Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 10.djvu/620

 MORAVIA

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MORAVIA

the law establishing in Bohemia the right of succession by seniority (1054), extended also to Moravia (which would have been divided to provide petty principali- ties for the younger sons of the ducal house), cspc- cially to the principalities of Briinn, Olmiitz, and Znaim. The suzerainty of the Bohemian duke was however maintained. In 1063 Duke Wratislaw (1061-92) gave the land its own ecclesiastical centre by establishing the Diocese of Olmiitz, which was placed under Mainz.

The Moravian petty princes repeatedly rebelled against the sovereignty of the Bohemian duke; thus when, on the death of Wratislaw II, Bfetislaw II ap- pointed his brother his successor in contravention of the law regulating succc.-ision by seniority, long wars were waged against liim bv the rightful heir, Duke Udalrich of Briuin (1101, "llOo, and 1107). These wars reached their climax in 1125, when Prince Otto of Olmiitz rose against Duke Sobeslaw, the youngest son of Wratislaw II, and was supported by Lot hair of Sup- plinburg. Lot hair led an army in person for his confederate Otto, but was defeat ed in a decisive battle near Kulni (1126). Sobeslaw (1125- 40) and his nephew and successor, W'lad- islaw II, energeti- cally maintained the Bohemian su[)reiii- acy over Moravia; during the reign of the latter the Mo- ravian branch of the Pfemysl family be- came extinct, where- upon Prince Conrad Otto of Znaim, who probably belonged to the collateral line of the Bo- hemian Pfemysls, united the three divisions of the Moravian kingdom (1174). On his attempting also to annex Bohemia (from which, on the death of Wladislaw, his son Frederick had been expelled by his barons), Barbarossa, to whom Frederick had fled, summoned both the Pfemysl nobles to appear before his tribunal at Ratisbon, and decided (29 Sept., 1182) that Frederick should rule in Bohe- mia, but that thenceforth Conrad Otto should hold Moravia as an immediate margraviate, independent of Bohemia. After Conrad Otto's death in Sicily (1191), a new war of succession broke out between the brothers Ottokar and Henrj' Wladislaw: to avoid bloodshed, the latter renounced in 1197 his claims to Bohemia, accepting Moravia as a margraviate feuda- tory to the Bohemian crown. Thenceforth, this was the political condition of Mora\'ia.

The German colonization of Moravia, begun under Henrj' Wladislaw, greatly increased under his succes- sors Henry Wladislaw II and Pfemysl, as the inva- sions of the Mongols in 1241 and the Cumansin 1252 had swept away numbers of the inhabitants into cap- ti\'ity. This immigration of Germans led to the for- mation of German townships, the development of which was encouraged by the Pfemysl family, espe- cially by Ottakar II. The privileges, accorded to these towns, were based generally on those of Magdeburg and Nuremberg. After Ot t akar had fallen in the bat- tle of Marchfeid fighting against Rudolf of Hapsburg (1278), Moravia remained for five years as a pledge in Rudolf's hands, but was then under Ottakar's succes- sor, Wenceslaus II, reunited with Bohemia, though its area was somewhat reduced. With W'enceslaus UI the ruling line of the I^emysls became extinct in

1306. Moravia at first fell with Bohemia to Albert I of Hapsburg; then on Albert's death in 1307 to Henry of Ciirinthia, and in i;i09 to John of Luxemburg, son of Em]ieror Henry VII. In the Privilege of 1:>1 1 .lolm granted the country important liberties, which formed the foundation of the sub.sequeiitly augmented rights of the estates. Under the i)ri)vincia! governor Henry of Lipa and Margrave Charles (l:i:>5), later Kniperor Charles 1\', a new period of prosperity began. In 1349 Charles (■nf<'(ilTecl his brother .lolm in the margraviate. In 1371 ,Iohn divided theeountry among his three sons, Jobst (Jodoeus) receiving the title of Ancient Mar- grave and Overlord; his two younger sons were also given the title of Margrave, but they were to hold their lands in fief from Jobst. This partition and the great Western Schism, which evoked two ecclesiasti- cal parties in Moravia as elsewhere, gave rise to much discord and disturbances between 1380 and 1405. On the death of the childless Jobst, Moravia, as a vacant fief, reverted to the Bohemian Crown, and its administra- tion was entrusted to cert ain district gover- nors by Wenceslaus IV.

As in Bohemia, where similar politi- cal and ecclesiastical conditions prevailed, H ussi t ism made rapid and great progress in Moravia under the feeble rule of Wences- laus, especially among the nobility and peasantry; the Bishop of Olmiitz and almost all the im- perial cities inhabited by Germans, how- ever, remained true to the Catholic cause. On Wenceslaus's death his brother, Emperor Sigismund, was recognized in Mo- ravia as margrave, although the Bohemians refused to recognize him as king. Against the Hussites, who, under the leadership of two apostate priests, had established a fortified camp in the neighbourhood of Ungarisch-Hradisch (Neu Tabor), the emperor re- ceived vigorous support from Duke Albert of Austria. In 1423 Albert received for these services the Mar- graviate of Moravia in fief. After the chief jiower of the fanatical Hussites in Bohemia had been crushed in the battle near Lipau (1434), a treaty of peace was also arranged in Moravia, according to which the Hus- sites were allowed to receive Communion under both species, these Compaclata, as they were called, being published at the Diet of Iglau (1436). Under Al- bert's .son, Wladislaw Posthumus (1449), began the first attempts to stem Utraquism and to restore to the Catholic Church its earlier dominant position. Es- pecially efficacious towards this end was the missionary activity of St. John Capistran, whose ignorance of the native speech, however, prevented him from attaining complete success. George of Podiebrand, who be- came King of Bohemia on Wladislaw's death in 1457, had to resort to arms to secure recognition in Moravia from the German and Catholic towns. In 1464 he promised the Moravian Estates that the margraviate should never be separated from the Crown of Bohemia by sale, exchange, or mortgage. After his death, however, the strife between Matthias Corvinus and Wladislaw of Poland for the Bohemian Crown resulted in the peace of 1 478, according to which Corvinus re- ceived Moravia for life and Wladislaw Boherniii. On the death of Corvinus, Moravia also fell under the Bway of Wladislaw (1490). Thanks to the excellent