Page:EB1911 - Volume 14.djvu/21

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HUSTING—HUTCHESON
9

such views might extend to their own countries, to desire peace. Many Hussites, particularly the Utraquist clergy, were also in favour of peace. Negotiations for this purpose were to take place at the oecumenical council which had been summoned to meet at Basel on the 3rd of March 1431. The Roman see reluctantly consented to the presence of heretics at this council, but indignantly rejected the suggestion of the Hussites that members of the Greek Church, and representatives of all Christian creeds, should also be present. Before definitely giving its consent to peace negotiations, the Roman Church determined on making a last effort to reduce the Hussites to subjection. On the 1st of August 1431 a large army of crusaders, under Frederick, margrave of Brandenburg, whom Cardinal Cesarini accompanied as papal legate, crossed the Bohemian frontier; on the 14th of August it reached the town of Domažlice (Tauss); but on the arrival of the Hussite army under Prokop the crusaders immediately took to flight, almost without offering resistance.

On the 15th of October the members of the council, who had already assembled at Basel, issued a formal invitation to the Hussites to take part in its deliberations. Prolonged negotiations ensued; but finally a Hussite embassy, led by Prokop and including John of Rokycan, the Taborite bishop Nicolas of Pelhřimov, the “English Hussite,” Peter Payne and many others, arrived at Basel on the 4th of January 1433. It was found impossible to arrive at an agreement. Negotiations were not, however, broken off; and a change in the political situation of Bohemia finally resulted in a settlement. In 1434 war again broke out between the Utraquists and the Taborites. On the 30th of May of that year the Taborite army, led by Prokop the Great and Prokop the Less, who both fell in the battle, was totally defeated and almost annihilated at Lipan. The moderate party thus obtained the upper hand; and it formulated its demands in a document which was finally accepted by the Church of Rome in a slightly modified form, and which is known as “the compacts.” The compacts, mainly founded on the articles of Prague, declare that:—

1. The Holy Sacrament is to be given freely in both kinds to all Christians in Bohemia and Moravia, and to those elsewhere who adhere to the faith of these two countries.

2. All mortal sins shall be punished and extirpated by those whose office it is so to do.

3. The word of God is to be freely and truthfully preached by the priests of the Lord, and by worthy deacons.

4. The priests in the time of the law of grace shall claim no ownership of worldly possessions.

On the 5th of July 1436 the compacts were formally accepted and signed at Iglau, in Moravia, by King Sigismund, by the Hussite delegates, and by the representatives of the Roman Church. The last-named, however, refused to recognize as archbishop of Prague, John of Rokycan, who had been elected to that dignity by the estates of Bohemia. The Utraquist creed, frequently varying in its details, continued to be that of the established church of Bohemia till all non-Roman religious services were prohibited shortly after the battle of the White Mountain in 1620. The Taborite party never recovered from its defeat at Lipan, and after the town of Tabor had been captured by George of Poděbrad in 1452 Utraquist religious worship was established there. The Bohemian brethren, whose intellectual originator was Peter Chelčicky, but whose actual founders were Brother Gregory, a nephew of Archbishop Rokycan, and Michael, curate of Zamberk, to a certain extent continued the Taborite traditions, and in the 15th and 16th centuries included most of the strongest opponents of Rome in Bohemia. J. A. Komensky (Comenius), a member of the brotherhood, claimed for the members of his church that they were the genuine inheritors of the doctrines of Hus. After the beginning of the German Reformation many Utraquists adopted to a large extent the doctrines of Luther and Calvin; and in 1567 obtained the repeal of the compacts, which no longer seemed sufficiently far-reaching. From the end of the 16th century the inheritors of the Hussite tradition in Bohemia were included in the more general name of “Protestants” borne by the adherents of the Reformation.

All histories of Bohemia devote a large amount of space to the Hussite movement. See Count Lützow, Bohemia; an Historical Sketch (London, 1896); Palacky, Geschichte von Böhmen; Bachmann, Geschichte Böhmens; L. Krummel, Geschichte der böhmischen Reformation (Gotha, 1866) and Utraquisten und Taboriten (Gotha, 1871); Ernest Denis, Huss et la guerre des Hussites (Paris, 1878); H. Toman, Husitské Válečnictvi (Prague, 1898).  (L.) 


HUSTING (O. Eng. hústing, from Old Norwegian hústhing), the “thing” or “ting,” i.e. assembly, of the household of personal followers or retainers of a king, earl or chief, contrasted with the “folkmoot,” the assembly of the whole people. “Thing” meant an inanimate object, the ordinary meaning at the present day, also a cause or suit, and an assembly; a similar development of meaning is found in the Latin res. The word still appears in the names of the legislative assemblies of Norway, the Storthing and of Iceland, the Althing. “Husting,” or more usually in the plural “hustings,” was the name of a court of the city of London. This court was formerly the county court for the city and was held before the lord mayor, the sheriffs and aldermen, for pleas of land, common pleas and appeals from the sheriffs. It had probate jurisdiction and wills were registered. All this jurisdiction has long been obsolete, but the court still sits occasionally for registering gifts made to the city. The charter of Canute (1032) contains a reference to “hustings” weights, which points to the early establishment of the court. It is doubtful whether courts of this name were held in other towns, but John Cowell (1554–1611) in his Interpreter (1601) s.v., “Hustings,” says that according to Fleta there were such courts at Winchester, York, Lincoln, Sheppey and elsewhere, but the passage from Fleta, as the New English Dictionary points out, does not necessarily imply this (11. lv. Habet etiam Rex curiam in civitatibus . . . et in locis . . . sicut in Hustingis London, Winton, &c.). The ordinary use of “hustings” at the present day for the platform from which a candidate speaks at a parliamentary or other election, or more widely for a political candidate’s election campaign, is derived from the application of the word, first to the platform in the Guildhall on which the London court was held, and next to that from which the public nomination of candidates for a parliamentary election was formerly made, and from which the candidate addressed the electors. The Ballot Act of 1872 did away with this public declaration of the nomination.


HUSUM, a town in the Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein, in a fertile district 21/2 m. inland from the North Sea, on the canalized Husumer Au, which forms its harbour and roadstead, 99 m. N.W. from Hamburg on a branch line from Tönning. Pop. (1900) 8268. It has steam communication with the North Frisian Islands (Nordstrand, Föhr and Sylt), and is a port for the cattle trade with England. Besides a ducal palace and park, it possesses an Evangelical church and a gymnasium. Cattle markets are held weekly, and in them, as also in cereals, a lively export trade is done. There are also extensive oyster fisheries, the property of the state, the yield during the season being very considerable. Husum is the birthplace of Johann Georg Forchhammer (1794–1865), the mineralogist, Peter Wilhelm Forchhammer (1801–1894), the archaeologist, and Theodore Storm (1817–1888), the poet, to the last of whom a monument has been erected here.

Husum is first mentioned in 1252, and its first church was built in 1431. Wisby rights were granted it in 1582, and in 1603 it received municipal privileges from the duke of Holstein. It suffered greatly from inundations in 1634 and 1717.

See Christiansen, Die Geschichte Husums (Husum, 1903); and Henningsen, Das Stiftungsbuch der Stadt Husum (Husum, 1904).


HUTCHESON, FRANCIS (1694–1746), English philosopher, was born on the 8th of August 1694. His birthplace was probably the townland of Drumalig, in the parish of Saintfield and county of Down, Ireland.[1] Though the family had sprung from Ayrshire, in Scotland, both his father and grandfather were ministers of dissenting congregations in the north of Ireland. Hutcheson was educated partly by his grandfather, partly at an academy, where according to his biographer, Dr Leechman, he was taught

  1. See Belfast Magazine for August 1813.