elected Chief Bishop of the Bohemian Brotherhood; and his exhortations
and encouragements seemed for a time to put new life into the Society.
More noteworthy still is the effect which these addresses produced in
the following century; for it was they that decided Count Zinzendorf
to welcome the Brethren to Herrnhut, and to inaugurate that later
period of their career during which they have been known by the name
of “Moravians.” It is interesting, too, to find that Comenius was
actuated by that Slavonic feeling which was always so powerful in
Bohemia; and that he conceived the idea of translating the Bible
into Turkish, so that, by turning the Sultan to the true faith,
he might secure an easier life for those Slavs who were suffering
under the Mahommedan tyranny. His educational labours were also
carried on with some effect in Poland and Hungary; and it should be
specially remembered that the German Real-Schule is as much due to the
inspiration of Comenius as the Universities of Leipzic and Wittenberg
are to the model provided for them, and the scholars trained in the
University of Prague.
But, though the career of Comenius shows that there were still
Bohemians who tried to keep alive the intellectual and moral life of
their nation, such instances are but rare interruptions to the dreary
record of stifling tyranny which stretched over the last years during
which the male line of the Hapsburgs governed Bohemia. Doubtless,
occasionally, energetic students, like the Jesuits, Balbin and Pes̆ina,
give hopes of an ultimate revival of interest in the national history;
sometimes an insurrection of the peasantry, like that of 1680, seems to
hint that tyranny may become intolerable at last. Joseph I., indeed,
is credited with a desire for reform; but at any rate there is no sign
of a realisation of his ideas; and it is only when the male Hapsburgs
make way for the one female ruler of their race that a day of better
things seems just about to dawn. Even that dawn was very slow in
breaking. Some encouragement was given to culture by Maria Theresa,
and a literary society was founded; but it soon became apparent that
even literary discussions involved an awkward revival of the past;
and the censors again interfered to check intellectual progress. The
Empress-Queen relaxed the feudal oppression of the peasantry; but
only enough was granted to excite, without satisfying, the desire for
liberty. One step, however, was gained during this reign, which cleared
the ground for future progress. Popes and kings at last realised
that that great Order, before which they had bowed, might become as
dangerous to them as to the people whom they governed; and, in 1773,
Clement XIV. dissolved the Society of Jesus. This dissolution struck a
blow at that monopoly of education which had stunted the intellectual
life of Bohemia, and it prepared the way for the changes of the
following reign.
In 1780, Joseph II. of Germany, the first king of the House of
Lorraine, succeeded his mother as ruler of all the dominions of
the House of Austria. He at once signalised his accession to power
by an Edict of Toleration, which allowed all Protestants to return
to Bohemia, and to settle there freely. But, with all his zeal
for enlightenment, Joseph was hampered by those old traditions of
uniformity which he had received from his mother’s family. He soon
found that Protestants could not be all rolled together in compact
bundles and kept quiet there. Not only the Bohemian Brothers, but a
number of very strange sects, would come in under the new Edict. Some
of these did not even profess Christianity; and Joseph was yet more
irritated to find that men who had special convictions sometimes wished
to express them in ways of which their neighbours disapproved. The
Protestants were therefore called upon to accept either the Augsburg
Confession or the Calvinistic Formulæ; and, when he at last realised
that there was a growing body in the country who refused to accept
any definite Christian creed, Joseph’s feelings of toleration gave
way. Children were torn from their parents to be educated in sounder
principles, and the parents were banished to Transylvania.
A blot, that created even more general indignation in Bohemia, stained
Joseph’s schemes of educational reform. Here, too, he wished to remove
restrictions and to extend knowledge; but here again the Hapsburg
instinct was too strong for eighteenth-century enlightenment. The
Latin of the Jesuits was, indeed, to be deposed from its supremacy.
Printing-presses were to be established. Studies previously rejected
were to be encouraged. But the tyranny of Latin only made way for the
tyranny of German. _That_ was to be the one recognised language of
education; and Bohemian was to yield to it even more completely than it
had yielded to the language of an older civilisation.
Nor had Parliaments or municipalities any chance of life. No laws
were to be passed by the Bohemian Estates without the sanction of an
Austrian Board; the censorship of Bohemian books was to be conducted
from Vienna; a brand-new municipal code was to check the free play of
the old Town Rights. Only in one matter was freedom to be unhampered in
its progress, and untainted by any of those inconsistent arrangements
which took back with one hand what the other hand had given. The
power of the lord over the serf was to be completely broken; and the
freed peasants might move as they pleased from place to place, and
might choose whatever trade or study they desired, unhampered by the
authority of their former masters.
But the opposition to the denationalising plans of Joseph, which
assumed so violent a form in Hungary and the Netherlands, encouraged
the Bohemians also to protest in a milder fashion; and, when Leopold
succeeded Joseph as King of Bohemia, he was forced to reconsider his
brother’s policy, to convoke the Bohemian Assembly once more, and to
make concessions to the national feeling in the matter of language.
For, in spite of all repressions and discouragements, that feeling
had never ceased to have its influence in Bohemia; and it was well
illustrated by three men of very different type, who had begun their
efforts in the discouraging times of repression, and who lived on into
more hopeful days.
Of these the eldest was Frantis̆ek Pelc̆el, who was born at Rychnov
(Reichenau) in 1735. He was a man of obscure birth, and he was intended
by his parents for the medical profession. But he did not like this
occupation; so he went to Prague to study in the High School, where he
partly supported himself by teaching the children of rich citizens.
Finding, however, that logic was better taught at Králové Dvůr
(Königinhof), he went there to study; but, while he was there, the
school was placed more completely under Jesuit control. The strange
mixture of repulsion and attraction which that wonderful Society seems
generally to excite in its pupils, had its influence over Pelc̆el; and
the attraction proving, for the time, the stronger feeling, he was
inclined to give himself to theology; but the Seven Years War cut short
his studies, and he left Bohemia for Vienna.
It was on his return to Prague that he fell in with the second of the
men who were to be the great promoters of the new movement. This was
Count Caspar of Sternberg, the son of an officer who had served under
Maria Theresa. He, like Pelc̆el, had been attracted to the study of
theology; but his audacious speculations had startled the professors
at the German College in Rome, and the Jesuits had produced on him a
purely repellent effect. After the dissolution of the German College,
Sternberg had returned to Prague, and had given himself to the study of
art. He soon took notice of Pelc̆el, and entrusted to him the education
of his children. This turned Pelc̆el from his theological speculations;
but it was not till his transfer to the family of another nobleman that
he devoted himself wholly to the study and writing of history. His life
of Charles IV. and his short history of Bohemia may be wanting in the
wide views and deeper insight of later historians; but the evidence of
enormous industry and hearty interest in the subject make a distinct
mark in the progress of national feeling.
The most remarkable of the leaders of the movement, and the one who
seems to be the most looked back to by the historians of the present
day, was Josef Dobrovsky. He, too, was intended by his Jesuit teachers
for a theological career; and it was only the suppression of that
Order which turned him for a time to the study of the language. He did
not, however, abandon theology. In 1778 he brought out a commentary on
Bohemian literature; and in 1779 he began to edit a journal in which
contemporary Bohemian literature was noticed and criticised. Curiously
enough, his conclusions about Bohemian history were rather opposed to
those of modern national historians. He threw doubts on the existence
of the common Slavonic language; and he rather discredited the extent
of the influence of Cyril and Methodius, as compared with that of the
Roman Church. But for the Bohemian language he was keenly zealous, and
when, in 1790, Leopold appeared at a meeting of the Bohemian Society
of Sciences, Dobrovsky appealed to him to protect his countrymen in
the use of their mother-tongue. The Emperor was so much impressed by
this appeal, that he sent six thousand gulden to the society, for
the promotion of journeys for inquiry into the Bohemian history and
language. Dobrovsky was chosen to travel in Sweden and Russia, both
for the recovery of lost manuscripts and for the collection of further
information about Slavonic literature.
In the meantime, Count Caspar von Sternberg had been forced to abandon
official life, and had begun to devote himself more exclusively to
the promotion of art, literature, and science. The Emperor Francis
showed himself almost as friendly as Leopold had been to the revival
of Bohemian literature and art; and, in 1818, he assented to the
foundation of the National Museum at Prague for the collection of all
kinds of literary, artistic, and scientific antiquities of Bohemia. The
foundation of this museum was almost contemporaneous with events which
excited, to the highest pitch, the champions of Bohemian language and
literature.
A man named Hanka, in hunting for some ecclesiastical documents in the
vault of the church of Králové Dvůr, found an old chest in the wall,
in which church ornaments were kept. Hidden behind this were some
curious old manuscripts, which, on examination, proved to be Bohemian
songs of a comparatively early date. They were at once despatched to
Prague, and were handed over by Count Sternberg to two men who were now
gaining much reputation. These were Josef S̆afarik, a Slovak from that
district of Hungary where a dialect of the Bohemian language is usually
spoken, and Frantis̆ek Palacký, the son of a Calvinist minister, who
had been marked out for an important post in the new museum. They
examined the manuscript, and, after long consideration, pronounced it
genuine. This discovery seemed to open a new world of life and thought
to the champions of national literature. Most of the songs, it was
true, dealt mainly with battles; but the power of expression seemed to
indicate a condition of culture in the ninth or tenth century which
led the Bohemians to believe in an early development of national life,
uninfluenced by Teutonic intruders.
[Illustration: SLOVAK WOMAN FOUND IN PARTS OF MORAVIA AND ALSO IN
HUNGARY.]
Count Sternberg now issued an appeal to the possessors of all
antiquities, whether literary, artistic, or scientific, to send them
to the National Museum. One of the first answers to this appeal was
an anonymous letter, in which the writer announced that he had
discovered another Bohemian manuscript in a certain castle; but that
he feared to give his name or call public attention to the place, as
the owner of the castle was a German “Michel”[6] who would destroy any
Bohemian manuscript if he found it. The writer, therefore, forwarded
the manuscript secretly, without waiting for the lord’s permission.
The manuscript was found to be the poem of the Libus̆in Saud described
in the first chapter of this history; and the writer, on inquiry,
was discovered to be Kovar, the bailiff of Count Colloredo-Mansfeld.
The manuscript, it appeared, had been discovered in a vault of the
Castle of Zelená hora (Grünberg), in Nepomuc, where the bailiff had
been examining a number of business papers. This manuscript was also
examined, and was pronounced by Palacký and S̆afarik to be of earlier
date than the Königinhof manuscript.
These discoveries, however, were not suffered to pass unchallenged.
At first, indeed, the controversy seemed likely to be conducted on
scientific principles. The chief opponent of their authenticity was
the zealous patriot Dobrovsky; and he disputed their claim to historic
worth on philological grounds. But soon the controversy passed out
of the serene air of scientific discussion. The eager enthusiasm
with which most Bohemian patriots had hailed the discovery of the
manuscripts, aroused an equally eager desire on the part of the enemies
of their language to dispute the authenticity of these discoveries; and
savage German critics accused Hanka and Kovar of forgery, and denounced
as absurd the suggestion of any possible Bohemian civilisation which
had not come from Germany. The writings of S̆afarik on the various
Slavonic languages kept the discussion alive; and the appearance, in
1836, of the early volumes of Palacký’s history roused still angrier
attacks.
[Illustration: BOHEMIAN WOMAN WITH “DOVE” HEAD-DRESS AND NATIVE WORK.]
Even before this literary revival had taken place, discoveries had
been made which seemed to point to an early culture even amongst the
Bohemian peasantry. Bronzes and earthenware ornaments had been dug up,
the antiquity of which was proved by the heathen symbols marked upon
them; and it was noticed that these devices corresponded to the designs
which were produced in later ages by the peasantry in Bohemia and
Moravia. This curious fact gave a new impulse to investigation, and
numerous specimens of the peasant art were collected. The beauty of
colouring and design in this work is the more striking because it was
not learnt in any school, but is the fruit of native genius. About the
same time a similar interest was roused in the music produced by the
peasantry, and the songs and dances of the peasants have been embodied
in the operas of S̆metana.
The revolution of 1848 naturally brought to a head the struggle between
the Germans and Bohemians: and the demand then made for the further
protection of the Bohemian language was strengthened at a later stage
by the meeting of the Slavonic Congress, which was to protect the Slavs
against the threatened encroachment of the Frankfort Parliament.[7] The
unfortunate rising of June, 1848, led to the downfall of the newly-born
liberty of Bohemia; but, when German and Magyar revolutions were alike
crushed, questions of race-division naturally ceased for a time to be
interesting to those who had suffered a common loss of liberty. The
idea of a federative union of the Austrian dominions was, however, kept
steadily before the public by Palacký; and the old fear of sinking to
an equality with other races gradually roused the Germans to renewed
action. In 1858 the controversy about the manuscripts of Králové Dvůr
and Zelená hora was renewed in all its fierceness; and when, after the
Austrian collapse in 1859, the talk about Constitutional government
once more began, it was soon found that the new liberties were not to
produce equality of race. The wars of 1866 and 1870 gave a new impulse
to the German claim for supremacy in Austria; and so the struggle has
gone on with varying fortune, but ever circling round the central point
of language and literature.
THE END.
FOOTNOTES
[1] The following account of the legend of Libus̆a is taken partly from
the translation of the Libus̆in Saud by Mr. A. H. Wratislaw, partly
from the version of the story given by Cosmas. I have not the least
desire to enter here into the burning question of the authenticity of
the original poem. I have heard every degree and variety of opinion on
that subject, even from patriotic Bohemians. But the only two points
that concern me here are, first, that Cosmas must have had before him
some old legend containing a version of the story, not unlike that
edited and translated by Mr. Wratislaw; secondly, that Cosmas accepted
this story as embodying his conception of the beginnings of Bohemian
history. No one, as far as I know, disputes the genuineness of Cosmas’s
history; into the sources of his information it is not necessary to go.
[2] A new word in the Bohemian language fitly marks this period. This
word is _Kostel_, which is obviously formed from the German _Castell_,
and ultimately from _Castellum_; but which was used to signify church,
since the military Christianity introduced by the Franks was marked by
the use of castles as churches.
[3] In the English carol the story has evidently been adapted to modern
feeling; for the saint’s barefoot walk to the church has been changed
into a mission of practical benevolence.
[4] Since writing the above I have found a curious confirmation of
my opinion of the danger of this utterance in one of the decrees of
Ferdinand II., issued at the time when he was practically destroying
the foundation of Charles IV. He appeals to the memory of Charles as
a justification of his proceedings, on the ground that he was only
restoring that unity of the Catholic religion, of which Charles was so
ardent a champion.
[5] These words are curiously like those of a later popular ruler of
Rome--“Mankind has worshipped in the name of the Father and the Son.
Give place to the religion of the Spirit.”--_From the Pope to the
Council._--GIUSEPPE MAZZINI.
[6] “Michel” is an embodiment of certain ideas about the typical
German, much as the name “John Bull” embodies certain conceptions about
the average Englishman.
[7] I have treated this part of the subject in full in my account of
the Bohemian Revolution in the “Revolutions of 1848 and 1849.”
INDEX.
A
Adalbert, his early career, 30;
his influence as Bishop of Prague, 30;
his flight from Prague, 31;
his conversion of the Hungarians, 31;
circumstances of his death, 32;
restoration of his body to Prague, 39-41;
appealed to at Battle of Chlum, 53;
popularity of his hymn, 32, 112
Adamites, 270, 271
Adam, Daniel, historian, 417
Adolf of Nassau, Wenceslaus’s relations with, 114, 115
Albert, son of Rudolf of Hapsburg, his quarrels with Wenceslaus, 114;
elected Emperor, 115;
sanctions union of Poland with Bohemia, 115;
defeated by Wenceslaus II., 116;
tries to secure Bohemia for his sons, 117, 118;
Bohemian feeling about his death, 118
Albert in the time of Sigismund (_see_ Austria, Albert of)
Albik, Archbishop, his demands from Hus, 197, 198
Alexander II., 47
Alexander V., Pope, his relations with Zajíc, 190, 193;
checks inquiry into Wyclif’s books, 193
Alexander VI., Pope, his treatment of the Brotherhood, 353, 354
Amos of S̆tekna opposes changes in the Brotherhood, 350, 351;
denounces the Brotherhood to Ladislaus, 355
Anabaptists, their relations with the Brotherhood, 379
Angelini, chaplain to Maximilian of Bavaria, 478
Anhalt, Siegfried of, 92
Anhalt, Christian of (_see_ Christian)
Anna, sister of Wenceslaus IV., effect of her marriage with Richard
II., 177
Arnestus, Bishop, his support of Charles IV.’s reforms, 142;
his treatment of Rienzi, 150
Arnulf, his claims on Pannonia, 16;
his candidature for the Empire, 19;
his struggles with Svatopluk, 19;
calls in the Hungarians to his help, 19, 20;
stirs up civil war in Moravia, 21
Art, encouragement of, by Vratislav, 50;
by Charles IV., 134-6;
by Rudolf II., 416, 417
Art of peasantry, 507, 508
Assembly, Bohemian, in time of Libus̆a, 5;
in time of Vladislav, 59, 60;
character of, in early times, 67, 68;
elects Henry of Carinthia, 118;
in time of John, 119, 120, 125, 126;
resists Charles IV., 140, 141;
superseded by Wenceslaus’s Council, 168;
imposes conditions on Sigismund, 234, 235;
rejects him as king, 272;
attitude of, to George, 326;
debates of, in 1537, 385, 386;
in 1575, 413, 414;
in 1608, 438, 439, 453;
suppression of, by Ferdinand II., 490;
revival of, by Leopold II., 501
(_see_ also Nobles, Council)
Assembly, Moravian, 330, 375, 399;
Silesian, 330, 375
Augusta, John, his early career, 380;
draws up Confession, 380, 384;
his relations to Luther, 383;
visits Bucer and Calvin, 386, 387;
rebuked by Ludanic, 392;
kidnapped and imprisoned, 393;
his cruel treatment, 393, 398, 401;
his relations to the Jesuits, 403, 404;
his quarrels with the Elders, 400, 402, 404;
his final release, 405;
his later differences with the Brotherhood, 411, 412
Austi, rout of Taborites at, 243
Austria, first struggle of, with Bohemia, 49;
Margravate of, raised into a Dukedom, 58;
end of Babenberg line in, 65;
claim on, of Frederick II., 65, 66;
conquered by Ottakar II., 66, 84, 85;
secured to him by marriage, 85;
conquered by Rudolf, 99;
relations of Charles to, 145, 146;
Protestantism in, relations of, with Matthias (_see_ Protestants
and Tschernembl)
Austria, Duke of, joins conspiracy against Wenceslaus IV., 170;
allied with John XXIII., 209
Austria, Albert of, made ruler of Moravia, 282;
chosen King of Bohemia, 311, 312;
struggles of, 312-14
Austria, Upper, attitude of, towards Bohemian rising, 469, 471
Austria, Lower, invaded by Thurn, 471, 472
(_see_ also Hapsburg, Rudolf, &c.)
Avars, struggles of, with the Slavs, 7
Avignon, 126, 155
B
Babenberg, house of, 84
(_see_ Frederick, Leopold)
Balbin, Jesuit historian, 498
Basel, Bishop of, supports Rudolf against Ottakar, 104
Basel, Council of, reasons for its summons, 290-4;
discussions at, 297-302
Basel, Compacts of, 307, 309, 318, 319, 323, 333, 368, 385, 386
Battles of Chlum, 53;
Crecy, 129;
Domaz̆lic̆e, 288, 289;
Knin, 243;
Kutna Hora, 277;
Lipaný, 305;
Lomnice, 470;
Mailberg, 49;
Marchfeld, 105;
Merseburg, 27;
Mohács, 372;
Mühlberg, 390;
Nemecky Brod, 277;
Porc̆ic, 253;
Rakonic, 477;
R̆ic̆an, 268;
Sudomír, 248, 249;
Tachov, 285;
Vys̆ehrad, 266, 267;
White Hill, 478, 479;
Z̆izkov Hora, 257, 258
Bavaria, relations of, with Charles IV., 145-7;
resistance of, to Ferdinand, 377
Bavaria, Duke Louis of, his opposition to Ottakar, 91;
claim of electoral rights by, 91, 92
Bavaria, Duke Henry of, his friendship for Ottakar, 91;
goes over to Rudolf, 98
(_see_ also Louis, Emperor; Maximilian)
Beaufort, Cardinal, leads fourth crusade, 285-8, 292
Bela, King of Hungary, defeated by the Tartars, 74;
Ottakar’s rivalry with, 86;
gives his daughter to Ottakar, 87
Berka, Ladislaus of, 430, 434, 435
Bethlen Gabor, his rising in Transylvania, 472;
invades Austria, 475;
declared Prince of Hungary, 476;
his steady opposition to Ferdinand, 476
Bilek, his relations with Augusta, 393, 401, 403, 404
Blahoslav, his importance in Brotherhood, 401;
his controversy with Augusta, 411
Bocksay, Stephen, his insurrection, 427, 428
Bohemia, peculiarities of its history, 1-4;
zeal for national language in, 2;
early settlements in, 4;
forced into Christian baptism by Franks, 8;
Christianised by Methodius, 12;
Slavonic ritual introduced into, 12;
national estimate of patriotism and heroism, 18, 19;
effect on, of fall of Dukedom of Moravia, 21;
struggles between Christians and heathens in, 22-32;
relations of, to German Empire in tenth century, 33;
to Saxony and Poland in same period, 34, 35;
first king of, 49;
uncertainty of royal title in, 51;
effect on, of Vladislav’s policy, 59, 62;
peculiarities of constitutional history of, 67, 68;
how strengthened by German weakness, 89, 90;
effect on, of Battle Of Marchfeld, 105, 106;
privileges secured to, by John, 119, 120;
feeling of Charles IV. to, 132, 137, 146;
new life developed in, by Charles, 137;
position in Empire claimed for, 146;
extension of territory of, 145, 148;
attitude of, towards its kings, 235;
traditions of, contrasted with English, 341-3;
Luther’s feeling towards, 364, 365;
decline of liberty in, in sixteenth century, 361, 362;
attitude of, towards Ferdinand II., 374, 375;
final struggle in, 467-82;
sufferings of, in seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, 483-91