Žižka Dies at Přibyslav

JAN 01 1424 · 12:00

Jan Žižka of Trocnov dies of plague before the walls of Přibyslav, 11 October 1424, undefeated in the field. Place: Hussite camp before Přibyslav, Bohemian-Moravian Highlands Figures: Jan Žižka of Trocnov (now Žižka of the Chalice), hejtman of the Orphans · Prokop the Bald, his successor in the field Žižka loses his second eye at the siege of Rábí in 1421, struck by an arrow or a sliver of splintered timber depending on the chronicler. From that day he commands from a wagon, with junior officers reading him the disposition of the field and a drummer relaying his signals. He fights for three more years, against crusaders, against the Prague Utraquists when they grow too moderate for him, against the Catholic Rosenbergs in the south. He has never lost a battle. Kutná Hora 1421, Německý Brod 1422, Hořice 1423, Malešov 1424: each time the wagon fortress (vozová hradba) opens at the right moment, the cannon and crossbows fire from inside, the flails come over the top, the heavy cavalry breaks and runs. By autumn 1424 he is besieging Přibyslav, a small Catholic-held town in the Highlands. The bubonic plague (or perhaps a carbuncle, the chroniclers disagree) takes him in camp on October 11.