pl. [So called from Petrus
Waldus, or Peter Waldo, a merchant of Lyons, who founded this
sect about a. d. 1170.] (Eccl. Hist.)
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, where the sect
survives. They profess substantially Protestant principles.