Prague

PRAGUE

PRAGUE. Prague was one of the largest and most influential cities in the Holy Roman Empire and central Europe in the early modern period. It was remarkable for its bilingual and multireligious population of Czech- and German-speaking Catholics, Protestants, and Jews; its distinctive geographic and political landscape; and its Reformation and cultural achievements. It was also the site of events of central importance in the histories of both the Bohemian kingdom and the empire. In reality, Prague was a complex of four legally and politically independent though socially and economically linked cities. The Old and New Cities, on the right bank of the Vltava River, were the center of artisanal and commercial activities. The Castle Hill (autonomous since 1592) and the Small Side, on the left bank, were home to royal and estate governments and were the seat of an archbishopric.

In 1346 Charles IV (ruled 1355–1378), king of Bohemia and Holy Roman emperor, chose Prague as his imperial residence. In 1348 he founded the University of Prague, the first university in central Europe, and he expanded and renovated the city. The new construction included the first stone bridge across the Vltava River and the monumental Saint Vitus Cathedral, which became the seat of a newly established archbishopric. Fifty years later Prague became the birthplace of the religious reform movement centered around Jan Hus (c. 1372–1415), rector of the Bethlehem Chapel in the Old City. In 1419 the reform movement turned into a revolution when a mob threw anti-Hussite councillors out of windows of the New City government building (an event known as the first Prague defenestration). During the Hussite Revolution religious orders and German speakers were forced to flee the city, and churches, monasteries, and other structures were destroyed in direct attacks and battles between competing forces. In the wake of the revolution Prague came into the hands of an Utraquist elite, a religiously and socially moderate group descended from the Hussites. Prague's population began to grow again, and schools and literary brotherhoods flourished in parish churches. Under the reign of King Vladislav II Jagiellon (ruled 1471–1516) Catholic religious orders began to return to the city, and Renaissance architecture first appeared in Bohemia at the Prague Castle. In 1483 the installation of new councillors sympathetic to the king's policies led to a revolt that culminated in a second defenestration of city councillors, this time from both the Old City and the New City government buildings. This revolt paved the way for the 1485 Peace of Kuttenberg, which established legal parity between Roman Catholics and Utraquists (though it forbade other religious groups).

By the beginning of the sixteenth century Prague had a population of about twenty thousand. The arrival of Lutheran ideas in the 1520s assisted in the ongoing development of Utraquism. In 1526 Ferdinand I (ruled Bohemia 1526–1564; ruled the Holy Roman Empire 1558–1564) was elected king of Bohemia. The first years of his reign were marked by maintenance of the status quo in religion and politics. However, in 1547, when the Prague cities refused to send troops to support the Catholic imperial army in the Schmalkaldic War, Ferdinand punished them with sanctions and sent his son, Archduke Ferdinand of Tyrol, to reside in Prague as his viceroy. The residence of the viceroy helped draw Bohemian nobles, artisans, and some foreigners to the city. The mid-sixteenth century also witnessed a flowering of printing houses and literary societies and the spread of Renaissance innovations to noble palaces and burgher houses. In 1555 the first Jesuit college in Bohemia was founded, and in 1561 a new archbishop, who established the foundations of Catholic reform, was installed. In 1583 Rudolf II (ruled 1576–1612), Bohemian king and Holy Roman emperor, moved the imperial court from Vienna to Prague, making the city an imperial capital for a second time. At the Prague court Rudolf assembled a large array of foreign artists, artisans, and scientists. Among these notables were the astronomers Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) and Tycho Brahe (1546–1601), the painters Bartholomeus Spranger (1546–1611) and Giuseppe Arcimboldo (c. 1530–1593), and the sculptor Adriaan de Vries (c. 1560–1626). Rudolf's Kunstkammer, located in the Prague Castle, was the largest art collection in the Europe of that day.

By 1600 Prague had become a major European center of late Renaissance culture and, with a population of about sixty thousand people, the largest city in the empire and in central Europe. Growing tension between Catholics and Protestants within the ruling elite led in 1618 to an Estates revolt, which culminated in a third defenestration. This time Protestant noblemen tossed two Catholic imperial governors from a window in the Prague Castle. Although the men were not badly hurt, this action was the catalyst for the outbreak of the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648). In 1620 the Bohemian Estates and their Protestant allies were defeated by Catholic imperial troops at the Battle of White Mountain, just outside of Prague. A year later twenty-one leaders of the revolt were executed on Old Town Square, and their heads were displayed on the bridge, an event publicized throughout the empire. The Edict of Restitution in 1629 firmly entrenched Habsburg rule and the Counter-Reformation and resulted in property confiscations and the exile of Protestants from the city. At the same time Prague's baroque culture flowered, which continued into the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. During the reign of Empress Maria Theresa (ruled 1740–1780) a new wing was added to the Prague Castle. In 1781 the Edict of Toleration of Emperor Joseph II (ruled 1765–1790) brought with it the dissolution of cloisters and monasteries. In 1787 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart came to Prague for the premiere of Don Giovanni, which was widely acclaimed and affirmed Prague's importance as a major cultural center.

See also Bohemia ; Habsburg Dynasty: Austria ; Holy Roman Empire ; Hussites ; Jagiellon Dynasty (Poland-Lithuania) ; Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus ; Reformation, Protestant ; Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Demetz, Peter. Prague in Black and Gold: Scenes from the Life of a European City. New York, 1997.

Fučíková, Eliška, et al., eds. Rudolf II and Prague: The Court and the City. Prague, London, and New York, 1997.

Pešek, Jiří. Měšťanská vzdělanost a kultura v předbělohorských Čechách 1547–1620. Prague, 1993.

Vlk, Jan, and Jaroslav Láník, eds. Dějiny Prahy (The history of Prague). 2 vols. Prague and Litomyšl, 1997–1998.

James R. Palmitessa