The followers of the martyred Bohemian priest Jan Hus (1371-1415) formed one of the greatest challenges to the medieval Latin Church. Branded as heretics, outlawed, then forced to fight for their faith as well as their lives, the Hussites occupy one of the most colorful and challenging chapters of European religious history. The essays reprinted in this book (along with one here first published in English and additional notes) explore the essence of the early Hussite movement by focusing on the nature and development of heresy both as accusation and identity. Heresy and Hussites in Late Medieval Europe first examines the definition of heresy, and its comparative nature across Europe. It investigates the unique practices of popular religion in local communities, while examining theology and its unavoidable conflicts. The repressive policy of crusade and the growth of martyrdom with its inevitable contribution to the formation of Hussite history is explored. The social application of religious ideas, its revolutionary outcomes, along with the intentional use of art in pedagogy and propaganda, situates the Czech heretics in the fifteenth century. An examination of leading personalities, together with the eventual and more formal church administration, rounds out the study of this remarkable era.

This selection of over 200 texts, nearly all appearing for the first time in English translation, provides a close-up look at the crusades against the Hussite heretics of 15th-century Bohemia, from the perspective of the official Church - or at their struggles for religious freedom, from the Hussites' own point of view. It also throws light on the meaning of the crusading movement and on the nature of warfare in the late Middle Ages. There is no single documentary account of the conflict, but the riveting events can be reconstructed from a wide range of contemporary sources: chronicles, sermons, manifestos, songs, bulls, imperial correspondence, military and diplomatic communiqués, liturgy, military ordinances, trade embargos, epic poems, letters from the field, Jewish documents, speeches, synodal proceedings, and documents from popes, bishops, emperors and city councils. These texts reveal the zeal and energy of the crusaders but also their deep disunity, growing frustration and underlying fears - and likewise the heresy, determination and independence of the Hussites. Five times the cross was preached and the vastly superior forces of the official church and the empire marched into Bohemia to suppress the peasant armies. Five times they were humiliated and put to flight.

The Hussites, as the Bohemian reformists have come to be called, became one of the most vocal and influential reform movements of the late Middle Ages, with significance for the reformations of the sixteenth century and later. They represented an interchange between "town and gown" that was largely unprecedented in medieval Europe. Scholarship on the Hussites has a long and distinguished tradition, and current studies must continually contend with a historiography that is implicated in the nationalism, confessionalism, and politics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This volume gives students and scholars a clear sense of the historiography and current trends in Hussite studies, as well as concise statements on major emphases in Hussite theology, ecclesiology, philosophy, and religious practice. Contributors are: Eliska Baťová, Pavlína Cermanová, Dusan Coufal, Phillip Haberkern, Ota Halama, David Holeton, Stephen Lahey, Jindřich Marek, Pavel Kolář, Olivier Marin, Petra Mutlová, Pavlína Rychterová, Pavel Soukup, Michael Van Dussen, and Blanka Zilynská.

Six hundred years ago, the Czech priest Jan Hus (1371-1415) traveled out of Bohemia, never to return. After a five-year legal ordeal that took place in Prague, in the papal curia, and finally in southern Germany, the case of Jan Hus was heard by one of the largest and most magnificent church gatherings in medieval history: the Council of Constance. Before a huge audience, Hus was burned alive as a stubborn and disobedient heretic. His trial sparked intense reactions and opinions ranging from satisfaction to accusations of judicial murder. Thomas A. Fudge offers the first English-language examination of the indictment, relevant canon law, and questions of procedural legality. In the modern world, there is instinctive sympathy for a man burned alive for his convictions, and it is presumed that any court that sanctioned such an action must have been irregular. Was Hus guilty of heresy? Were his doctrinal convictions contrary to established ideas espoused by the Latin Church? Was his trial legal? Despite its historical significance and the controversy it provoked, the trial of Jan Hus has never before been the subject of a thorough legal analysis or assessed against prevailing canonical legislation and procedural law in the later Middle Ages. The Trial of Jan Hus shows how this popular and successful priest became a criminal suspect and a convicted felon, and why he was publicly executed, providing critical insight into what may have been the most significant heresy trial of the Middle Ages.

The life and work of Jerome of Prague have been overlooked outside Czech historiography, but represent an important chapter in the understanding of late medieval European history. Thomas A. Fudge makes a case for the central importance of Jerome, peer of Jan Hus, by reconstructing his biography using the original Latin and Czech sources and drawing significantly upon German, French, English, and Czech scholarship. The book traces the development of Jerome's life, paying special attention to the controversies he caused at the universities of Paris, Cologne, Heidelberg, Vienna, and Prague. Of particular note are the two heresy trials in which he was a defendant (Vienna 1410-12 and Constance 1415-16). Fudge situates Jerome within the philosophical conflicts of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. He argues that Jerome is not only an important component in the intellectual history of the Middle Ages, and a leading personality in the church's war on heresy, but is also an essential influence on the development of the Hussite movement in Bohemia. As the Italian humanist Poggio Bracciolini remarked, after hearing Jerome speak at the Council of Constance in 1416, "this was a man to remember." Jerome of Prague and the Foundations of the Hussite Movement brings to life a little known but indisputably significant figure of the late Middle Ages.

The Hussite Chronicle is the most important single narrative source for the events of the early Hussite movement. The author is Laurence of Březová (c.1370–c.1437), a member of the Czech lower nobility and a supporter of the Hussite creed. The movement arose as an initiative for religious and social reform in fifteenth-century Bohemia and was energized by the burning of the priest Jan Hus in 1415. Church and empire attempted to suppress the movement and raised five crusades against the dissenters. The chronicle offers to history and scholarship a nuanced understanding of what can be regarded as an essential component for a proper understanding of late medieval religion. It is also a considered account of aspects of the later crusades. This is the first English-language translation of the chronicle.

This study is a reconsideration of Jan Hus, a late medieval Bohemian priest who was burned at the stake six hundred years ago. His death sparked a social revolution. This book considers his role as a priest and reformer in Prague, his martyrdom in Germany, and his legacy. It attempts to provide an evaluation of Hus in the context of the medieval world, especially by engaging in alternative perspectives of his life and work. The core themes and arguments are revisionist. These include seeing Hus properly as a heretic, exploring Hus as a medieval man interested in more than preaching, religious practice, and reform. The book sets out to challenge traditional assumptions and seeks less to contribute to monument-building than to challenge the prevailing views about Hus and the interpretation of his life and thought. A conscious effort has been undertaken to explore the historical relevancy of Hus and to assess his contemporary significance. The book also places Hus into a comparative context with the Reformation of the sixteenth century.

More than seventy documents, ranging in date from the early eleventh century to the early fourteenth century and representing both orthodox and heretical viewpoints are included.

This book examines the abduction of a medieval Bohemian bishop by heretics and the forced consecration of over one hundred candidates to holy orders. The author clarifies the significance of the kidnapped bishop and his coerced acts of consecration.

This book examines the broad varieties of religious belief, religious practices, and the influence of religion within medieval society. Religion in the Middle Ages was not monolithic. Medieval religion and the Latin Church are not synonymous. While theology and liturgy are important, an examination of animal trials, gargoyles, last judgments, various aspects of the medieval underworld, and the quest for salvation illuminate lesser known dimensions of religion in the Middle Ages. Several themes run throughout the book including visual culture, heresy and heretics, law and legal procedure, along with sexuality and an awareness of mentalities and anxieties. Although an expanse of 800 years has passed, the remains of those other Middle Ages can be seen today, forcing us to reassess our evaluations of this alluring and often overlooked past.