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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Idea i państwo: korona Królestwa Czech w latach 1457-1547 T. 4. Król i stany cz. 1. Siła słabości? Długie późne rządy Władysława II

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This book is devoted to the twenty-six years of King Vladislaus’ reign in the Bohemian state, mostly absent in the country, who in 1490 also assumed the Hungarian throne. It is difficult to assess the King’s actions. On the one hand, the monarch seemed to have acted cautiously. On the other hand, many of his undertakings appear to be imprudent or even threatening to the integrity of the Bohemian state. It is worth mentioning that he gave the Bohemian Crown fiefs to his brothers, John I Albert and later to Sigismund, from the position of the Hungarian and not the Bohemian ruler. In such circumstances, the Czech states became the guarantor of the state’s stability, also striving to limit the independence of the Silesian princes. A number of measures was also taken at that time to centralise power in Prague, with monetary reforms at the forefront. Paradoxically, it was in the absence of the King that the spectacular expansion of the Prague Castle was carried out, making it one of the most magnificent monarch residences in Europe and a monument to power. The Vladislav Hall and other components of the utilitarian and the ideological program of the castle to varying degrees express the power of the King, as well as the Bohemian states exercising power in his name not only in the Bohemian Kingdom, but in a way in the whole Crown, which also included the Moravian Margrave, the Duchy of Silesia and Lower and Upper Lusatia. The Bohemia King was also famous for the programs of his residences and public buildings, such as the Krivoklat castle, Vlassky Dvur in Kutna Hora (the royal mint) and other smaller ones. Wroclaw was no longer able to meet such challenges. However, it did not give up demonstrating its ambitions (The Nicolas Gate, completion of the town hall’s reconstruction, bishops’ foundations). One of them was an attempt to establish a university in 1505, supported by the King but halted by the Pope. It was supposed to be a Catholic university for the “decoration of the Bohemian state”, competitive to the utraquistic and the then declining University of Prague. This period was marked by great codifications - only Moravia had already experienced such undertakings (Tovacov Book from the early 80s of the 15th century). At the end of the 15th century Lusatia and Silesia were granted the confirmation of their political principles from the King. So did the Czech Kingdom later in 1500. It was an extensive normative act called Vladislaus Constitution. In some aspects it concerned the entire Bohemian Crown. Interestingly, contrary to its name, it significantly limited the position of the monarch and strengthened the political role of the nobility, especially the magnates. The main victims, however, were the Bohemian royal cities. This triggered a state crisis lasting 17 years which almost ended in a civil war. When you look at these struggles from the perspective of the whole Crown of Bohemia, and not only the Bohemian Kingdom, the divisions that took place seem to be very complicated. For example, the Bohemian cities were supported by Duke Bartholomew, who fought against Wroclaw in Silesia, while Duke Frederick II of Legnica, periodically also in opposition to the capital of Silesia, acted for the benefit of Czech magnates and the royal Świdnica. The conflict ended in 1517: the cities gave up their economic monopolies and the nobility allowed them to participate in the deliberations of the Czech Parliament. It was not until 1500 that the ageing Vladislaus lived to see his offspring. Obtaining recognition by the Czech states of the rights to succession of his daughter and son, he had to give way to them on the integrity of the Bohemian Crown, a matter on which he had so far acted rather carelessly. He also had to take care of the recognition of the rights to the crown of his son Louis in Wroclaw. That is why it was not until 1511 that he undertook a homage visit to receive homage from the states of Silesia - 21 years after he assumed reign over the whole Crown! He did not receive the homage because the Silesians raised the issue of whether they should pay homage to Vladislaus as the Bohemian or the Hungarian ruler. The dilemma was related to the provisions of the Olomouc Treaty of 1479 which stated that in the event of the death of Vladislaus Matthias Corvinus would reign over the entire Bohemian state. In the event of his death Vladislaus would have to pay 400,000 guilders to the Hungarian Crown for its involvement in Bohemian affairs, after which he would be able to rule the entire Bohemian Crown. From the King’s point of view he would be paying himself. However, Wroclaw (just like the Hungarian states) demanded the settlement of this issue. The matter was solved much later by Ferdinand I Habsburg in a truly ingenious way. The last years of Vladislaus’ reign were therefore ripe with concern for his adolescent son, Louis, to take over the throne. At the congress in Vienna in 1515, it was agreed with Emperor Maximilian that Louis would be adopted by the Emperor, which opened the prospect of Jagiellon assuming the throne of Rome (such ambitions were already discreetly displayed by the painting decoration in the Chapel of St. Wenceslas in the Prague Cathedral from 1506, created when Vladislaus’ wife was pregnant and was to give birth to another child, as it turned out - Louis). In addition, the young Ferdinand Habsburg was married to the daughter of the Bohemian-Hungarian king, Anna and Louis to Maria Habsburg, Ferdinand’s sister. The first of these marriages would later have a significant impact on the election of her husband as the Bohemian king after Ludwig’s death in 1526. Meanwhile, the Bohemian Crown, integrating under one Jagiellonian sceptre, also created monuments of power and idea of the state other than those in Prague and Wroclaw. One of them is the Church of St. Barbara in Kutna Hora, spectacular and so far underestimated in its character. The place in which Vladislaus was elected the Czech king in 1471 became a place to exhibit the legitimacy of his son Louis, as well as the cohesiveness of the Bohemian Crown in, what is interesting, a utraquistic spirit, but with many universalistic features. The religious-political program stretched over the vault of the presbytery of this extraordinary church is the most spectacular demonstration of pro-reformist ideas. After the death of the long-reigning king Vladislaus in 1516 his young successors and the mostly Catholic magnate elites would later struggle with the Lutheran Reformation. Prague and Wroclaw would again determine their positions in relation to one another on the opposite sides of the political and confessional barricade.