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religious and national in character. John Hus, a man of great moral strength and a true Czech patriot, who, under the impression of Wycliffe’s writings, stood up for the regeneration of the Church of those days, was burnt as a heretic in Constance in 1415. This provoked consternation in Bohemia, and the whole Czech nation rose up to revenge his death. The Hussite armies, led by Zizka, repeatedly defeated vastly superior forces which the German Emperor brought against them.
In 1526 the Czechs elected the Habsburgs to the throne of Bohemia. Thus for the first time Bohemia, as a fully independent State, became united through a common dynasty with Austria and Hungary in view of the Turkish peril. But legally she remained independent even to this day. Soon after their accession to the throne, the Habsburgs began to violate Bohemia’s religious and national liberties, which finally led to the Czech revolution of 1618, and to the thirty years’ war. The Czech revolution was crushed at the White Mountain, near Prague, and the nation cruelly punished. The leaders were executed, all educated classes exiled, their property confiscated and the population decimated. The poor peasant alone remained.
Czech regeneration.
