In church history, disciples of the Lyon merchant Pierre Valdes, or Valdo, who preached in favour of a return to evangelical poverty, around 1170.

In 1532, at the synod of Chanforans, then part of the Dauphiné but now in Italy, the Waldenses joined the Reformation.

Nowadays the term Vaudois refers both to the Italian protestants and to the inhabitants of the Swiss Canton of Vaud.