Hus and Hussites. —JOHN (JAN) Hus, b. at Husinetz in Southern Bohemia, 1369; d. at Constance, July 6, 1415. At an early age he went to Prague where he supported himself by singing and serving in the churches. His conduct was exemplary and his devotion to study remarkable. In 1393 he received the degree of Bachelor of Arts from the University of Prague and in 1396 the master’s degree. He was ordained a priest in 1400 and became rector of the university 1402-03. About the same time he was appointed preacher in the newly erected Bethlehem chapel. Hus was a strong partisan on the side of the Czechs, and hence of the Realists; and he was greatly influenced by the writings of Wyclif. Though forty-five propositions of the latter were proscribed in 1403 by ecclesiastical authority, Hus translated Wyclif’s “Trialogus” into Czech and helped to circulate it. From the pulpit he inveighed against the morals of clergy, episcopate, and papacy, thus taking an active part in the movement for reform. Archbishop Zbynek (Sbinco), however, was not only lenient with Hus, but favored him with an appointment as preacher to the biennial synod. On the other hand Innocent VII directed the archbishop (June 24, 1405) to take measures against the heretical teachings of Wyclif, especially the doctrine of impanation in the Eucharist. The archbishop complied by issuing a synodal decree against these errors; at the same time he forbade any further attacks on the clergy. In the following year (1406) a document bearing the seal of the University of Oxford and eulogizing Wyclif was brought by two Bohemian students to Prague; Hus read it in triumph from the pulpit. In 1408 Sbinco received a letter from Gregory XII stating that the Holy See had been informed of the spread of the Wycliffite heresy and especially of King Wenceslaus’s sympathy with the sectaries. This stirred up the king to measures of prosecution and aroused the university to clear itself of the suspicion of heresy. At the June synod it was ordered that all writings of Wyclif should be handed over to the archdiocesan chancery for correction. Hus obeyed the order, declaring that he condemned whatever errors these writings contained.
About the same time a new conflict broke out on national lines. The king agreed to the “neutrality” plan proposed by the secessionist cardinals at the Council of Pisa (q.v.) and endeavored to have it recognized by the university. The Czechs fell in with his wishes but the three other “nations” refused. The king then decreed (January 18, 1409) that in the university congregations the Czechs should have three votes, the other “nations” should have only one vote between them. In consequence the German masters and students in great numbers (5000 to 20,000) left Prague and went to Leipzig, Erfurt, and other universities in the North (see Rashdall, “Universities“, II, 224 sq.). The king now forbade communication with Gregory XII and proceeded against those of the clergy who disregarded his prohibition. In consequence the archbishop placed Prague and the vicinity under interdict, a measure which cost many of the loyal clergy their position and property. Hus who had become once more rector of the university, was called to account by the archbishop for his Wycliffite tendencies and was reported to Rome, with the result that Alexander V, in a Bull of December 20, 1409, directed the archbishop to forbid any preaching except in cathedral, collegiate, parish, and cloister churches, and to see that Wyclif’s writings were with-drawn from circulation. In accordance with the Bull the archbishop at the June synod of 1410, ordered Wyclif’s writings to be burned and restricted preaching to the churches named above. Against these measures Hus declaimed from the pulpit and, with his sympathizers in the university, sent a protest to John XXIII. The archbishop, July 16, 1410, excommunicated Hus and his adherents. Secure of the royal protection, Hus continued the agitation in favor of Wyclif, but at the end of August he was summoned to appear in person before the pope. He begged the pope to dispense with the personal visit and sent in his stead representatives to plead his case. In February, 1411, sentence of excommunication was pronounced against him and published on March 15 in all the churches of Prague. This led to further difficulties between the king and the archbishop, in consequence of which the latter left Prague to take refuge with the Hungarian King Sigismund, but died on the journey, September 23.
Hus meanwhile openly defended Wyclif, and this position he maintained especially against John Stokes, a licentiate of Cambridge, who had come to Prague and declared that in England Wyclif was regarded as a heretic. With no less vehemence Hus attacked the Bulls (September 9 and December 2, 1411) in which John XXIII proclaimed indulgences to all who would supply funds for the crusade against Ladislaus of Naples. Both Hus and Jerome of Prague aroused the university and the populace against the papal commission which had been sent to announce the indulgences, and its members in consequence were treated with every sort of indignity. The report of these doings led the Roman authorities to take more vigorous action. Not only was the former excommunication against Hus reiterated, but his residence was placed under interdict. Finally the pope ordered Hus to be imprisoned and the Bethlehem chapel destroyed. The order was not obeyed, but Hus towards the end of 1412 left Prague and took refuge at Austi in the south. Here he wrote his principal work, “De ecclesia”. As the king took no steps to carry out the papal edict, Hus was back again at Prague by the end of April, 1414, and posted on the walls of the Bethlehem Chapel his treatise “De sex erroribus”. Out of this and the “De ecclesia” Gerson extracted a number of propositions which he submitted to Archbishop Konrad von Vechta (formerly Bishop of Olmutz) with a warning against their heretical character. In November following the Council of Constance assembled, and Hus, urged by King Sigismund, decided to appear before that body and give an account of his doctrine. At Constance he was tried, condemned, and burnt at the stake, July 6, 1415. The same fate befell Jerome of Prague, May 30, 1416. (For details see Council of Constance.)
HUSSITES.—The followers of Hus did not of themselves assume the name of Hussites. Like Hus, they believed their creed to be truly Catholic; in papal and conciliar documents they appear as Wycliffites, although Hus and even Jerome of Prague are also named as their leaders. They wisely objected to the appellation of Hussites, which implied separation from the Universal Church; willing to venerate Hus as a holy martyr of the old religion, they refused to see in him the founder of a new one. Only about 1420, with the beginning of the Hussite Wars, does the new name occur, first in the neighboring lands; then it gradually imposes itself as connoting both the original followers of Hus and the subsequent smaller sects into which they divided. The distinctive tenet of the Hussites is the necessity, alike for priest and layman, of Communion under both kinds, sub utraque specie, whence the term Utraquists. Hus himself never preached Utraquism. During his presence at the Council of Constance, his successor in influence at the University of Prague, Jacobellus von Mies, taking his stand on the Bible as the supreme rule of faith and practice in the Church, persuaded the people that partaking of the chalice was of absolute necessity for salvation, this being expressly taught by Christ: “Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.” (John, vi, 54.)
Three parishes at once adopted the innovation. Former unauthorized sermons by Jacobellus, and trespasses on episcopal rights by the parish clergy, had prepared the ground in these particular places. The introduction of the lay chalice was regarded by many well-intentioned men as the outward sign of a nascent schism. These withdrew from the movement, but the people at large eagerly joined it as if the chalice were a panacea for all the evils of the time. Their eagerness is partly accounted for by a kind of crusade in favor of frequent and even daily Communion, and by a huge mass of eucharistic literature in Bohemia during the fourteenth century. As far back as 1380a priest in Prague (Altstadt) is said to have preached to his parishioners the necessity of Communion under both kinds. Jacobellus was excommunicated, and Andreas von Brod confuted his teaching in a treatise; but he continued preaching and answered Andreas’s tract by one of his own. Hus, then in Constance, was consulted. In a letter to the Knight von Chlum, he said: “it would be wise not to introduce such an innovation without the approbation of the Church“. Soon, however, seeing how the council upheld the existing practice, he inveighed against it and maintained that Christ and the Apostle Paul should be obeyed by giving the chalice to the laity; he also entreated the Bohemian nobles to protect the lay chalice against the council. These last words of Hus, written in sight of his funeral pyre, aroused Bohemia. In Prague the priests faithful to the Church were driven out of their parishes and replaced by Utraquists; in the country the nobles likewise filled all the parishes in their gift with men of the new discipline.
The change caused many excesses. Bishop Johann of Leitomischl had all his possessions devastated by the neighboring nobles because of his strenuous opposition to Hus at Constance. King Wenceslaus (Wenzel) did not interfere. He had a grudge against the Emperor Sigismund for the role he played at the council, and he regarded the execution of Hus as an infringement of his royal rights. Meanwhile the fathers assembled in council at Constance sent earnest letters to the civil and ecclesiastical authorities in Bohemia, insisting on complete extirpation of the dangerous heresy (July, 1415); and gave ample powers to the Bishop of Leitomischl as legate for the same purpose. The Bohemian and Moravian nobles took up the gauntlet. Four hundred and fifty-two of them appended their seals to a joint answer to the council, setting forth their conviction that the sentence on Hus was unjust and insulting to their country; that there were no heretics in Bohemia, that any assertion to the contrary was itself a heresy of the worst kind. This document bears date September 2, 1415. Three days later they formed an offensive and defensive league, by which they bound themselves for six years to grant on their estates to all priests applying for it freedom to preach the word of God, and protection against episcopal prosecutions for heresy, and against excommunication except from the local bishops. The clergy, however, should obey a lawfully elected pope in all things not contrary to God and God‘s law. The authority of the council was thereby set at naught; the Wycliffite principle that the laity should restrict and restrain the power of the clergy was fully applied.
The Catholics did not remain idle; episcopal ordinances of September 5 enjoined the publication in all churches of the prohibition of the lay chalice; a decree of September 18 inhibited vagrant, i.e. Utraquist, preachers; a league of Catholic lords was formed on October 1; it consisted mostly of the southern and northern gentry accessible to German influence. King Wenceslaus was on their side in word if not in deed. Before this favorable turn of events became known to it, the council, in its ordinary proceedings against Wycliffism, took a step of the gravest consequences, viz. the laying of the interdict on Prague for sheltering Johann of Jesenic, already excommunicated in 1412. Armed crowds of citizens invaded every church and monastery where Divine service had been suspended in obedience to the interdict, drove out all priests and monks unwilling to submit to the popular will, robbed them of their possessions and put Utraquist clergy in their places. The whole country followed the example of the capital; the king and the magistrates looked on without concern. The council’s legate, Bishop Johann of Leitomischl, was powerless to stem the evil tide. Probably on his denunciation the four hundred and fifty-two signatories of the Utraquist covenant, together with Archbishop Conrad of Prague and Wenceslaus, Bishop of Olmutz, were summoned to appear before the council as suspected of heresy. Archbishop Conrad had been remiss in carrying out the conciliary measures; in the beginning of 1416 he had, in concert with the king, suspended the interdict on the far-off chance of thus conciliating the dissidents. The council was even then (1416) determined to use the secular arm against the King of Bohemia and his unruly land, but Sigismund, with whom lay the execution, refused his aid, hoping, as he said, to come to an understanding with King Wenceslaus.
The University of Prague was preponderatingly Utraquist; the council, therefore, towards the end of 1416, suspended all its privileges and forbade, under excommunication, all further academical proceedings. The lecturers, however, continued to lecture as before; but the chancellor, Archbishop Conrad, refusing his cooperation, no new degrees could be conferred. Notwithstanding the turbulent spirit of many masters, the influence of the university as a whole was moderating. Thus, e.g. January 25, 1417, when some fanatical country parsons had destroyed the images and profaned the relics of their churches, the university, in virtue of the teaching authority it claimed, sent to all the faithful an exhortation to abstain from innova-tions and to hold fast to old customs. The noblemen of the Hussite league ordered the clergy dependent on them to conform to their teaching. This act in the right direction was followed on March 10, 1416, by another which gave Utraquism the sanction of the only teaching authority then recognized in the country. The rector, Johann von Reinstein (surnamed Cardinalis), declared, with the consent of all the Magistri, that Communion under both kinds is an ordination of Christ Himself and a practice of the ancient Church, against which no human ordinances of later date could prevail. The declaration had been given in answer to questions by members of the Hussite league, and it was acted upon, wherever they ruled, with such thoroughness that the Utraquist clergy was insufficient to fill the places of the ejected Catholic priests. The head of the league, Vincenz von Wartenberg, found a way out of the difficulty. He waylaid the Auxiliary Bishop of Prague, confined him in a stronghold, and forced him to ordain as many Utraquist candidates for the priesthood as were needed.
The archbishop henceforth withheld ordination and benefices from all who did not abjure Wycliffism and Utraquism. The Council of Constance mean-while gave continued attention to Bohemian affairs. Martin V who, in 1411, as Cardinal Colonna, had terminated the trial of John Hus with the sentence of excommunication, now, as pope, confirmed all the council’s enactments regarding him and his followers; he wrote to all whom it might concern to return to the Church or to lend their aid in suppressing the new heresies. Before the close of the council he addressed to King Wenceslaus a rule containing twenty-four articles, designed to bring back the religious status of the country to what it was before the Hussite upheaval. The task was heavy, and perhaps uncongenial to King Wenceslaus. Could he force all Wycliffites and Hussites to abjure or to die, reinstate all ejected priests in their benefices, maintain Catholic ascendency? He made no attempt. In June, 1418, he forbade the exercise of foreign jurisdiction over his subjects, a measure which put a stop to the work of the cardinal legate, Giovanni Domenici. The same year saw the arrival of foreign sectarians, Beghards—called Pickarts—attracted by Bohemia‘s fame for religious liberty, and of the Oxford Wycliffite, Peter Payne, admitted to the faculty of arts at the university. The university, apprehensive of doctrinal excesses, assembled (September, 1418) the whole party, the Communitas fratrum, in order to come to an agreement on doubtful points. The assembly granted Communion to new-born infants, but forbade all deviation from tradition except where it was evidently opposed to Scripture, as in the case of Utraquism.
In 1419 Utraquism received an accession of strength from the repressive measures against it. King Wenceslaus at last giving way to the pope, and the emperor threatening a “crusade” against Bohemia, banished Johann of Jesenic from Prague and commanded that all ejected Catholic beneficiaries should be reinstated in their offices and revenues. The people, accustomed by this time to Utraquist ministrations, resented the change; they fought for their churches and schools; blood was shed, but the king’s ordinance was executed wherever his authority was strong enough to enforce it. The success was, however, far from complete. The Utraquist clergy, followed by their numerous adherents, now assembled on the hills, to which they gave Scriptural names, such as Tabor, Horeb, Mount Olivet etc. In July, 1419, `Mount Tabor” was the scene of an epoch-making assembly. Nicolaus of Husinec, banished by Wenceslaus as a dangerous agitator, had brought together 42,000 Utraquists; they listened to Utraquist preachers, received the chalice, and spent the day in organizing resistance to any interference with their religion; they sent a message to the king that they, one and all, were ready to die for the chalice. In Prague it-self matters had gone even further. Ziska of Troznow, like Nicolaus of Husinec, a former favorite of the king, had taken the lead of the malcontents and familiarized them with the thought of armed resistance.
Ziska belonged to the inferior nobility of southern Bohemia; he had distinguished himself both as an undaunted fighter and as an excellent leader of men. Johann, formerly a Premonstratensian monk of Selau, now a zealot for Utraquism, on July 30, 1419, carried the Blessed Sacrament in procession through the streets of Prague (Neustadt); the processionists, excited by a fiery sermon of their leader, first penetrated into St. Stephen’s church which had been closed to them; then they assembled in front of the town hall, where Johann, still holding up the Blessed Sacrament, demanded from the magistrates the release of several Utraquists imprisoned for previous disturbances. The magistrates refused and prepared for resistance. Ziska ordered the storming of the town hall: all persons found therein were thrown out of the windows on to the spears and swords of the processionists, and hacked to pieces, whilst Johann called on God in His Sacrament to inflame their murderous fury. The mob there and then elected four captains, called all men to arms and fortified the Neustadt. King Wenceslaus swore death to all the rebels, but a stroke of apoplexy, caused by excitement, carried him off, August 16, 1419. The next months were marked by deeds of violence against the faithful clergy, by wanton destruction of church furniture, and by the burning of monastic houses. Many citizens, especially Germans and the higher clergy, sought safety in flight.
Wenceslaus’s successor on the Bohemian throne was his brother Sigismund, German Emperor and King of Hungary. He had been the very soul of the Council of Constance; but the Bohemians, holding him responsible for the death of their beloved Hus, disliked and distrusted him. Nor was Sigismund eager to assume the ruling of this troubled kingdom. He tarried in Hungary, leaving Bohemia to be governed by the queen-widow and Vincenz von Wartenberg, the chief of the Utraquist league. The popular masses, led by the lesser nobility and fanatical priests, now began to multiply their meetings on “holy” mountains—Tabors—and to move towards Prague in armed bands. The queen regent, with the assent of the higher nobility, forbade them to meet or even to come near to Prague. In various encounters Ziska and Nicolaus of Husinec successfully resisted the royal troops (4-November 9, 1419); an armistice was, however, concluded and Ziska withdrew to Pilsen. Sigismund now gave up his plans of a campaign against the Turks and resolved to restore his new kingdom to Roman unity. On his side were the Catholic nobles, the higher clergy, the Germans settled in the land, and all who had suffered persecution and losses at the hands of the sectarians; against him stood Ziska and Nicolaus of Husinec at the head of the peasantry. Sigismund took up the government in December, then went to Silesia to collect more troops. The Catholics regained courage. They were hard on the Utraquists wherever they were the stronger: in Kuttenberg, for instance, hundreds of captured Utraquists were thrown by the miners into the shafts of disused silver mines. The leaders of the people, meanwhile, built the impregnable stronghold of Tabor, whither the country people betook themselves with all their movable possessions, in order to await in the “community of the brethren” the things that were to come.
Here Utraquism entered upon a new development. The priests of Austi, starting from the principle that the Bible contained the whole teaching of Christ, abolished every traditional rite and liturgy. There were to be no more churches, altars, vestments, sacred vessels, chants, or ceremonies. The Lord’s Prayer was the only liturgical prayer; the communion table was a common table with common bread and common appointments; the celebrant wore his everyday clothes and was untonsured. Children were baptized with the first water at hand and without any further ceremony; they received Communion in both kinds immediately after Baptism. Extreme unction and auricular confession were abolished; mortal sins were to be confessed in public. Purgatory and the worship of saints were suppressed, likewise all feasts and fasts. Such a creed accounts for the fury of destruction which possessed the Hussites. Ziska spent his time in drilling his peasants and artisans into an army capable to withstand the dreaded knights in armor of the king’s army. Clever tactics, apt choice of the battlefield, confidence in their chief and in their cause, made up for their defective armament: straightened scythes, flails, forks, and iron-shod cudgels were their weapons. Their religious fanaticism was heightened by a young Moravian priest, Martin Hauska, surnamed Loquis, who taught them to read in the Bible that the last days had come, that salvation was only to be found in the mountains—their Tabors—that after the great battle the millennium would reign on earth.
Sigismund‘s army had been strengthened by contingents from Hungary and other adjoining lands; all was ready for the fray. On March 1, 1420, Pope Martin V issued a Bull inviting all Christians to unite in a crusade for the extermination of Wycliffites, Hussites, and other heretics: this Bull was react to the imperial diet assembled at Breslau on March 17. Its effect was terror on the Catholic side, holy enthusiasm and closest union for deadly warfare on the side of the Taborites. Many Catholics took to flight; the Utraquist nobles renounced their allegiance and declared war on Sigismund “who had brought the slander of heresy on the land”; a secret embassy offered the Bohemian crown to King Wladislaw II of Poland. The energetic Ziska at once began operations in southern Bohemia: royal towns, fortresses, and monasteries fell into his hands: these latter were plundered and destroyed. Koniggratz submitted, as did also some nobles disgusted with the excesses of the Taborites. Whilst the king was waiting for the “crusaders” from Germany, he had seventeen Utraquists drowned in the Elbe at Leitmeritz, and two burnt at Echlau. The rebels retaliated by setting fire to several monasteries near Prague and by burning the monks. The “crusading” army arrived in July; with the king’s troops they were 100,000 strong. Before engaging in battle, the papal legate, Ferdinand of Lucca, examined the “Four Prague Articles”, i.e. four points on the granting of which the rebels would submit.
These articles emanated from the university. In substance they are: “(I) The Word of God is to be freely examined by Christian priests throughout the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Margravate of Moravia. (2) The venerable Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ is to be given in two kinds to adults as well as to children, as Jesus Christ has instituted. (3) The priests and monks, of whom many meddle with the affairs of the State, are to be deprived of the worldly goods which they possess in great quantities, and which make them neglect their sacred office; and their goods shall be restored to us, in order that, in accordance with the doctrine of the Gospel, and the practice of the Apostles, the clergy shall be subject to us, and, living in poverty, serve as a pattern of humility to others. (4) All the public sins which are called mortal, and all other trespasses contrary to the law of God, are to be punished according to the laws of the country, by those in charge of them, in order to wipe from the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Margravate of Moravia the bad reputation of tolerating disorders.” The legate concluded his examination by a demand of almost unconditional submission. The “Calixtines”, now so called from the chalice which decorated their flags, weapons, and clothes, took up the unequal fight; on July 14, 1420, they inflicted a signal defeat on the crusaders. Sigismund had recourse to new negotiation on the four articles. But seeing his best supporters wavering, he had himself crowned in the cathedral of Prague (July 28), and two days later he dissolved the crusading army. In order to pay his mercenaries he turned the treasures of several churches into money, and pledged their lands to the nobles, who never parted with them again.
The Utraquist magistrates imposed their whole will on the town and the university; riots and deeds of violence occurred everywhere; the wealthy monasteries were the first and greatest sufferers. Many of the best citizens proclaimed their horror at the destruction of the fairest buildings and their disgust with the Taborite forms of worship. In Prague, however, they were kept down by Johann of Selau, who had assumed a kind of dictatorship; in the country the Taborite leaders themselves thought it better to give another direction to the destructive mania of their followers. Ziska in the southern borderlands and the Prague army added victory to victory; the strong town of Wysehrad surrendered, November 1, 1420, after a crushing defeat of Sigismund‘s troops. The rebels, now sure of their power, offered the Bohemian throne to King Wladislaw II of Poland. In March 1421, King Wenceslaus returned to Hungary, leaving his country almost defenseless. By June of the same year the Hussites had established their dominion over the whole kingdom, with the exception of a few northern and western border districts. The inhabitants were asked to accept the Four Prague articles or to emigrate within a stated time; captains and sheriffs were appointed to rule the towns with royal powers. Thus Utraquism and home rule supplanted Catholicism and German rule. The nobility accepted the new order; Archbishop Conrad of Prague adapted the four articles (April 21, 1421), ordained Utraquist clergy, and invited the older clergy likewise to conform. The metropolitan chapter, however, who had fled to Zittau and Olmutz, remained faithful, and appointed the “iron” Johann of Leitomischl, later of Olmutz, administrator of the archdiocese: the Hussites never had a sterner enemy.
Among the Taborites a new sect arose about this time. The priest Martin Loquis taught these rabid levellers of monasteries and murderers of priests that Christ was not really present in the Eucharist, consequently, that worshipping the sacrament was idolatry. Sacrilegious profanations became the order of the day. Proceedings were taken by the Utraquist authorities, advised by the university, against the innovators. Loquis and another were taken prisoners, dragged through the country, cruelly tortured, and finally burnt in a barrel. His four hundred followers were expelled from Tabor. For some time they roamed through the country “as avenging angels”, robbing, burning, and killing. Ziska, in disgust, had twenty-four—others say fifty—of the worst put to death by fire. The remainder, reinforced by some fanatical Chiliasts, formed a sect of Adamites, subject to no law and possessing their women in common. Ziska surrounded them on their island in the River Neidrka and exterminated them to the last man (October, 1421). The summer of 1421 was employed by the Hussites in consolidating their new power. Successful expeditions penetrated to the northwestern border, burned more monasteries, killed more monks, priests, and inoffensive citizens; but here also they suffered their first serious defeat at the hands of Catholic knights and the troops of Meissen (August 5, 1421). As early as April a second army of crusaders, twice as strong as the first, had been forming at Nuremberg, while Sigismund was expected to bring up his Hungarian army. The crusaders laid siege to Saaz.
On October 2 the news spread that Ziska was coming to the rescue of the besieged. This perhaps false information sufficed to disperse the crusaders and their five leaders in all directions in disorderly flight. Not a blow was struck. Sigismund entered Moravia, which he reduced to submission, and met Ziska in battle at Kuttenberg. The stronger battalions were on the emperor’s side, but Ziska fought his way through them and shortly afterwards, at Deutsch-Brod, almost annihilated them (January 8, 1422). This victory kept the Hussites’ foreign foes in wholesome fear for many years; new crusades were indeed preached year after year, but not carried out. The field was left free for internal dissensions to undo what had so far been done. Prague began by shaking off the tyrannical dictatorship of Johann of Selau: with twelve of his partisans he was beheaded, March 9, 1422. The mob avenged his death by ravaging the university, colleges, and libraries. Next, civil war broke out between, on the one hand the Taborites under Ziska, a few southern towns and Saaz with Laun in the northwest; and on the other, Prague with the whole nobility and the other towns. Its cause was the proposal to unite all parties under the administration of Sigismund Korybut, a nephew of the Grand Duke Witold of Lithuania, who had accepted the Bohemian crown refused by the King of Poland, and appointed Korybut as governor. The first victory again was Ziska’s (end of April, 1423). Some futile negotiations followed. From January to September, 1424, the Taborites waged a most successful war, which led their victorious army up to the gates of the capital. Korybut and Prague now sent to Ziska the eloquent priest Rokyzana, who succeeded in bringing about a complete understanding between the parties. They then joined in an expedition against Moravia. Close to the Moravian frontier, at Plibislau, Ziska fell ill and died (October 14, 1424).
His death was followed by new groupings of the parties. The closer partisans of Ziska, who represented the moderates, now took the name of “Orphans”; their priests still said Mass in liturgical vestments and followed the old rite; the more extreme Taborites chose new chiefs, of whom the most prominent was Andrew Procopius, a married priest surnamed “the Great” or “the Shaven”, to distinguish him from Little Procopius (Prokupek) who in time became the spiritual leader of the Orphans. Orphans and Taborites fought together against any common foe; when there was no common foe they fought or quarrelled with one another. Their united forces, under Procopius the Shaven, won the battle of Aussig on the Elbe (June 16, 1426), in which 15,000 Germans and many Saxon and Thuringian nobles lost their lives, but they were beaten in their turn by Albert of Austria, at Zwettel, March 12, 1427. Whilst these horrible wars were laying waste the country, the Magistri of Prague, pro tem. the supreme judges in matters of Faith, divided into two parties. Rokyzana, Jacobellus, and Peter Payne favored a nearer approach to the Taborite innovations; others had gained the conviction that peace and union were only to be found in returning to the Roman allegiance; the chalice for the laity was the only point they wished to retain. Korybut, the governor, favored the latter view. He engaged in secret negotiations with Pope Martin V, but the secret having leaked out, Rokyzana, at the head of the populace of Prague, seized him and confined him to a fortress (April 17, 1427). The Hussites under Procopius the Shaven now raided Lusatia and Silesia. In July, 1427, a third army of crusaders, some 150,000 strong, entered Bohemia from the west: Procopius met and defeated them at Mies (August 4). Another army coming from Silesia had a similar fate.
Being complete masters of the situation at home, the Hussites set out for further raids abroad. Their own country was lying waste after so many years of war; the people had become a huge horde of brigands bent on bloodshed and plunder. In the years 1428-1431 the combined Orphans, Taborites, and the towns-men of Prague invaded Hungary, laid waste Silesia as far as Breslau, plundered Lusatia, Meissen, Saxony, and advanced to Nuremberg, leaving in their track the remains of flourishing towns and villages, and devastated lands. Negotiations for an armistice came to naught. When the raiders returned in 1430 they had with them 3000 wagons of booty, each drawn by from six to fourteen horses; a hundred towns and more than a thousand villages had been destroyed. In 1431 a fourth crusade, sent by the unbending Martin V, entered Bohemia. The crusaders numbered 90,000 foot and 40,000 horse; they were accompanied by the papal legate and commanded by the Electoral Prince Frederick of Brandenburg. They met a strong army of Hussites at Taus: the wild war-songs of the enemy filled the soldiers of the Cross with uncontrollable fear: once more they fled in disorder, losing many men and 300 wagons of stores (August 14, 1431). After so many reverses the Catholics realized that peace was only to be attained by concessions to the Hussites. Advances were made by Emperor Sigismund and by the Council of Basle, then sitting: a meeting of the contending parties’ delegates took place at Eger, where preliminaries for further discussion at Basle were agreed upon. Meanwhile the excommunicated Archbishop Conrad of Prague and the “iron” Bishop Johann of Olmutz died, and the Utraquist Rokyzana had an eye on the See of Prague: it was therefore his interest to make further peace negotiations with Rome. The Taborites, on the contrary, continued the war, heedless of the Eger arrangements; they raided Silesia and Brandenburg, advancing as far as Berlin, and fought Albert of Austria in Moravia and in his own Austrian dominions.
At length, January 4, 1433, a deputation of fifteen members, provided with safe-conducts and accompanied by a numerous train, arrived at Basle. Discussion on the Four Articles of Prague lasted till April without any result. The deputies left Basle on April 14, but with them went a deputation from the council to continue negotiations with the diet assembled at Prague. Here some progress was made, notwithstanding the opposition of Procopius and the extreme Taborites, who were loth to lay down their arms and return to peaceful pursuits. The conferences dragged on till November 26, 1433. The council, chiefly bent on safeguarding the dogma, consented to the following disciplinary articles, known as the Compactata of Basle: (I) In Bohemia and Moravia, communion under both kinds is to be given to all adults who desire it; (2) All mortal sins, especially public ones, shall be publicly punished by the lawful authorities; (3) The Word of God may be freely preached by approved preachers but without infringing papal authority; (4) Secular power shall not be exercised by the clergy bound by vows to the contrary; other clergy, and the Church itself, may acquire and hold temporal goods, but merely as administrators etc. In substance the Compactata reproduced the Four Articles of Prague. They were accepted by the delegates, but further discussion on minor points led to a new rupture and in the beginning of 1434 the delegates left Basle. A new party now arose: the friends of the Compactata. It soon gathered strength enough to order the Taborites, who were besieging Pilsen and infesting the country, to dissolve their armed bands. Instead of dispersing they brought all their forces together at Lipau near Prague and offered battle: here they suffered a crushing defeat from which they never recovered. Their two best leaders, Procopius the Shaven and Prokupek, were killed (May 30, 1434).
The tedious negotiations, in which religious, political, and personal interests had to be satisfied, went on with various vicissitudes until July 5, 1436, when the Bohemian representatives at the Diet of Iglau, solemnly accepted the Compactata and promised obedience to the council: the representatives of the council, on their side, removed the ban from the Bohemians and acknowledged them as true sons of the Church. The diet accepted Sigismund as King of Bohemia: on August 23 he entered Prague, and took possession of his kingdom. Henceforth the Utraquists or Calixtines and the Subunists (sub una specie) had separate churches and lived together in comparative peace. Priests were ordained for the Utraquist rite. New difficulties were created by Rokyzana’s failing to obtain the bishopric for which he had so long agitated, and which he had been promised by Sigismund. His partisans went back to former aberrations, e.g. they reestablished the feast of the “Holy Martyr Hus” on July 6.
In 1448 Cardinal Carvajal came to Prague to settle the ever open question of Rokyzana’s claims. Having demanded restitution of confiscated church property as the first step, he was threatened with murder, and fled. In December of the same year Rokyzana returned to Prague as president of the Utraquist consistory. The governor, George Podiebrad, supported him in his disobedience to Rome and nullified all Roman attempts at a final settlement; he opposed St. John Capistran, who was then converting thousands of Utraquists in Moravia. As things were going from bad to worse, Pope Pius II, who had had long experience of the sectarians at Basle and as legate to Prague, refused to acknowledge the Utraquist rite, and declared the Compactata null and void, March 31, 1462. Podiebrad retaliated by persecuting the Catholics; in 1466 he was excommunicated by Paul II; there followed other religious and civil wars. In 1485 King Wladislaw granted equal liberty and rights to both parties. Judging by its results this was a step in the right direction. By degrees the Utraquists conformed to the Roman rites so as to be hardly distinguishable from them, except through the chalice for the laity. In the sixteenth century they resisted Lutheran inroads even better than the Subunists. Their further history is told in the article Bohemian Brethren.
J. WILHELM