Pál Kinizsi (1432-1494) was a Hungarian general, legendary commoner commander in the army of king Matthias Corvinus. He was comes of Temes (comes Temesiensis) since 1484 and Captain General of the Lower Parts of the Kingdom of Hungary (generalis capitaneus inferiorum partium regni). He is famous for his participation with Stephen V Bathory, the Voivode of Transylvania in the victory over the Ottoman Turks in the Battle of Breadfield October 1479.
PRINCIPAL COMBATANTS: Bohemia vs. Hungary
PRINCIPAL THEATER(S): Bohemia
DECLARATION: Hungary declared war on Bohemia at the urging of Pope Paul II in 1468.
MAJOR ISSUES AND OBJECTIVES: After the nationalistically minded Hussites came to power in Bohemia, the pope excommunicated all of them in a call for a pro-Catholic uprising within Bohemia and a pro-Hapsburg invasion to return Bohemia to the Holy Roman Empire, a call that both Bohemia’s Catholic nobles and Hungary’s Catholic king quickly heeded.
OUTCOME: The nationalists retained control in Bohemia, but at the cost of three provinces that went to Hungary, a much weakened monarchy, and an increasingly powerful nobility.
TREATIES: Peace of Olomouc, December 7, 1478
Throughout the 14th century, Bohemia was racked by turmoil and civil war, most of the troubles stemming from the persecution of the religious followers of John Huss (1369- 1415), who the majority of Bohemia’s Catholic population considered heretics. The BOHEMIAN CIVIL WAR (1390- 1419) was hardly over before the long HUSSITE WARS began, and not until 1436, when all factions were united under King Sigismund (1368-1437), after most of the Hussites accepted a Catholic compromise on doctrine, did Bohemia know peace. Civil war broke out once again in 1448, when George of Podebrad (1420-71), representing the Utraquist faction of the Hussite religion, seized power and declared himself regent over the minor Ladislas V “Posthumous” (1440-57), the Hapsburg candidate for the Bohemian throne. George’s ascendancy made the Hussite heresy the official religion of Bohemia, and when he became king upon the death of Ladislas, he was naturally the leader of Bohemia’s growing nationalism. All of which, just as naturally, earned him the enmity of the pro-Hapsburg Romanists, especially the Roman Catholic nobles, who allied against him.
In 1465 Pope Paul II (1417-71) excommunicated George and all Hussites as heretics and officially freed the Bohemian Catholics from their duty of allegiance to the king. When George seemed to be successfully quelling the Catholic rebels, the ambitious King Matthias Corvinus (1443-90) of Hungary attacked Bohemia with the pope’s blessings in 1468. In their first encounters George defeated the invading Hungarians, but by tying down a major portion of the royal army, Matthias fed rebel success in other parts of Bohemia. Thus, on May 3, 1459, when Hungarian troops seized the Moravian capital of Brno, the disloyal opposition was quick to proclaim Matthias king of Bohemia. Buoyed by the advance into Hungary of Bohemian troops led by George’s son, supporters rallied to their beleaguered king in 1470, but George was unable to consolidate his successes because of his rapidly deteriorating health. On March 22, 1471, he died and was much mourned by Protestant Utraquists and loyal Catholics alike.
Prince Uladislas II (1456-1516), a strong supporter of Bohemia’s Hussite nationalists, succeeded George on May 27, 1471. Now the Utraquist Hussites grew even stronger, absolutely dominating the country’s political life. Uladislas carried on the war against the Hungarians and their Romanist supporters without much success. When Moravia, Silesia, and Lusatia fell to the Hungarian troops, Bohemia sued for peace. The treaty signed at Olomouc on December 7, 1478, awarded the rule of Bohemia to Uladislas and that of Moravia, Silesia, and Lusatia to Matthias, though under the terms of the treaty the three provinces would revert to Bohemia on the death of the Hungarian. During the remainder of Uladislas’s reign, the mostly Catholic Bohemian nobility grew ever more powerful at the expense of the weak king’s authority.
Bohemian Civil War (1465-1471)
PRINCIPAL COMBATANTS: Bohemian king George of Podebrad vs. the Catholic nobles
PRINCIPAL THEATER(S): Bohemia
MAJOR ISSUES AND OBJECTIVES: King George of Podebrad wished to make Utraquist Hussite the official religion of Bohemia.
OUTCOME: The national party grew to a position of dominance in Bohemia, and King Ladislas II, the son of King Casimir of Poland, became king of Bohemia.
TREATIES: Treaty of Olomouc, December 7, 1478
Before the HUSSITE WARS (1419-1436) followers of Protestant renegade John Huss (1369-1415) had been much persecuted in Bohemia. But after George of Podebrad (1420-71), leader of the Utraquist faction of the Hussites, seized power and declared himself regent in the BOHEMIAN CIVIL WAR (1448-1551), he rose to become king in 1459. An ardent nationalist, George sought to make the sect’s beliefs, as outlined in the 1420 Four Articles of Prague (i.e., the word of God should be preached freely; communion should be administered in both kinds to clerics and to laymen; the worldly possessions of the clerics should be abolished; and public sins should be exposed and punished), the bedrock of his country’s official religion. At the Council of Basel in 1431, Catholic and Utraquist emissaries had reached a compromise under which the Roman church agreed to accept watered-down versions of the Four Articles. It was these “compacts” that George was now hoping would hold Rome at bay while he basically imposed Hussite Protestantism on Bohemia.
To give him his due, George was subtle and also truly wished to rule as a king of “two peoples.” Anxious to be crowned according to the Catholic rites first prescribed by Charles IV (originally called Wenceslaus) (1361-1419), he took extraordinary measures to accommodate the adherents of Rome in Bohemia. He welcomed an envoy of two bishops from his son-in-law, King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary (1440-90), and took a secret oath in their presence to defend the true faith and lead his people from error. He felt free to do so because the compacts were not specifically mentioned. George’s coronation was held in Protestant Prague, but he asked papal envoys to help him acquire recognition from Catholic Breslau in Silesia.
Nevertheless, George knew that eventually he could achieve lasting peace only by actually resolving once and for all his country’s religious issues, and toward that end, after having so carefully enhanced his prestige at home and abroad, he attempted to have Pope Pius II (1405-64) sanction the compacts in 1462. Instead, the pope declared them null and void. George responded by calling an assembly in Prague and affirming his devotion to the Four Articles. Neither man seemed ready to back down, despite the best efforts of several princes, including Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III (1415-93). Matters only grew worse when the new pope, Paul II (1417-71), elected in 1464, adopted an even more aggressive stance, openly encouraging George’s foes, especially in Breslau.
Bohemia’s Roman Catholic nobles then rose against George at Zelena Hora in 1465. Paul II excommunicated George and other Hussites in 1466 and released George’s Catholic subjects from their oath of allegiance to the king. In spring 1467 George launched an attack on rebel castles throughout Bohemia and on their strongholds at Breslau and other Catholic centers. Although desultory, his campaign was showing signs of success before the rebels rallied aid from Hungary’s King Matthias. At first the Hungarian king was unsuccessful during his invasions of Bohemia, but on May 3, 1469, the Bohemian nobles elected Matthias king of Bohemia. To save his throne, George made a deal with King Casimir IV (1429-92) of Poland and relinquished his sons’ rights of succession. In 1471, after George’s death, Casimir’s son, Prince Uladislas II (or Ladislas) (1456-1516) was selected king of Bohemia. The war waged by King Matthias ended with the Treaty of Olomouc, which recognized Uladislas as king of Bohemia and secured Moravia, Silesia, and Licesia (Lusatia) for Matthias.
Further reading: E. H. Gillett, The Life and Times of John Huss: The Bohemian Reformation of the 15th Century (New York: AMS Press, 1978); Tibor Klaniczay and Jozsef Jankovics, eds., Matthias Corvinus and the Humanism in Central Europe (Budapest: Balassi Krado, 1994); Mikulas Teich, ed., Bohemia in History (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998). Frederick Gotthold Heymann, George of Bohemia (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1965); John M. Klassen, Warring Maidens, Captive Wives, and Hussite Queens: Women and Men at War and at Peace in Fifteenth Century Bohemia (Boulder, Colo.: East European Monographs; New York: Columbia University Press, 1999); Mikulas Teich, ed., Bohemia in History (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998).
