Prague in Black and Gold: Scenes from the Life of a European City (24 page)
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Authors: Peter Demetz
BOOK: Prague in Black and Gold: Scenes from the Life of a European City
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The emperor’s love for Prague and Bohemia did not deflect him from pursuing his intention to build power bases beyond but contiguous to his native lands; while, in the 1340s and early 1350s, he labored valiantly under political burdens imposed on him by his adventuresome father, he was shrewd enough to cut his inevitable losses, including the Tyrol and Carinthia, leaving them in the long run to Hapsburg interests, and to continue King John’s territorial initiatives as long as they were manageable and successful, as, for instance, in Silesia and Lusatia. He was not really interested in Luxembourg, the land of his father, and unwilling to intervene in the treacherous Italian conflicts, though he followed them with a keen eye. Always willing to attune his mind to changing conditions, in the early 1370s Charles shifted his attention to the German north; in the Treaty of Finsterwalde (1373), he bought Brandenburg for the price of half a million gold florins, two hundred thousand to be paid in cash immediately, from Otto of Wittelsbach, who, in turn, agreed to declare his disinterest in the lands of the Bohemian crown. After this, Charles spent a good deal of time in the Brandenburg town of Tangermünde, where he built a little North German residence, employed, to educate his son Sigismund, the learned Italian tutor de Beccari (who promptly wrote a treatise, in Latin, echoing Cola di Rienzo’s provocative views), and adorned a new court chapel with encrustations of gold and precious stones, as he had done in Prague and at Karl-Stejn but nowhere else. Prague may have been closest to him, but he was devoted to other places, for private and political reasons, among them Lucca, from his early years; rich Nuremberg, for economic reasons; and Tangermünde, a retreat for his old age.
In the 1360s, the sweet times of Prague’s economic boom had turned sour, and the emperor’s chroniclers had a difficult time ignoring its recurrent religious and social conflicts, the first signals of bloody upheavals to come. The patriotic chronicler Peter of Zittau had been disturbed, even in the mid-1330s, by fighting in the Prague streets, caused by differing views about who was to receive payments and fees for religious rites. The Dominicans, Franciscans, and a branch of the Augustinians preached poverty
and obedience, yet they challenged the parish priests by preaching at their regular hours and demanding and securing payments for funerals, which often resulted substantial bequests to their monasteries. The Curia had long favored the mendicant monks, exempting them from the jurisdiction of local bishops, but later it changed its mind; in 1334, a gathering of Prague parish priests excommunicated the mendicants by extinguishing candles and ringing the church bells. The friars and their rabid followers in the meantime invaded the churches, screaming accusations against the parish priests, whom they called “drunkards involved in all kinds of crimes, … killers of the soul and deceivers of the people.” The chronicler, himself a distinguished Cistercian, sadly remarks that he had to see all this with his own eyes: partisans of one side and the other, parish priests often being defended by women, raging against each other, people using fists, knives, and clubs against each other, priests and friars being roughed up, knifed and bloodied, and dragged through the streets of Prague. In the end, the Curia sided with the parishes and against the mendicants, who had to transmit part of their fiscal gains to the parishes.
and obedience, yet they challenged the parish priests by preaching at their regular hours and demanding and securing payments for funerals, which often resulted substantial bequests to their monasteries. The Curia had long favored the mendicant monks, exempting them from the jurisdiction of local bishops, but later it changed its mind; in 1334, a gathering of Prague parish priests excommunicated the mendicants by extinguishing candles and ringing the church bells. The friars and their rabid followers in the meantime invaded the churches, screaming accusations against the parish priests, whom they called “drunkards involved in all kinds of crimes, … killers of the soul and deceivers of the people.” The chronicler, himself a distinguished Cistercian, sadly remarks that he had to see all this with his own eyes: partisans of one side and the other, parish priests often being defended by women, raging against each other, people using fists, knives, and clubs against each other, priests and friars being roughed up, knifed and bloodied, and dragged through the streets of Prague. In the end, the Curia sided with the parishes and against the mendicants, who had to transmit part of their fiscal gains to the parishes.
Earlier in the century, the Prague church hierarchy had had a rather ambivalent attitude toward the Inquisition, not because it wished to side with the heretics, but rather because it felt that this new institution interfered with Bohemia’s own administrative habits. It is possible that the emperor’s and archbishop’s official insistence that heresy in Bohemia must be eradicated mercilessly was both a sincere expression of their orthodoxy and an effort not to allow the flying courts of the papal Inquisition (surprisingly, often manned by Bohemians) to meddle too heavily in the affairs of the Bohemian church. Fourteen heretics were burned at the stake in Prague in 1315, mostly peasants and craftsmen from Lower Austria who had been brought to Prague to be sentenced; as soon as Jan of Dražice, bishop of Prague, was himself called to Rome to answer an accusation of being too lenient about heresy, the Curia established a permanent court of Inquisition housed in the Old Town. It was mostly concerned with the infiltration of heretic ideas across the Austrian frontiers that might affect German settlers in southern Bohemia (many were held in Prague because the southern Bohemian prisons were overcrowded). Citizens of Prague were more directly concerned with the exemption from the rule of secular law of all priests, whether worthy or not, and the affair of the priest Martin taught the town a serious lesson. Martin, a priest at the cathedral, was a professional thief and when he was caught, the town handed him over to the archbishop, who did not take legal action; when, in an economically depressed year (1361), Martin organized a gang of
thieves and holdup men, the town councillors caught him again, put him into a sack, and had him drowned in the Vltava River. The emperor, doing business in Nuremberg at the time, was irate and declared that he would not set foot in Prague again until the culprits were punished; the town judge and councillors immediately lost their jobs, and the archbishop sentenced them to deliver two eternal lights to the cathedral and seven thousand measures of wheat to his office, whence he distributed it to the poor. Judge and councillors were expelled from Prague forthwith, and when they were allowed to return later they died early deaths, or so it is said.
thieves and holdup men, the town councillors caught him again, put him into a sack, and had him drowned in the Vltava River. The emperor, doing business in Nuremberg at the time, was irate and declared that he would not set foot in Prague again until the culprits were punished; the town judge and councillors immediately lost their jobs, and the archbishop sentenced them to deliver two eternal lights to the cathedral and seven thousand measures of wheat to his office, whence he distributed it to the poor. Judge and councillors were expelled from Prague forthwith, and when they were allowed to return later they died early deaths, or so it is said.
The church was the richest institution in Prague, owned more land, not to speak of Prague property, than the Bohemian nobles, and was the most attractive employer for the poor, ambitious, young, and educated; even Jan Hus, martyr of the Hussite revolution, said that “as a little scholar” (
žá
ek
) he had wanted to become a priest because he hoped for a good roof over his head, a cassock, and the respect of the people. The trouble was that there were too many young clerics and too few benefices; the situation was complicated by the tradition of awarding more than one benefice, or paid position, to a well-connected person who then appointed an easily cowed substitute (there were so many applicants) to fulfill the duties at the altar, or elsewhere. Conditions were particularly bad toward the end of the century; in 1395 there were 980 new clerics but only 204 benefices; in 1399, 1224 against 110, and in 1404, 1,386 young people for 220 positions. The clerical proletariat was on the increase, and those who enjoyed a benefice and their hangers-on were not particularly prompted to be stern examples of ascetic living. The archbishop had to tell the clergy over and over again what its way of life should be, and he often appointed clerical
correctores
to investigate and to punish undisciplined priests. From his irate letters to the bishops, it is evident that many among the Bohemian and Prague clergy were too merry for their own good; spent their time in the taverns drinking heavily, carrying arms, throwing dice, making obscene and “clownish” speeches; dishonored virgins; and committed all kinds of indecencies that asked for immediate arrest and punishment by the ecclesiastical authorities.
žá
ek) he had wanted to become a priest because he hoped for a good roof over his head, a cassock, and the respect of the people. The trouble was that there were too many young clerics and too few benefices; the situation was complicated by the tradition of awarding more than one benefice, or paid position, to a well-connected person who then appointed an easily cowed substitute (there were so many applicants) to fulfill the duties at the altar, or elsewhere. Conditions were particularly bad toward the end of the century; in 1395 there were 980 new clerics but only 204 benefices; in 1399, 1224 against 110, and in 1404, 1,386 young people for 220 positions. The clerical proletariat was on the increase, and those who enjoyed a benefice and their hangers-on were not particularly prompted to be stern examples of ascetic living. The archbishop had to tell the clergy over and over again what its way of life should be, and he often appointed clerical
correctores
to investigate and to punish undisciplined priests. From his irate letters to the bishops, it is evident that many among the Bohemian and Prague clergy were too merry for their own good; spent their time in the taverns drinking heavily, carrying arms, throwing dice, making obscene and “clownish” speeches; dishonored virgins; and committed all kinds of indecencies that asked for immediate arrest and punishment by the ecclesiastical authorities.
The renowned preachers of the 1360s and 1370s, who called for a new purity of Christian living and condemned the role of money in religious experience, were greatly admired as long as they turned to the townspeople, but they inevitably ran into trouble as soon as they touched on the sensitive question of buying and selling benefices and indulgences. Konrad Waldhauser and Mili
of Krom
íž, the most famous of these, held on to the truth of the church, yet they were both accused of heresy
and were forced to defend themselves before the archbishop or to travel to Rome. Konrad was called Waldhauser because he came to Prague, at the emperor’s invitation, from the Augustinian monastery of Waldhaus, in Upper Austria; he preached in German at the Church of St. Gallus and, with ever increasing success, at the Týn Church (he had to speak on the town square just outside, because the sizable church was too small for his audiences, which included the Empress Elizabeth and, it is said, a few Jews from the neighborhood). Patrician ladies took off their high and costly veils and gave away their expensive dresses to indicate their new humility. Mendicants and nuns, whom Waldhauser accused of making money too easily (especially the Dominican nuns of St. Anne, who sold places in their institution to the pious daughters of rich parents), by 1363 united against him and compiled an eighteen-point accusation that was transmitted to the archbishop and a papal delegate, dwelling in Prague. Waldhauser was honest, sober, far from a mystical visionary, and he loved a good fight, particularly with Dominicans, but he never suffered because he had friends in high places, including Pope Urban V, King Charles, and the archbishop (who usually told him that the mendicants were outside his jurisdiction), as well as among the eager students.
of Kromíž, the most famous of these, held on to the truth of the church, yet they were both accused of heresyand were forced to defend themselves before the archbishop or to travel to Rome. Konrad was called Waldhauser because he came to Prague, at the emperor’s invitation, from the Augustinian monastery of Waldhaus, in Upper Austria; he preached in German at the Church of St. Gallus and, with ever increasing success, at the Týn Church (he had to speak on the town square just outside, because the sizable church was too small for his audiences, which included the Empress Elizabeth and, it is said, a few Jews from the neighborhood). Patrician ladies took off their high and costly veils and gave away their expensive dresses to indicate their new humility. Mendicants and nuns, whom Waldhauser accused of making money too easily (especially the Dominican nuns of St. Anne, who sold places in their institution to the pious daughters of rich parents), by 1363 united against him and compiled an eighteen-point accusation that was transmitted to the archbishop and a papal delegate, dwelling in Prague. Waldhauser was honest, sober, far from a mystical visionary, and he loved a good fight, particularly with Dominicans, but he never suffered because he had friends in high places, including Pope Urban V, King Charles, and the archbishop (who usually told him that the mendicants were outside his jurisdiction), as well as among the eager students.
Waldhauser’s friend and disciple, the Moravian Mili
of Kromê
íž, was a practical mystic (rare in Prague), precariously hanging on to the accepted truth of the church and yet constantly accused of heresy by his enemies in the mendicant orders. He quickly advanced to notary in the emperor’s office and later to a high position at the cathedral. He was among Waldhauser’s most impressionable listeners, but suddenly, in 1363, he gave up his cathedral benefice and decided, against the friendly protests of the patient archbishop, to become a simple country priest and preacher. He trained first for six months in the Bohemian provinces and returned to Prague to preach to audiences at the Malá Strana and in the Old Town, initially with limited success, for many laughed at his broad Moravian dialect, but he soon convinced even the most skeptical among his listeners by his fierce earnestness and personal commitment. He was a driven man, given to self-torture, as were so many mystics of his time. He wore a hair shirt under his habit, refused (after a journey to Rome, where Dominicans briefly imprisoned him) to drink wine or to eat meat and fish, preferring instead a steady diet of peas and beans, declined to bathe (when his habit needed cleaning, his friends had to tear it off his body), slept on a wooden board, and often heard the voice of the Holy Spirit telling him what to do and what to say. In Prague, he was difficult to avoid. Speaking for two or three hours in sequence once or twice a
day, he was eager to reach all Prague audiences; he preached in Czech at St. Aegid’s, in Latin to students and the learned at St. Nicholas, and, after he had brushed up his grammar, in German to the patriciate, at the Týn Church.
of Kromêíž, was a practical mystic (rare in Prague), precariously hanging on to the accepted truth of the church and yet constantly accused of heresy by his enemies in the mendicant orders. He quickly advanced to notary in the emperor’s office and later to a high position at the cathedral. He was among Waldhauser’s most impressionable listeners, but suddenly, in 1363, he gave up his cathedral benefice and decided, against the friendly protests of the patient archbishop, to become a simple country priest and preacher. He trained first for six months in the Bohemian provinces and returned to Prague to preach to audiences at the Malá Strana and in the Old Town, initially with limited success, for many laughed at his broad Moravian dialect, but he soon convinced even the most skeptical among his listeners by his fierce earnestness and personal commitment. He was a driven man, given to self-torture, as were so many mystics of his time. He wore a hair shirt under his habit, refused (after a journey to Rome, where Dominicans briefly imprisoned him) to drink wine or to eat meat and fish, preferring instead a steady diet of peas and beans, declined to bathe (when his habit needed cleaning, his friends had to tear it off his body), slept on a wooden board, and often heard the voice of the Holy Spirit telling him what to do and what to say. In Prague, he was difficult to avoid. Speaking for two or three hours in sequence once or twice aday, he was eager to reach all Prague audiences; he preached in Czech at St. Aegid’s, in Latin to students and the learned at St. Nicholas, and, after he had brushed up his grammar, in German to the patriciate, at the Týn Church.
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