The Story of Prague
officials, Archduke Ferdinand of Styria was accepted as heir to the throne. Only one of the officials, Count Thurn, burgrave of the Karlstyn, opposed the acceptation, and was therefore deprived of his office. The decision which assured the Bohemian crown to Ferdinand, a determined persecutor of the Protestants, necessarily hastened the progress of events. The Protestants knew that war to the knife awaited them; the only question was when hostilities should begin. The initiative finally, however, came from the Catholics. In direct violation of the agreements of 1609[1] the Romanist Archbishop of Prague caused the Protestant church at Hrob (or Klostergrab) to be destroyed, while the abbot of Broumov (Braunau) ordered the Protestant church in the town of that name, which was under his jurisdiction, to be closed.
The Protestant ‘defenders’ took immediate action. They summoned their Protestant Estates to a consultation, which began on March 6, 1618, in the Carolinum. Though King Matthias had forbidden the meeting, a large number of nobles and knights and a few townsmen were present.
Count Thurn now became the leader of the Protestant Estates, and there is little doubt that he from the first considered war inevitable. He spoke eloquently of the grievances of the Protestants, alluding particularly to the recent occurrences at Hrob and Broumov, and suggested that a remonstrance should be addressed to the Government officials at Prague. The Protestants agreed to this, and also resolved, should this step prove ineffective, to address their complaints directly to King Matthias,
- ↑ The size of this book obviously excludes all controversial matter. I have entered fully into the question in my Bohemia: A Historical Sketch, pp. 301–308.
