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

by C. Edmund Maurice

TOWN COUNCIL HOUSE OF PILSEN (PLZEN).

Although the recovery of the Vys̆ehrad was an important gain to the royalist cause, the great centre of the extreme Catholic feeling was the town of Kutna Hora. That town, from its importance as a mining centre, and from the special favour shown to it by the kings, had become a kind of rival to Prague; and in a time of civil war such rivalry naturally ripened into active hostility of the fiercest description. In spite of the occasional fierceness of such outbursts as that which had produced the slaughter of the Councillors of the New Town, there had been, till now, little organised cruelty in the contest between the two parties. Now, however, whether actuated by municipal rivalry or religious hostility, the men of Kutna Hora began to inaugurate a system of persecution which was to produce terrible reprisals. They seized upon all the Utraquists whom they could find, and even paid other towns so much a head to send them victims. Some of these they buried alive in pits; some they burnt, and some they beheaded; so that in a short time more than sixteen hundred had been put to death.

In the meantime Sigismund had returned from Hungary to Moravia; and in Christmas, 1419, he and Queen Sophia held a meeting at Brünn (Brno). The citizens of Prague sent a deputation to this assembly to entreat for terms of peace. Sigismund ordered them at once to pull down all the chains which they had placed across the streets; to destroy all their new fortifications; and to bring back the Catholic priests who had been driven out. The citizens were so anxious to avoid a collision with Sigismund that they consented to these terms; and they destroyed their fortifications amid the jeers of the Catholics and Germans.

Z̆iz̆ka now fully realised the impossibility of any compromise, and he prepared for a desperate struggle. His first intention had been to make the town of Pilsen the centre of his operations. From that town he had succeeded in driving out all the Catholics; and its fortifications were so strong that he hoped to make it good against all comers. But the growing strength of the fortress of Tabor led him to change his opinion; and he decided to withdraw from Pilsen, and to concentrate the whole force of his followers on the mountain from which they took their name. According to one account, the divisions in Pilsen itself were the main cause of this decision. Certainly some special explanation is needed of a step which proved, in one way, so disastrous to the reforming cause; for, during all the victories gained by the Utraquists, they were never able to recover this important fortress again.

It was not, however, unconditionally that Z̆iz̆ka consented to abandon this position. He stipulated that he should be allowed to depart freely to Tabor, and that the granting of the Cup to the laity should be permitted in Pilsen. Wenceslaus of Duba, as leader of the Catholic forces, consented to the terms which Z̆iz̆ka proposed. Unfortunately, however, the doctrine that faith should not be kept with heretics had already taken deep root amongst the opponents of the Utraquists. While Z̆iz̆ka was still on his way from Pilsen to Tabor, he was attacked by Peter of Sternberg, at the head of a royalist force. Unprepared for this attack, and very inferior in the number of his forces, Z̆iz̆ka at first retreated before his enemies; but, finding himself compelled to fight, he took up his position on the bank of a fish-pond near the town of Sudomír. There, for the first time, he adopted the plan which became a special characteristic of his battles. He entrenched himself behind his baggage-waggons, over which his men fired at the advancing foe. The struggle was a fierce one; but at last the royalists were compelled to retreat, and Z̆iz̆ka went on in safety to Tabor.

But though much of the success of the Utraquist wars was due to the energy of Z̆iz̆ka and his followers, the leading citizens of Prague had also a very important influence on the struggle; and Sigismund’s actions soon roused in them that desperate courage which had seemed for a moment to forsake them. The nickname of Sigismund, “Super Grammaticam,” has been fixed on this Emperor by Carlyle; but an even more distinctive name would have been Sigismund “Super Veritatem.” Many other rulers have told lies in their time of emergency; but surely no one ever took so much pains to write himself down a liar as Sigismund did at every stage of his career. It will be remembered that he had written most urgently to the Bohemians, to express his regret for the death of Hus, and to assure them that he had done all he could to prevent it. Yet, as soon as Pope Martin had published his Bull, urging a crusade against the Hussites, Sigismund seized upon a merchant of Prague named Krasa, and publicly burnt him in Breslau, on the express ground that he had disapproved of the burning of Hus and Jerom.

C̆enek of Wartenberg, who had been entrusted by Sigismund with the care of the fortress of Prague, now declared that he could no longer serve the king. At nearly every stage in the career of this unfortunate nobleman, his change of opinion, however excusable in itself, was stained by some act of treachery. On this occasion he invited the subordinate governors of the castle to dinner, and seized that opportunity for arresting and imprisoning them. Having thus mastered the castle, he placed it under the care of the citizens of Prague. He then arrested seventy-six of the clergy, and drove several of the opposing citizens from the town.

But C̆enek was never long of one mind; and he soon began to despair of the struggle on which he had entered. On the one hand the Catholic defenders of the Vys̆ehrad held out successfully against his attacks; and at the same time he seems to have been sincerely shocked at the outrages committed by the Taborites. In the early outbursts, though there had been much plundering and some bloodshed, there had been little deliberate cruelty. Now, however, Z̆iz̆ka began to imitate only too closely the cruelties of the Kuttenberger; for finding a number of monks in a castle which he had stormed, he burnt them alive after the victory was over. When this cruelty was followed by the destruction of many churches and monasteries, C̆enek began to shrink from the cause which he had defended, and to urge the citizens of Prague to come to terms with Sigismund. Finding, however, that he was unable to persuade them to take this course, he resolved secretly to betray the castle to Sigismund, on the understanding that the Communion in both kinds should be permitted on C̆enek’s own estates. Sigismund apparently consented to this arrangement; and C̆enek secretly admitted into the castle four thousand of the royalist soldiers, of whom many were Germans. Furious at this treachery, the citizens made so fierce an attack upon the castle that C̆enek was panic-struck and fled secretly to Sigismund. But the attack was made without organisation or arrangement and the citizens were repelled.