King Sigismund’s rule was short and contentious. At his death in 1437 Bohemia’s internal political development was vulnerable to interference from neighbouring territories. Nor was the power of the Papacy yet spent; in cooperation with dissatisfied subjects and with ambitious neighbours, it could seriously undermine the position of the ruler of a heretical state. The challenges for anyone trying to rule Bohemia were threefold: to satisfy the minimal demands of the Hussite community; to establish internal political order; and to secure the country against threats from its immediate neighbours.
Rivals of the Bohemian king could easily exploit the unsettled religious situation. On his accession in 1436 Sigismund had confirmed the Compacts, a watered-down version of the Four Articles. Originally the Articles had called for the giving of the wine to the laity in communion, for freedom to preach, for the clergy to renounce pomp, avarice and secular lordship, and for the cessation of public sin. In 1436 Sigismund added the important reservation that only those who had practised communion in both kinds up to that time might continue to do so. Sigismund also endorsed the diet’s election of the Hussite, John Rokycana, as archbishop. The king’s action was important for the moderates, but neither the Council of Basle, the pope nor the returning Catholic clergy would recognise Rokycana. As a result, differences between Catholics and Hussites continued to thwart the organisation of a single Bohemian Church.
In 1440, however, the Catholics of Bohemia joined the Hussites in drawing up a Letter of Peace affirming the Compacts, and indicating that no candidate other than Rokycana could be seriously considered. Negotiations with the Council and the pope failed, but the Hussite cause in Bohemia was furthered by the capture of Prague by George of Podebrady in September 1448, an event which allowed Rokycana to enter and assume leadership over the Church. However, he and his church wanted papal confirmation without which he could not ordain priests. Hussite hopes were not fulfilled. In 1458 Pope Pius II appointed Wenceslas Krumlov as administrator of the archdiocese of Prague, dashing Rokycana’s expectations. Later, on 31 March 1462, Pius proclaimed the Compacts null and void. However, the two faiths at least partially respected royal decrees to live in peace. When Vladislav became king in 1471 he confirmed freedom of worship for the Hussites. In the agreement made at Kutna Hora in 1485, Catholics and Hussites promised to be content with the parishes under their control, and to abstain from polemics against one another. The freedom to worship according to Catholic or Hussite rites was guaranteed to all social classes. But no archbishop would be appointed to Prague until 1561.
Rivals of the king also took advantage of the unsettled dynastic issue. King Sigismund died in December 1437, but left no male heir. His son-in-law was Albert of Austria, but he died soon afterwards, leaving an infant son, Ladislav. Political forces in Bohemia were divided between Catholics, led by Ulrich of Rozmberk and Menhart of Hradec, and the Hussites, led first by Hynek Ptacek of Pirkstejn and, after 1444, by George of Podebrady. The Hussites wanted recognition of the chalice by a legitimate ruler. To this end they persuaded Frederick III of Austria, the guardian of Ladislav, to send the minor heirapparent to Prague and establish stable government. In the heir’s absence, George wanted a governor or administrator. From 1444 to 1448 George prepared himself for that position by marrying the Catholic, Kunhuta of Sternberk, and by removing his rival, Menhart of Hradec, from the royal castles of Vysehrad and Hradcany. In June 1450 George defeated the league of Strakonice formed by his opponents in the southern and south-western parts of the country. On 27 April 1452 a diet named George as governor to work with Ladislav for two years. In October 1453 Czechs celebrated Ladislav’s accession to the throne.
In 1458, after Ladislav’s death, both Catholic and Hussite estates accepted election as the most appropriate way of resolving the problem of succession. The general population was involved in the choice, albeit not directly. The Hussite archbishop-elect, Rokycana, sent his priests and chaplains into towns and castles and into the houses of ordinary citizens to influence opinion on behalf of George, a native son. Their propaganda stressed the age-old strife between Germans and Slavs. It described Germans as natural lovers of violence, treacherous and deceitful, with the Elbe Slavs among their victims. Czech history was a warning not to accept a German king. The decisive session of the diet opened on 2 March 1458 in the town hall of Old Town Prague. The large square between Tyn church and the town hall was filled. After ancient documents had been examined, it was decided that the assembled lords, knights and representatives of royal towns were entitled to proceed to an election. The Catholic lords met separately and persuaded their most conservative members to accept a Hussite king. No formal vote was needed, and the Catholic, Zdenek of Sternberk, indicated the choice of the estates by announcing ‘May the Lord Governor be our king’; he then knelt before George of Podesbrady. The assembled electors signalled their approval. George walked amidst the crowds to Tyn church, where clergy and students sang the ‘Te Deum’; from there to the royal residence his procession marched singing the ancient hymn honouring St Wenceslas. In the following year the Emperor, Frederick III, proclaimed George king and imperial elector.
As king of a country branded heretical, George was vulnerable to papal politics. In December 1466 Pope Paul II declared George a heretic. Since they did not need to obey George, his baronial subjects used the opportunity to elect Matyas Corvinus of Hungary as king. He was loyal to Rome and unhappy about raiding Hussite armies. However, since the crown and regalia were in George’s hands at Karlstejn, there could be no coronation, and as neither the German princes nor Casimir of Poland supported Matyas, George remained in power. However, he had to abandon any thought of designating his son as his heir, and of thus establishing a native dynasty. After his death in March 1471, the diet voted to invite Vladislav of Poland to be king. Vladislav granted the ancient privileges and freedoms of the kingdom, including the Compacts, and was crowned on 22 August 1471. In 1477 he was confirmed as king by Frederick III, and in 1490 the estates of Moravia, Silesia and the Lusatias united with Bohemia so that the lands of the Crown of St Wenceslas once again had a single ruler.
George’s diplomatic efforts in the Empire, and his contribution to Europe’s welfare, helped him ward off some of the Papacy’s attacks. Overall, his court was a lively centre of diplomacy. In 1460 he supported efforts to reform the Empire and prepare for its defence against the Turks. He also undertook to mediate between the Wittelsbachs and Albrecht Achilles and the margrave of Brandenburg, through which he gained respect and friends. From his court came the plan for European co-operation, the work of Antonio Marini. This proposed league had at its core a supreme assembly. Among other things it was to decide what weapons were to be used against the Turks, the roles of ground and naval forces, the appointment of commanders, the control of supplies and the establishment of hospitals. It proposed a common currency for all Europe, as well as a common fund. The league foundered because no European prince would seriously consider surrendering his autonomy.
Hussites were given a mixed reception when travelling abroad. At the Council of Basle, in 1433, the popularity of the Hussites compelled the Council’s protector and the city’s magistrates to threaten death and loss of property to all who attended a Hussite service or engaged with them in discussion of theological issues. Hussite leaders were requested to forbid their people to preach while on visits to nearby villages. None the less, George of Podesbrady was able to block papal efforts to isolate his country from Europe, and Czechs who travelled abroad during his reign felt at ease there. Yet Hussite Bohemia remained an island in a sea; outsiders regarded the heretical Czechs as defective, their country one which needed to be put straight. Czech travellers reported that while a German inn-keeper’s wife cursed all Czechs as heretics, some French, who expected them to be primitive, were surprised at how politely Czechs dined.
Fifteenth-century Bohemian life was deeply marked by Hussite efforts at religious reform. In the 1420s, the most radical adherents held sway militarily, and threatened to eradicate the office of kingship and any other country-wide governing institution. For a time, the Hussites were poised to weld national feeling to the notion of popular self-government, expressed in secular terms in Prague and in religious terms in Tabor. Tradition, and the desire for a Church and a king accepted by Europe as legitimate, proved too strong for this early form of democracy to establish itself. As a result, the nobles seized the advantage. They set up temporary governmental offices, defeated the radicals on the battlefield and sponsored negotiations for the return of the monarch. As leading arbiters, they laid down the rules and the requirements to both the king and the other estates. The roots of decay among the radical Hussites, popular disillusionment with them, and their military defeat, prevented them from creating a national solidarity. But the victorious nobility was no more successful. It refused to lead a socially broad commonwealth, and its narrow view of the national community, as represented by the nobility alone, effectively cut short Czech experiments with national sovereignty in the fifteenth century.