Jičin and Turnov calling the people to arms. A large number of peasants, many of them, indeed, armed only with flails and fighting-clubs, flocked to Žižka’s standards.
Sigismund, always a prudent warrior, only entered the gates of Kutna Hora on December 24. (Christmas was celebrated there very festively, and the King believed that the heretics had at last been definitely vanquished. Events soon proved that his hope was not justified. On January 6, 1422, the national army again advanced, and Žižka established his headquarters at Nebovid, a village halfway between Kolin and Kutna Hora. The Hussite soldiers were never so determined as at this moment. Zealous readers of the Old Testament, they considered merciless revenge their duty. Their fury became yet intenser when they found in a shed at Nebovid the corpse of a young girl, who had succumbed to the outrages inflicted on her by some of Sigismund’s Hungarian mercenaries. “It is our duty,” the warriors said, “to avenge this, even at the risk of our lives.”[1] On the other hand, the unexpected advance of Žižka caused a panic among Sigismund’s soldiers. Even so experienced a general as Pipa of Ozora advised the evacuation of Kutna Hora and an immediate retreat to the frontier. It is here particularly regretted that we have very little contemporary evidence.[2] The King decided to leave the town, but suggested that some of the Bohemian nobles who had joined his party should remain at Kutna Hora and defend the city. They declined this task as being too dangerous. Men who had so frequently changed sides can hardly have felt great enthusiasm for either cause. Not wishing
- ↑ “Scriptores rerum Bohemicarum,” Vol. III. p. 48.
- ↑ Professor Tomek in his Life of John Zizka, to which I wish here to acknowledge my indebtedness, quotes on this occasion an important passage from the German chronicler Windecke. Windecke’s German is so rugged and difficult that I will transcribe his words in English. He writes: “Now the King had on this evening [when Žižka’s advance became known] many cowards [Windecke writes ‘Hollanders,’ but the word had that signification at this period] from Bohemia and Moravia in his camp, though they sworn to be faithful to him; so the King had to retreat. Yet Pipo was accused of having caused the flight both from the town and from the open country.”
