people, by whom the news was enthusiastically received. Poděbrad appears to have been very certain of his election, which the strong popular feeling in his favour indeed rendered secure. It was generally felt that Bohemia must at any cost be freed from the predominance of the Germans. Rokycan, whose influence in the country was still great, warmly supported the claims of Poděbrad to the throne. We read that he declared from the pulpit that it would be better, "following the example of the judges of Israel, to transform Bohemia into a republic, if there was no native worthy of bearing the royal crown."
Moravia soon acknowledged King George, though there was some opposition on the part of the towns, especially those which, like Brno, contained a population largely German, and devoted to the cause of Rome. Silesia also submitted, though the opposition there was of a more serious nature, and was promoted by the rejected candidate, Duke William of Saxony. The town of Breslau, in particular (where a fanatically Catholic and democratic faction had obtained the government of the city), for some time resisted the authority of King George.
During the first and more successful part of the reign of King George, his foreign policy was entirely founded on the close alliance he had concluded with Matthew Corvinus, King of Hungary. Like George, Matthew had at the same time and in a similar manner become ruler of his country; for in Hungary, as in Bohemia, the legitimate claimant to the throne was the Emperor Frederick, as head of the house of Habsburg, to whom family treaties (already referred to) secured the succession in both countries. It was through the aid of his ally that King George overcame the difficulties with regard to his coronation which were caused by the anomalous ecclesiastical position in Bohemia. King Matthew, with the consent of Cardinal Carvajal, then papal legate in Hungary, sent the Bishop of Waitzen and Raab to Prague, by whom King George was crowned (May 7, 1458). Besides the usual coronation oath, the king had the day before the ceremony taken another oath, by which he pledged himself to obey the Church, to maintain its unity, and to extirpate all sects and heresies in Bohemia. The Compacts, and the right of using the chalice, were not mentioned in this oath, and the Romanists subsequently maintained that the king had thus renounced the special
