Page:The Hussite wars, by the Count Lützow.djvu/139

 people, and even the most absurd and anti-social theories found believers. The best known occurrence in connection with these religious excesses is the rise and fall of the so-called Adamites. The excesses of these obscene fanatics have very unfairly been used to discredit the whole Hussite movement, and even Pope Martin V did not hesitate to do so. As I have previously written recent research has proved that the so-called Adamites had no connection whatever with Hussitism. The first mention of Adamites in Bohemia is contained in a letter addressed to the Archbishop of Prague in the year 1409—before the death of Hus and long before the beginning of the Hussite movement—by the priest John of Chvojnov, in which he complains of the orgies which took place at night-time among his parishioners. He relates misdeeds very similar to those of which Březova, Æneas Sylvius, and their many copiers afterwards accused the Adamites. This letter undoubtedly contains the first mention of Adamites in Bohemia. That sect cannot in any way be connected with Hus, or even with extreme fanatics such as Loquis. It is probable that though religious insanity has, under various forms, existed at all periods, the direct forerunners of the Adamites were the so-called Turlupins in France. From France their doctrines penetrated to Austria early in the fourteenth century, and they undoubtedly reached Bohemia from there in the first years of the fifteenth century. The attempt to connect the deeds of these fanatics with the actions of the brothers of Tábor was undoubtedly inspired by the writings of Březova, whose hatred of the Táborites was even intenser than his hatred of the adherents of the Church of Rome. It is sufficient to state that the doctrine of the