befell Moravia. The ability of the princes of the house of Přemysl, who then ruled over Bohemia, may have largely contributed to preserve the country from the Magyar invaders. Old legends tell us that Vratislav, who about this time succeeded his brother Spytihněv, was a glorious prince, so that we may infer that he was successful in defending the country against its numerous enemies. Vratislav died about the year 920,[1] and after his death dissensions arose in the reigning family. Vratislav left three sons—Venceslas, Boleslav, and Spytihněv, the last of whom died in early youth. The widow of Vratislav, Drahomira of Stodor, daughter of a prince of the still heathen tribe of the Lutices (in the present Lusatia), assumed the guardianship over her two other sons. She is described to us as a proud and imperious woman, who soon became jealous of the influence of her mother-in-law, the saintly Ludmilla, who had educated Prince Venceslas in the Christian faith. She sent murderers to the castle of Tetin, whither Ludmilla had retired, and these, finding her kneeling at prayers, strangled her with her own veil (921). Ludmilla was afterwards canonized as a saint of the Catholic Church.
The regency of Drahomira did not prove advantageous to the country. Bohemia was soon involved in war with Henry the Fowler, the great king who was then reigning over Germany. King Henry had recently subdued many of the Slavonic tribes in the region of the upper Elbe. It is probable that Drahomira incurred his hostility by assisting these tribes, to one of which—the Lutices—she herself belonged; or Henry the Fowler may have considered his victories incomplete, as long as he had not subdued the Slavonic Bohemians also.
Though hostilities had probably begun before, it was in 928 that King Henry entered Bohemia with a large army and advanced as far as Prague. Venceslas, who by this time had assumed the government of the country, felt the impossibility of resisting the German power, and a peaceful settlement was agreed to. Venceslas consented to pay an annual tribute of six hundred marks of silver and one hundred and twenty head of cattle. Venceslas, according to the contemporary records, appears to have been a peaceful and pious prince. We are told that he spent a great part of the night in prayers, and that he was in the habit of him-
- ↑ The chronology of Bohemia is at this time still very uncertain.
