The Four Articles of Prague

JAN 01 1420 · 12:00

Satan sells indulgences: the Jena Codex satirises the Roman abuses that the Four Articles of Prague set out to abolish. Place: Prague, drafted in council during the siege Figures: Masters of Charles University (Utraquist) · the priests of Tábor (radical) · Jakoubek of Stříbro, theorist of the lay chalice By the summer of 1420 the Hussite movement is two movements. The Prague masters, schooled at the university Charles IV founded, want a reformed Bohemian church inside Latin Christendom. The Taborites, gathered around Žižka and the priest Mikuláš of Pelhřimov in their hilltop fortress in southern Bohemia, want the Bible alone, no purgatory, no saints, no images, and a return any day now of Christ in person. The two wings need a single platform if the crusade outside the walls is to be answered. They produce one. The Four Articles of Prague are issued in July 1420, drafted by Jakoubek of Stříbro and the university circle, accepted (with reservations) by the Taborite preachers. They are short enough to copy onto a wall. They will be the negotiating position of the Czech reformers for the next sixteen years.