Crusades against Hussites

The crusades against Hussites implied the military actions of the catholic against and among the partisans of Jan Hus in Bohemia during the time between 1420 until worms 1434. They were the first combat in Europe where portable weapons with powder as the Mousquet S made a decisive contribution.

Origins

The movement hussite assumed a revolutionary character as soon as the news of died of Hus the July 6th 1415 reached Prague. Knights and noble of Bohemia sent to the Concile Constancy on September 2nd 1415 the protestatio Bohemorum , a formal protest, makes some in favor of the reform of the Church, condemning the execution of Jan Hus with the hardest words. Attitude of emperor Sigismond, which sent threatening letters in Bohemia declaring that it would drown soon all the Wycliffites and Hussites, made furious the people. Disorders burst then everywhere in Bohemia.

Among the hussites, two parties were formed. Little time before its death, Hus had accepted doctrines preached during its absence by its members in Prague, named Utraquisme or obligation for the believers to receive the communion of the two species. The hussites ultraquists took for symbol the Calice. In same time, the most extreme reformers, refusing to recognize some terrestrial authority that it is and wishing to live exclusively according to the laws of the Bible, became known as the Taborites according to the town of Tabor which became their center.

Contrary to his/her brother Wenceslas who even tolerated supported the movement hussite, Sigismond undertook to break it. A certain number of Hussites, carried out by Nicolas de Hus - without relation with Jan Hus - left Prague. They held of the meetings in various places of Bohemia, in particular in Usti close to the place where the town of Tabor was founded, denouncing Sigismond violently and preparing with the war.

Although many Hussites influential left the city, the disorders continued in Prague. The July 30th 1419 a procession hussite carried out by the priest Jan Želivský will défenestra the imperial advisers since the windows of the town hall of Prague. This defenestration, known like the first Défenestration of Prague caused the death - by infarction - of Wenceslas Ier and the beginning of the religious hostilities.

The release of the engagements

The death of the king increased the disorders in Prague and almost everywhere in Bohemia. Several catholics, the majority German and representatives of the imperial capacity, were expelled of the cities. In Prague in November several engagements took place between Hussites and the mercenaries that the Sophie queen (widowed of Wenceslaus and regent) had recruited in urgency. After a considerable part of the city was destroyed the parts declared a cease-fire on November 13rd. The noble ones, which was favorable to Hussites but nevertheless supported the regent promised in Sigismond to act like mediators; while the citizens of Prague agree to return to the royal forces the castle of Vyšehrad. Jan Žižka which disapproved this compromise left Prague for Plzeň. Not being able to be maintained there it went until the south of Bohemia and after having beaten the catholics with the Bataille of Sudomer on March 25th, 1420 it arrived at Usti. Not feeling safe he united with the new camp with Tábor named according to the Mont Tabor in the Bible. Four captains ( hejtman ) of which one was Žižka were elected and a strict military discipline was instituted.

The first anti-hussite crusade

Sigismond became king de Bohême, with the death of his/her Wenceslas brother is lived; but it was not clear if the succession were hereditary or elective. As a support of the Church of Rome it obtained the assistance of the pope Martin V which promulga on March 14th, 1420 a crusade for the destruction of the heretics. A vast cross army joining together of many German princes and the adventurers attracted by plundering from all Europe besieged Prague on June 30th. The army hussite carried out by Jan Zizka gained the victory over the crusaders with the battle of Vitkov, and Zizka entered Prague as a liberator. The hill of Vitkov will bear from now on the name of Žižkov. Negotiations were undertaken to try to solve the religious differences.

Sigismond kept the castles of Vyšehrad and of Prague which, if they dominated Prague, was isolated one from the other. Trying to supply them Sigismond was beaten on November 1st close to Pankrác, suburbs of Prague. Almost all Bohemia was under the control of the rebels.

The second crusade

Internal disorders did not make it possible to the new Masters effectively to be organized. In Prague, the priest Jan Želivský became dictator and in Tabor, the egalitarian movement (preaching the absolute equality of all in front of God and on ground, preaching the division of the tangible properties) was repressed by Žižka. Little time after, a new crusade was undertaken. A broad German army invades and spent in August 1421 the seat around the town of Zatec. The crusaders hoped to have the support of Sigismond but he was prisoner in Hungary. With the advertisement of the arrival of the army hussite the crusaders fled. Sigismond arrived to Bohemia only at the end of the year where it took possession of the town of Kutná Hora, and undergoes a decisive defeat with the Bataille of Nemecky Brod (Deutschbrod) the January 6th 1422.

Civil war

Jan Želivský was stopped on March 9th, 1422 by the town council of Prague and was decapitated. Žižka had to repress disorders with Tabor. The prince Sigismond Korybutovic of Poland became for one short period the governor of the country. But after its departure the Civil war burst again between Utraquistes of Prague and the Taborites. Those carried out by Žižka beat the army of Ultraquistes carried out by Cenek de Wartemberg; shortly after an armistice was concluded with Konopilt. The rebels invaded the catholic Moravie of which part of the population was favorable to their belief.

The third crusade

A new crusade was formed but Sigismond Korybutovic which had taken the command of the army hussite after the death of Žižka inflicted a cruel defeat with the Germans with Usti nad Labem then in 1427 with Tachov enabling him to carry out raids in Germany.

Discussions of peace

The uninterrupted continuation of the victories hussites seemed to make vain any attempt to make them fold by the force. Moreover, the popular and levelling character of the hussites returned the princes of the nervous surrounding countries and they feared the contagion of these ideas on their subjects. The utraquists, for their part, preferred to consolidate their conquests to continue an exhausting war. Also peace talks began on March 3rd, 1431, with the Concile of Basle between the catholic power and the clergy hussite. The catholics rejected with vehemence the suggestion that representatives of the orthodoxe Église and other Christian branches are present.

But before giving their assent, the catholics wanted to carry out a last test to put at the step the hussites. The 1431, an large army under the orders of the count Frederic Ier de Brandebourg, accompanied by the Cesarini cardinal, papal legate, crosses the border with Bohemia and the August 14th reached the town of Domažlice. However as soon as the army of the hussite Prokop Holy was presented, reinforced by six-mille Polish hussites, the crusaders escaped again. The legend wants that it was the battle song of the hussites, Kdož jsou Boží bojovníci ( Which are the soldiers of God ) who had put them in rout.

Consequently, the October 15th, the members of the council sent a formal invitation to the rebels to negotiate peace. A delegation of those carried out by Prokop Holy and including Jan de Rokycany, the abbot of Tabor Nicolas de Pelhřimov, the “English hussite” Peter Payne and others arrived the January 4th 1433. The discussions trailed in length.

The May 30th 1434, the fratricidal conflict enters the taken again extremists and the moderate ones. The army of the Taborites was crushed with the Bataille of Lipany which sees the death of the hejtman ultraquists, Prokop Holy.

Peace agreement

Moderate having taken the top, they presented their requests which were accepted on July 15th 1436 by the the Vatican after a small amendment and which related to especially the possessions of the catholic orders with Jihlava. The Compactats are also endorsed in 1436 by the Sigismond emperor of which it was the single chance to see itself recognizing as king de Bohême by the General states of the crown of Bohemia. The Compactats recognize the confiscation, during risings hussites, of the goods of the Church, confiscations which benefitted with the Czech nobility and the cities. “Democratic” waitings of the less favoured layers of the population, essentially, were disappointed.

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