Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)/Huss, John

HUSS, JOHN (hös), a famous Bohemian protestant in religion; born of humble parents in Husinetz, near Prachatitz, Bohemia, July 6, 1369. He became a priest in 1400. Huss was a realist in philosophy, and adopted the views of Wycliffe (q. v.), whose works he translated and whose doctrines he preached, giving great offense to the Archbishop of Prague. Huss appeared by citation before the Council of Constance, and, though provided with a safe-conduct from the Emperor Siegmund, or Sigismund, he was adjudged a heretic, and burned alive July 6, 1415, as was his disciple Jerome of Prague, on May 30, 1416. By the decision of the Council of Constance, in 1414, the request of the Bohemian laity to communicate under two kinds was refused. The treatment of Huss exasperated his followers, and led to a religious war in which great ferocity and cruelty were manifested on both sides. The Hussite leaders were John Ziska, and after his death Procopius. Sigismund commanded the imperial forces. The Hussites fortified a mountain near Prague, which they called Mount Tabor. Before Ziska's death, Oct. 12, 1424, after obtaining religious liberty for Bohemia, the Hussites had begun to split into minor sects, as the Orebites, or Horebits, the Orphanites, and the Calixtines. In 1433, the Calixtines were conciliated by the concession of the cup of the laity. By the treaty of 1435, Siegmund was acknowledged King of Bohemia, which, however, remained in an uneasy state. The Hussite troubles prepared the way for the Lutheran Reformation.