Early Adulthood

A whole new chapter opened with John the Blind’s oldest son with Eliska Premyslovna and heir to the Bohemian throne Charles IV. Born in Prague in 1316 the new King managed to improve the capital’s standing even before his coronation when in 1344 the bishopric of Prague was raised to an archbishopric due to his efforts.

Soon after, the French master builder Matthias of Arras is summoned from the papal palace in Avignon to design the new Gothic Cathedral of Saint Vitus, for the new church to stand out as the nation’s most prominent cathedral, the family crypt, the treasury for the most precious relics of the kingdom, and the last resting place of the city’s patron Saint Wenceslaus.

In 1347 right after the death of his father in the Battle of Crécy (Charles escaped wounded from the same battlefield), Charles IV becomes King of Bohemia. A few months earlier he had been chosen by the prince-electors as King of the Romans (a title used by the German King after his election) a position that paved the way for his future election as Holy Roman Emperor. Prague was the capital of his Bohemian Kingdom and in the course of becoming the center of the whole empire.

Charles wanted his capital to rise to the level of Paris, the most important European capital at the time. He soon laid out his plans for establishing a new royal town that would surpass in glory the ones built by his predecessors. This city would be built outside the walls of the Old Town (Staré Mesto) to the southeast.

The building of the New Town (Nové Mesto) commenced on 26 March 1348 with the ceremonial placement of the first building stone by its founder the King. A few days later, on April 7th Charles IV establishes the first university in Central Europe. Charles University would soon provide the much-needed bureaucrats and lawyers to the Bohemian Kingdom & would make Prague the intellectual and cultural center of Central Europe.

The 3.5 kilometers-long, 10 meters tall, 5 meters wide wall of Nove Mesto encompassed an area of 7.5 km², about three times the size of the Old Town. The problem of housing troubled the citizens of the Old Town from the time of Charles IV’s father. Many people, mostly poor Czechs who came to the capital to find a job, settled in suburbs situated at the base of the old city walls, and the banks of the Vltava cramped in unhygienic conditions.

The new city and the 12 years of tax exemption given by the King to whoever managed to complete the construction of a new stone building within one and a half years answered the problem very swiftly. The largest urban planning project of the Middle Ages at the time, although it respected the structure of the older settlements on the Vltava it was structured on the undeveloped terrain in such a way (unusually broad streets and squares) that its equal could not be found in Europe.

On 5 January 1355, Charles IV is crowned emperor in Rome and Prague becomes the official capital of the Holy Roman Empire. The city councilors added the new imposing tower, the highest in the city. It was added to the Old Town Hall as a symbol of the power and pride of the first city of the empire and a new grandiose bridge, the famous Charles Bridge replacing its damaged by a flood predecessor.

The old Romanesque Palace was reconstructed and expanded in a High-Gothic style and the Vyšehrad complex was refurbished and reinforced with new fortifications. The New Town Hall of Nové Mesto was established along with numerous new parish churches throughout Prague & Bohemia & several new monasteries brought friars and monks from every order and corner of the European continent to Prague.

The “Greatest Czech of all time” (according to modern polls) or Pater Patriae (father of the country), a title first coined by Adalbertus Ranconis de Ericinio at Charles IV’s funeral, died in 1378 at his beloved city. He was buried in a crypt in St. Vitus Cathedral.

A census commissioned by Charles IV in 1378, just before his death found that Prague had 40.000 inhabitants, making it the fourth largest city north of the Alps after Paris, Ghent, and Bruges. Based on the area it covered Prague was the third largest after Rome and Constantinople. The major part of Charles IV’s monumental design, except for St. Vitus Cathedral which remained but a fragment of what we see today for five centuries, was mostly completed under the rule of his son Wenceslaus IV (1378-1419) who did not however succeed in being as effective as his father.

The city entered an era of religious fanaticism in the Easter of 1389 when members of the clergy encouraged their congregation to destroy the Jewish Quarter with the pretext of the desecration of the Eucharistic wafer by the Jews. In what became the first pogrom of its history, the city of Prague lost almost its entire Jewish population of about 3.000 people which had been an integral part of its life for almost half a millennia. In 1391 the Bethlehem Chapel is built in Staré Město for sermons in the Czech language. The chapel would play a crucial role in the birth of the Hussite movement and the Bohemian Reformation.

Jan Hus, a young Czech scholar of the University of Prague and ordained priest after 1400, starts preaching in 1402 at the newly built Bethlehem Chapel. Influenced by the writings of the English theologian and philosopher John Wycliffe (Catholic Church authorities banned many works of Wycliffe in 1403) he advocated the urgent need for reformation for the Roman Catholic Church and the moral failings of the clergy, bishops, and even the papacy, from his pulpit.

Despite King Wenceslaus IV’s & Archbishop Zajíc’s initial sympathy towards the non-conformist teachings of Hus, the papal irritation led to the confiscation of all the copies of Wycliffe’s writings & the ex-communication of Jan Hus & his followers in 1410. Hus’s ideas had become widely accepted in Bohemia and the resentment against the Church hierarchy grew even more after the Pope’s attack.

With the King backing him, Hus continued to preach at the Bethlehem Chapel until in 1412 an interdict placed Prague’s churches under a ban. To protect the city, Hus left for the countryside where he continued to preach & write. Towards the end of 1414, Hus agreed to partake in the 16th Ecumenical Council of Constance to help put an end to all the dissension. After a few weeks of open dispute, Hus was imprisoned and in June of 1415, he was tried as a heretic and burned at the stake a month later.

Hus’s tragic end sparked a flame of indignation throughout the Bohemian country & its people who saw his death as a criminal act and an insult to their country. King Wenceslaus IV, saw Hus’s death as an act of betrayal by his brother King Sigismund (King of Germany from 1411. He was the one who arranged for the council & invited Hus).

The members of the Bohemian government that were avowed Hussites, a large part of Prague’s nobility, and many members of the clergy gave free vent to this indignation. Towards the end of the 1410s, King Wenceslaus made a u-turn, conceded to his brother’s side, and tried to stem the Hussite movement from Prague. Many town councilors followed suit.

On 30 July 1419, the Hussite priest Jan Želivský leads his congregation on a procession through the streets of Prague to the New Town Hall to protest over the imprisonment of some members of the Hussite community. A stone thrown from the window of the town hall at Želivský enraged the crowd that stormed the building & threw 13 members of the town council, the judge & the burgomaster out of the window in what became known as the First Defenestration of Prague.

It is believed that King Wenceslaus’s death a few days after the incident was caused by the severe shock he experienced upon hearing the news. His death in August of 1419 & the prospect of his substitution by his brother King Sigismund, legitimate heir to the throne but at the same time betrayer of Hus according to the Hussites, would escalate things.

Many Catholics, mostly Germans, were expelled from Prague while many parts of the city, like Malá Strana, were destroyed by fire. The castle of Vyšehrad was conquered & ransacked by the Hussites who fought against the mercenaries of Wenceslaus IV’s widow Sophia of Bavaria in the first year of the so-called Hussite Wars (1419).

After the papal bull of March 1420 that called for a crusade against the Hussite followers, an army of about 100.000 soldiers under the command of King Sigismund reached Prague in June of that same year. In the Battle of Vítkov Hill which followed the Hussite forces under the command of Jan Žižka managed to triumph over the invading army.

A second victory on the battlefield against the anti-Hussite crusaders proved to be detrimental to the amity of the Hussite camp which was divided between the radical Taborites and the moderate Ultraquists (also known as Praguers because of their absolute dominance within the capital).

In May 1434 the Praguers allied with the Roman Catholic forces and inflicted the final blow to the opposite camp in the Battle of Lipany, where the Taborite army was almost annihilated. The reconciliation with Rome and the recognition of Sigismund as King of Bohemia (he was already Holy Roman Emperor by then) finally took place in 1436 after rivers of spilled blood.

Emperor Sigismund would only rule Bohemia for a year. He died in 1437, with Albert V Duke of Austria taking his place. He would also rule for just two years. Sigismund’s grandson Ladislaus the Posthumous took over in 1453 at the age of 13 but he would experience the fate of his predecessors suddenly dying after 3 years.

Although the Hussite Wars had officially ended, the division between Bohemians loyal to the Roman Catholic faith and Hussites was far from over. Two years before King Ladislaus’ death and after the successful march with 9.000 strong to Prague, George of Podebrady, the nobleman that led the Hussite party, is entrusted with the administration of the country by Emperor Frederick III, who wants to avoid another bloodshed. Seven years later, in February 1458, George of Podebrady, becomes the first Hussite King in history supported even by the adherents of the papal party.

Although a moderate in religious matters and a visionary in politics (one of the first to envision a European Union of peace, common parliament & common institutions) George was faced with the intransigence of two different Popes (Pius II & Paul II), who both campaigned for his deposition.

Pius II‘s plan of a crusade against Bohemia remained unaccomplished but Paul II would prove to be more efficient by excommunicating & calling his subjects to be free of their heretic king. King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary who led the campaign against the Hussite King joined by the insurgent Bohemian nobles managed to take over the southern & eastern parts of the country but never managed to seize Prague.

The Hussite Praguers would never accept Matthias Corvinus as their king so after George’s death in 1471 and after the arrangements of their late king, his followers chose Vladislaus II of the ruling Jagellon dynasty of Poland as their new king instead.

At the time of his arrival in Prague, Vladislaus II was only fifteen years old and to a great extent clung to his advisers. In addition, his place was disputed by Matthias Corvinus who also used the title King of Bohemia. The succession conflict was settled with the Peace of Olomouc, which gave Vladislaus II the sole rule of Bohemia and the throne of Hungary, after the death of Matthias Corvinus in 1490.

That same year the astronomical clock was placed on the southern wall of Old Town City Hall (Old Town Square). The calendar dial was added and the clock facade was decorated with Gothic sculptures. It was the third-oldest of its kind in the world & is the oldest one still working.

The end of the 15th century was also the time the Prague Castle entered into a phase of reconstruction and the massive Vladislav Hall was added to the Royal Palace, while new defensive towers were added to the north side of the castle.

In August of 1526, the last Jagellonian King, the twenty-year-old Louis II (only son of Vladislaus II) dies after the disastrous Battle of Mohács with the forces of Suleiman the Magnificent, without securing a legitimate heir. Ferdinand I of the Habsburg Dynasty, husband of the late king’s sister Ann Jagellon and the future emperor would become King of Bohemia, commencing a new era that would last until 1918.