Bohemia, from the earliest times to the fall of national independence in 1620 / With a short summary of later events

by C. Edmund Maurice

It appears that the Cumani, a still barbarous tribe, had come into collision with the Tartars in Asia; and, either flying from Tartar vengeance, or following a new career of conquest, the Cumani entered Hungary. There they joined with some of their kinsmen who had formerly settled there, and began to harass the Hungarians. The Tartars quickly followed on their heels; and, having overrun Russia, they made their way into Hungary, defeated King Bela, and laid waste his territory, killing men, women, and children. From thence they swept over Poland, and advanced into Moravia, while others attacked Bulgaria and Greece. The terror-struck descriptions of the writers of the period seem to combine the memories of Gothic and Hunnish invasions with the imagery of the Apocalypse. Like so many conquerors, Genghis Khan seems to have had a conception of a special mission to destroy imposed on him by some invisible Power; and he and his followers were looked on, for a time, as irresistible. He had twelve thousand men wearing breastplates of skin, and always on horseback, and twenty or thirty horses without any one to guide them following every rider; for the Mongol Tartars could do nothing on foot because of their short legs and long bodies. They were killing all except those children whom Genghis Khan was branding on the face with his mark. Their women were said to fight on horseback; and those who slaughtered the most were the most admired.

While Europe was panic-struck, and every man was calling on his neighbour for help, Pope Gregory IX. and the Emperor Frederick II. were fighting with each other for the possession of Sicily; and, while Frederick pleaded that he could not put himself at the head of the Imperial forces till Gregory would let him alone, the friends and admirers of Gregory were accusing Frederick of having himself invited in the Tartars; and some even declared that they had seen his messengers in the Tartar army. Alone almost among the princes of Europe, Wenceslaus of Bohemia, who had now succeeded to the throne, seems to have preserved some nerve and sense. He called upon the Duke of Austria, the Patriarch of Aquileia, the Duke of Carinthia, and the Margrave of Baden to help him to gather together his forces near Olmütz (Olomouci); and he made so determined a stand that the invasion was rolled back upon Hungary.

Even after this defeat of the Tartars the terror of them hung for years over Europe; but, though Bohemia itself was not yet free from danger, Wenceslaus, as King of Bohemia, and his son Pr̆emysl Ottakar, as Margrave of Moravia, now set themselves to redress the injuries done by the Tartar invasion. In 1243 they began to enlarge and restore the towns which had been destroyed by the Tartars; and in order to induce the frightened citizens to devote themselves to this work, they found it necessary to encourage them by the grant of further liberties.

The conception of municipal government evidently makes great strides at this time. Accused persons are now more carefully guarded from arbitrary sentences; and we also find the jury rising to an equality with the judge in the decision of certain matters. More clearly, too, do we detect the determination to put a check on the tyranny of the nobles by the development of civic liberties. “We will,” says Wenceslaus, in his extension of the privileges of Brünn, “and we irrefragably decree that no baron or noble of the land shall have power in the city of Brünn, or shall do any violence in it, or shall detain any one, without the license and proclamation of the judge of the city; and we will that, whoever of the citizens has servants or possessions outside the city, shall not be summoned by the provincial judge, or the officials of the province, but shall be judged by the judge of the city.”

JÍHLAVA (IGLAU), THE GREAT MINING CENTRE IN MORAVIA.

The power of demising property without interference from others, freedom of marriage or non-marriage to widows and maidens, various forms of protection against violence, facilities for holding markets, and the removal of customs duties—such are the chief subjects dealt with in these civic constitutions. The discovery and working of minerals, which largely date from this time, led to new opportunities of self-government. In the town of Iglau (Jíhlava), where miners had been prominent in the defence of their country against the Tartars, the powers granted to them and the neighbouring citizens were particularly large. “We wish and command,” say Wenceslaus and Pr̆emysl Ottakar his son, “that, whatever the jury of our city and the jury of the miners have ordained, for the commercial good, should be inviolably observed by all.” Even tax-collectors of the king are to consult the miners in certain matters; while special securities are given against possible defalcations by debtors of noble birth.

Great as was the advance which is implied in these decrees, the use made of them by the citizens shows that they understood how to extend their liberties still further. The benefit derived from the powers granted to civic judges might have been neutralised by the way in which the judgeships were still conferred by the kings on their personal favourites; but the jurymen of Brünn claimed for themselves the power of checking, and even overruling the judge, which must have been a far better guarantee for the self-government of the city than any that was directly contained in the royal decree.

“The judge,” say these administrators, “must reverence the jury as legislators, never dictate sentences on his own authority, never arrest any one without their knowledge, never appropriate to himself the fines of the city, never bring back those that are driven from the city, without the consent of the jurors; always listen to them, and arrange all the business of his office according to their advice.”