Jan Hus: The Life and Death of a Preacher

By Pavel Soukup

Jan Hus was a late medieval Czech university master and popular preacher who was condemned at the Council of Constance and burned at the stake as a heretic in 1415. Thanks to his contemporary influence and his posthumous fame in the Hussite movement and beyond, Hus has become one of the best known figures of the Czech past and one of the most prominent reformers of medieval Europe as a whole.

This definitive biography now available in English opposes the view of Hus that saw his importance primarily as a martyr, subsequently invoked by a variety of religious, national, and political groups eager to appropriate his legacy. Looking for Hus’s significance in his own time, this treatment tells a story of a late medieval intellectual who—through his dedicated pursuit of what he understood as his mission—generated conflict and eventually brought execution upon himself. By investigating the life and death of Jan Hus, one learns not only about the man, but about the church, state, and society in late medieval Europe.

The story told in this book is original in structure and purpose. Each chapter takes a major event in Hus’s life as a starting point for a broader discussion of crucial problems connected to his career and the controversies he generated. How did these specific events contribute to Hus’s own convictions? By suggesting parallels to and departures from other late medieval figures and events in Europe, the book liberates Hus from a narrow and nationalist Czech historiography and places him squarely in a broader European context, showing a significance that transcended Czech borders. From a number of different vantage points, it raises a central question critical to understanding the later Middle Ages: why was a sincere ecclesiastical reformer condemned by a church council committed to reform itself?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Purdue University Press
• Release date: Dec 16, 2019
• ISBN: 9781612496061

Book preview

JAN HUS

Central European Studies

Charles W. Ingrao, founding editor

Paul Hanebrink, editor

Maureen Healy, editor

Howard Louthan, editor

Dominique Reill, editor

Daniel L. Unowsky, editor

Nancy M. Wingfield, editor

The demise of the Communist Bloc a quarter century ago exposed the need for greater understanding of the broad stretch of Europe that lies between Germany and Russia. For four decades the Purdue University Press series in Central European Studies has enriched our knowledge of the region by producing scholarly monographs, advanced surveys, and select collections of the highest quality. Since its founding, the series has been the only English-language series devoted primarily to the lands and peoples of the Habsburg Empire, its successor states, and those areas lying along its immediate periphery. Among its broad range of international scholars are several authors whose engagement in public policy reflects the pressing challenges that confront the successor states. Indeed, salient issues such as democratization, censorship, competing national narratives, and the aspirations and treatment of national minorities bear evidence to the continuity between the region’s past and present.

Other titles in this series:

Making Peace in an Age of War: Emperor Ferdinand III (1608–1657)

Mark Hengerer

Universities in Imperial Austria 1848–1918:

A Social History of a Multilingual Space

Jan Surman

A History of Yugoslavia

Marie-Janine Calic

The Charmed Circle: Joseph II and the Five Princesses, 1765–1790

Rebecca Gates-Coon

Lemberg, Lwów, L’viv, 1914–1947: Violence and Ethnicity in a Contested City

Christoph Mick

Center Stage: Operatic Culture and Nation Building

in Nineteenth-Century Central Europe

Philipp Ther

JAN HUS

The Life and Death of a Preacher

Pavel Soukup

Purdue University Press ♦ West Lafayette, Indiana

Copyright 2020 by Purdue University.

All rights reserved.

Printed in the United States of America.

Cataloging-in-Publication data is on file at the Library of Congress.

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-55753-876-5

ePub: ISBN 978-1-61249-606-1

ePDF ISBN: 978-1-61249-607-8

Originally published in German as Jan Hus by Pavel Soukup. Copyright 2014 W. Kohlhammer GmbH, Stuttgart.

This volume is based upon the updated and augmented Czech translation Jan Hus. Život a smrt kazatele. Translated from the Czech by Joan Boychuk and Ivana Horacek.

Cover image courtesy of Prague, National Library of the Czech Republic, MS. XVI A 17, fol. 122v.

Contents

Preface to the English

Edition Abbreviations

CHAPTER 1

Introduction: The Defendant at Constance

CHAPTER 2

Jan Hus in the Hands of Historians

CHAPTER 3

Master Jan Hus: A Brief Biography

CHAPTER 4

Hus the Preacher:

The Appointment as Rector of the Bethlehem Chapel, 1402

CHAPTER 5

Prague Wycliffism and the Learned Heresy:

The First Condemnation of Wyclif’s Articles, 1403

CHAPTER 6

Jan Hus and Church Reform:

The Synodal Sermons, 1405 and 1407

CHAPTER 7

The University Career of Master Hus:

The Rector’s Speech of 1409, Strengthen Your Hearts

CHAPTER 8

The Generation of the Decree of Kutná Hora:

The University of Prague as a Central European Crossroads

CHAPTER 9

The Hussites’ Media Campaign:

Appealing the Papal Prohibition of Preaching, 1410

CHAPTER 10

Public Engagement and Political Support:

Royal Expropriation of Church Property, 1411

CHAPTER 11

Leader of the Protest Movement:

The Prague Indulgence Disputes, 1412

CHAPTER 12

The Judicial Process: The Appeal to Christ, 1412

CHAPTER 13

The Invisible Church and Conditional Obedience:

Hus’s Book On the Church, 1413

CHAPTER 14

Writing in the Vernacular and Mission in the Countryside:

The Czech Postil, 1413

CHAPTER 15

The Council of Constance: Conviction and Execution, 1414–15

CHAPTER 16

Epilogue: Hussitism and Reformation

Notes

Works of Jan Hus

Further Primary Sources

Bibliography

Index of Personal Names

About the Author

Preface to the English Edition

This book, originally written in German, was first published by W. Kohlhammer Press in Stuttgart in 2014. A year later, the Nakladatelství Lidové noviny Press in Prague released an augmented and updated Czech edition. Both versions appeared just in time to participate in the extensive literary output marking the sexennial of Jan Hus’s death. Between 2013–16, several dozen book-length publications dealing with Hus—monographs, source editions, exhibition catalogs, and even novels and comic books—have been published, both in and outside of the Czech Republic. This busy publishing schedule alone attests to the importance of Jan Hus in history and memory. Who was the man whose life found its tragic end at the stake on 6 July 1415? Of course, this entire book seeks to answer this question. However, it may be useful for many Anglophone readers to outline here the significance of Jan Hus in Czech history.

From the sixth century on, the historical lands of Bohemia and Moravia (also called the Czech Lands and forming, along with a small portion of Silesia, the territory of today’s Czech Republic) have been inhabited by the Czechs. The temperate climate of Central Europe and relative security in a basin surrounded by medium-height mountain ridges (up to 5,250 feet) offered the Slavic settlers favorable conditions. As the westernmost Slavic nation, the Czechs like to think of themselves as sitting in the heart of Europe and bridging the East and West. At any rate, their proximity to German-speaking areas led to long-term cultural and material exchanges, processes accelerated in the thirteenth century by large-scale German immigration into the Czech Lands, connected with a massive urbanization. In the ninth century, despite the Slavic-Byzantine mission of 863, the Czechs accepted the western (Roman) rite of Christianity. As a result, they shared in the fate of the Latin Church, which included the schisms and reforms of the Late Middle Ages. By that time Bohemia, originally a duchy, had become a kingdom (permanently from 1212 on), forming a politically important part of the Holy Roman Empire. In the mid-fourteenth century, the King of Bohemia—Charles IV of House Luxembourg—ascended to the imperial dignity, and Bohemia’s capital, Prague, became the center of the Empire. Charles University, the oldest in Central and Eastern Europe (1348), was just one indicator of the cultural and political rise of the Bohemian Kingdom.

All these factors played greater or lesser roles in the story of Jan Hus and Hussitism. The preacher, intellectual, and Church reformer strove to find remedies for the problems of his age, with the decline of Church life among the most pressing. Hus’s influence, even after his execution, was strong enough to trigger a protest movement that developed into an open uprising (the Hussite Revolution), giving birth to a distinct ecclesiastic structure (the so-called Utraquists, often seen as part of the Bohemian Reformation). Hus’s motivation was undoubtedly religious, yet the controversies that unfolded during and after his lifetime were also fed by national tensions (most Germans belonged to Hus’s opponents) and various sociopolitical interests (of nobles, burghers, and rulers). As a consequence, the figure of Jan Hus remained highly relevant for various agendas long after his death.

Although this book argues that Hus was an important figure of his time, and is among the central figures for anyone who wants to understand the Late Middle Ages, his significance in subsequent centuries cannot be denied. The sixteenth-century Reformations—Lutheran, and to some extent even Calvinist—diversified the religious landscape in the kingdom of dual-faith (i.e., Hussite and Catholic) even more. In 1526, the Crown of Bohemia became part of the Habsburg realm. A century later, the Habsburg counterreformation eliminated non-Catholics from the Czech Lands for the next 160 years. Though Enlightened Absolutism introduced a limited religious toleration, its centralizing processes caused a considerable Germanization of high culture and politics. In reaction, Czech patriots mobilized and sparked a remarkable revival of Czech language and culture around 1800. Nationalistic sentiments and Czech-German/Austrian antagonism shaped the entire nineteenth century, yet it was not until its second half that the Hussites became an important point of reference for Czech society. The Hussite revival was somewhat paradoxical; even after full religious toleration was introduced in the 1860s, the vast majority of the Czechs (95 percent) remained Catholic. Nevertheless, the Hussites (and the Protestant concept of Czech history) enjoyed great, and almost uncontested, popularity. The Hussites were seen as champions of the national cause rather than religious enthusiasts. After the establishment of the Czechoslovak Republic in 1918, the veneration of the Hussites continued and—with an emphasis shifted to social revolution—survived well into the times of communist totalitarianism (1948–89).

Contemporary Czech society is not religious. Only one-fifth of the population declared themselves to be believers in the census of 2011, and 10 percent claimed allegiance to the Roman Catholic Church. The second and third largest churches are the Evangelical Church of the Czech Brethren and the Czechoslovak Hussite Church, both claiming Hus among their spiritual fathers; their combined membership amounted to 1 percent in 2011. (It should be noted that 45 percent of respondents did not answer the question about religion. A telling indicator is that three out of five Czechs claimed no religion in 2001, while only 9 percent remained silent.) If Hus and the Hussites still attract the attention of the general public, the reasons lay beyond religion, and—with a few extreme exceptions—beyond nationalism, too. The phenomenon of Hussitism is perceived as historically important, and the prevailing view of Jan Hus is that of a virtuous, moral man, who chose death over betraying his conscience.

While the long tradition remembering Hus ensures the object of this book its relevance, the following pages want to reduce Jan Hus to his proper, original environs—the late medieval Church. Before various aspects of Hus’s career will be discussed, a note on terminology might be appropriate. The followers of Jan Hus are generally called Hussites. This term, in multiple Latin variants, emerged in the last years of Hus’s life, and was coined by his opponents. At the time, it was a label from the outside, and was never used by the Hussites themselves. In today’s scholarly discourse, however, it is a perfectly neutral, descriptive term. Most historians use it for the group of religious dissidents in Bohemia and Moravia who remained faithful to Hus after his condemnation, faced repression, and repelled the crusaders’ attacks in the 1420s. Speaking of Hussites during Hus’s life, as this book does, is perhaps a less usual usage. It reflects the fact that a group of followers began to form around Hus already during his life. Naturally, they did not turn into Hussites in 1415. I use this term especially for such phenomena contemporary to Hus that remained relevant for Hussitism in later phases as well, like the Hussite media campaign. The term Utraquism is also a modern one. It refers to the liturgical practice of giving communion to laypeople in both kinds (Latin: sub utraque specie), that is, in the form of the host and the wine from the chalice. This old Christian practice, abandoned by the Roman Church in the thirteenth century, was restored by Jakoubek of Stříbro in 1414 and adopted by the Hussites without any involvement from Jan Hus. In a more general sense, the term is used for the moderate Hussite wing, especially after 1436, when the building of the Utraquist Church began. Most of the radical currents in Hussitism, however, also gave communion in both kinds. The chalice and the reverence of Jan Hus were the most distinctive markers shared by all groups within Hussitism.

The present English edition of this book is based on the Czech text, translated from German by myself. The footnotes have been completely reworked, although references have been limited to the most relevant sources. Concerning the key events, I refer to Václav Novotný’s two volumes as the most comprehensive scholarly work on Hus, and to Matthew Spinka’s book as the standard, chronologically organized biography in English. References to primary sources and to specialized studies are provided throughout the book; the numerous standard works and biographies of Jan Hus are not cited at each individual occasion. Where applicable, references have been changed to English versions, and to the most recent source editions that have appeared since the publication of the German edition. Occasional errors, discovered over further study, or pointed out by reviewers, have been corrected. Chapter 2 was written at the request of the Czech publisher and is not included in the German edition.

I would like to thank people who contributed significantly to the publication of this translation: Howard Louthan, who first suggested preparing an English edition of this book during a seminar at the Center for Austrian Studies in 2016 and later coordinated the editing process; Joan Boychuk and Ivana Horacek, who translated the text from Czech; the reviewers of this and the previous editions, whose comments helped improve many details; and Michael Van Dussen, who, as always, offered invaluable help and advice.

This English edition is a result of the cooperation between the Centre for Medieval Studies at the Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences, and the Center for Austrian Studies at the University of Minnesota. The Czech Academy supported the translation with a grant within its Strategy AV21 scheme.

Abbreviations

Chapter 1

Introduction: The Defendant at Constance

On Wednesday, 28 November 1414, after spending more than three weeks in the town of Constance where the Church Council had been convened, Master Jan Hus received an important visit. The bishops of Trent and of Augsburg arrived as ambassadors on behalf of the College of Cardinals, accompanied by the burgomaster of Constance and others. Sir John of Chlum, the master’s loyal guide and protector, accepted them with some suspicion. He reminded the visitors that Hus had arrived in Constance under the protection of King Sigismund, and warned them against any wrongdoing against the king’s will. As the prelates began to explain their intentions, Jan Hus arose from the table, revealing his identity to the bishops who had not yet recognized him, and proclaimed:

I did not come here to merely see the cardinals nor have I ever desired to speak with them in private; but I have come to address the whole Council where I will say whatever God grants me to say and answer whatever I shall be asked. Nonetheless, at the request of the Eminent Cardinals I am ready to come to them at once; and should I be questioned about any matter, I hope that I may choose death rather than deny the truth, which I have learned from the Scriptures or otherwise.¹

Hus professed similar views on numerous occasions while in Constance; in the end, his words proved true, as he indeed chose death.

The bishops then led Hus into the pope’s palace, where the cardinals addressed him as follows: Master John, there is much strange talk about you. It is said that you hold many errors and that you have disseminated them in the Kingdom of Bohemia. Hus answered the accusation in the same manner as he addressed the bishops earlier: Most revered Father, be it known to You that I would rather die than hold a single error. For indeed, I have come freely to this sacred Council.² After the meeting, Hus was placed under guard until late in the evening. Later, in the middle of the night, he was taken to the house of the cantor of Constance Cathedral, where he was held captive for a week. Later he was imprisoned at a Dominican monastery on the shores of Lake Constance. After Pope John XXIII’s secret flight from Constance on 25 March 1415, Hus was transferred to the custody of the archbishop of Constance who kept him captive at Gottlieben Castle on the River Rhine. At the beginning of June he was taken back to the city and imprisoned at the Franciscan convent for questioning until his conviction and execution.

On the day of Hus’s capture, Sir John complained to Pope John XXIII on Hus’s behalf. Later he made his protest to the cardinals as well, but without a positive outcome. Even a proclamation that publicly acknowledged all the facts surrounding Hus’s unjust capture, which he hung on the gates of the city cathedral and other churches in Constance, had no effect. The proclamation John of Chlum put forth read:

Master [Jan] Hus, bachelor formatus of sacred theology, under the safe-conduct and protection of the most illustrious prince and lord, Lord Sigismund […] came to Constance to render full account for his faith in a public hearing to anyone demanding it. The above mentioned Master [Jan], in this imperial city, under the safe-conduct of the said my lord, king of the Romans and of Hungary, was detained and is kept detained.³

In the proclamation Sir John addressed Hus formally, using the title bachelor of theology—his highest title—while keeping silent about the fact that Hus was still the rector of the Bethlehem Chapel in Prague, and as such held extraordinary respect in the role of a preacher. Hus’s capture in Constance unambiguously signaled his downfall and sealed the path to a tragic end.⁴ Yet seven years prior to his execution, he enjoyed the support of the Royal Court and the friendship of the archbishop of Prague. He was then already preoccupied with deliberations on how to repair the reputation of the Church, which had been damaged by the Papal Schism and the undignified lifestyle of its clerics. Similar concerns troubled the majority of the fathers present at the Council of Constance, who even criticized the improprieties and offenses of the Church themselves, and called for rectification. The members of the Council of Constance tasked themselves with restoring the unity of the Latin Church and purging it of all abuses and indecencies. The well-attended international gathering represented probably the most serious attempt at Church reform in the fifteenth century.⁵ Why, then, did Hus’s ideas about the necessary reforms stand in such sharp contrast to the reformism of the majority of Catholic theologians, so much so that they felt compelled to burn him at the stake?

This is not an easy issue to resolve. While in Constance, Hus was accused of a whole series of crimes. The charges against him were already accumulating as early as 1408. But can the allegations themselves shed light upon Hus’s untimely demise? It is insufficient to simply seek answers within the text of the final judgment, the genesis of which will preoccupy the chapters that follow. From the historian’s point of view, however, investigation of the trial proceedings alone will not provide the necessary answers to resolve the question posed above. Other sources may shed additional light on the grounds for Hus’s conviction and reveal reasons for his condemnation, which the judges may have concealed, or of which they may not themselves have been aware. What is it that so provoked the Church authorities and secular representatives? Moreover, what was it about Jan Hus and his teaching that was so dangerous to warrant his annihilation? In order to adequately elucidate the demise of this renowned late medieval preacher and university scholar, one must investigate the society in which he lived, the society’s understanding of the world, and its internal tensions and biases.

This book examines Jan Hus and his career at the juncture of late medieval political conflicts, and deals only briefly with his second life. During the fifteenth century, Hus was an emblematic figure for the Utraquists. Later, he was the antagonist in a baroque legend who defiled Czech orthodoxy. In the nineteenth century Hus served as an integrative symbol of the Czech National Revival. A little later, at the hands of leftist historians, Hus became a fighter for social justice. Finally, for the Evangelical churches, not only in Bohemia but also abroad, he is a significant predecessor (or cocreator) of the Reformation. In a recent monograph, Hus’s posthumous glory takes up a good 40 percent of the text.⁶ It is therefore clear that the recollection of Hus’s second life is a separate topic in itself, one that this book will only lightly outline.

Although the last chapter addresses the relationship between Jan Hus and the German Reformation, my intention is not to portray the Czech reformer as a predecessor of Martin Luther. This book argues that the history of the Reformation begins with Hussitism in the fifteenth century. The comparison with the classic Reformation is intended to ameliorate our appreciation of Hus’s importance for the development of Czech society in the fifteenth century. The fact that over the course of the first half of the fifteenth century the Utraquist Church evolved into a particular variant of the new reformed church does not preclude that Hus himself wanted to embark on such a path. However, for Hus and his followers, a break with the Roman Catholic Church was an inevitable component of their concept of reform. And it is precisely these impulses that led to the formation of the Hussites as a group distancing themselves from the Catholic Church that are the focus of discussion in the following chapters.

Hus is thus taken up as a figure within his own time, emerging from both the specific circumstances in Luxembourg Bohemia and from the broader context of the developing Western Church during the time of the Great Schism. In the text that follows, rather than including a separate introduction on the history and culture of the Late Middle Ages, each chapter takes up the broader historical associations. Hus’s distinctiveness and the ways in which he was embedded in late medieval culture can only be determined on the basis of comparison with his European contemporaries and Czech forerunners. Therefore, in order to illustrate the historical figure of Hus, concurrent comparisons to other fifteenth-century ecclesiastical and university figures are included.

Retrospective in nature, the present biography interrogates the roots of the issues and controversies that pushed Hus to his limits. It recounts Hus’s successes and his demise, how he gained notoriety and created a circle of followers, why this attracted the attention of the Church authorities, and why the Church finally found it necessary to eliminate him. Although it is Hus’s death that serves as the basis of our inquiry, I do not agree with the opinion that Hus’s historical significance lies only in the fact that he was burned at the stake, and then was variously used and misused by history.⁷ Jan Hus was a publicly active and energetic scholar, and as such he must not only be of interest to scholars in death, but especially in life and through his deeds. From a historical point of view, as a significant actor and sometimes even the instigator of key events, Hus would be an attractive figure of study without the reformation, revolution, and national revival that were instigated in his name.

In this book, the figure of Jan Hus is primarily taken up as a well-documented medieval intellectual and a publicly engaged professor who gets into serious problems due to his popularity. It is Hus’s conflicts and controversies that have left the most noteworthy traces in historical sources. Owing to these disputes and to his posthumous fame, we have an infinitely deeper knowledge about Hus than about any of his contemporaries. What is more, no other Czech medieval author has left behind such an extensive and preserved body of work; Hus’s surviving correspondence is equally unique. Reports and documents that implicate him should also be added to the body of evidence. The many surviving documents provide insight into the world of the medieval scholar, something that would be impossible with any other contemporary figure.

This book includes a relatively wide scope devoted to the public activities of Hus, particularly the responses to his sermons and the emergence of a group of followers. As with any historical undertaking, the thematic focus of this piece is influenced by the experiences of the contemporary world. Hus’s image always corresponded and answered to the needs of the times inhabited by those who studied him. If today we are experiencing how political, civic, and social movements are organized through digital communications networks and social media, it is no wonder that the social impact of communicative behavior becomes a relevant topic of cultural-historical studies. For the purpose of the present book, however, this of course does not imply that we should create anachronistic parallels between the time of Hus and the present time. Rather, the focus on communication and group formation is an attempt to make Hus’s story relevant for the readers of today.

The subsequent two chapters give a concise overview of the historiography and of Jan Hus’s life. Each of the chapters that follow begins with a major event in the life of Hus. While these events form the chronological axis of the book, the problem-structured interpretation always takes into account additional testimonials from other phases of Hus’s life. A question is then posed at the end of each chapter that addresses the significance of a phenomenon or event in Hus’s life and whether it contributed to his conviction. In this way, Hus as defendant and, later, convict at Constance always stands at the center of this account.

Chapter 2

Jan Hus in the Hands of Historians

The Czech film The Elementary School (Obecná škola, 1991), directed by Jan Svěrák, features the character of a particularly favorite teacher. One of his most moving lectures is the one describing the life and death of Master Jan Hus. Two boys are incited by this story to confess the truth to the magician Mrázek about the tools they had previously stolen from him. We suffer like Hus, says one of the boys as the dog of the angry illusionist chases them out of his house. The boys became acquainted with Hus’s life and his suffering for the truth in 1946, a time that saw an upsurge of patriotism in the wake of the liberation from the Nazi occupation. The relevance of such a discourse about the martyr of Constance would have hardly been imaginable a century earlier, let alone even half a century later. Czech patriots of the late Austro-Hungarian monarchy and of the first Czechoslovak Republic vehemently seized the story of Hus, popularizing him to an unprecedented level not seen since the time of the Utraquist Church. Despite the fact that Hus’s popularity had its ups and downs, for centuries he has remained one of the most famous figures of early Czech history, not only in his country of origin, but also around the world. The so-called second life of Hus, his variously interpreted story, begins as soon as the preacher’s earthly pilgrimage came to an end by fire at the border of Constance. From a Catholic perspective, the day of death of a medieval martyr was also a birth. But Hus’s death marked the simultaneous birth of a martyr and a heretic, and both perceptions began to unfold without delay.¹

The preacher’s execution was documented by two chroniclers whose reports differ not only in the details they provided, but also in the overall assessment of the event. Ulrich Richental, from Constance, recorded Hus’s burning as an event connected to the Council, which of course attracted attention to the execution.² Peter of Mladoňovice wrote with the intention of eternally preserving Hus’s memory.³ The overall course and scope of the execution were described by the two eyewitnesses in roughly the same manner. The text of Hus’s prayer that the master uttered while walking to his execution is also the same. However, according to Richental, Hus was praying on his way to the execution, and again upon arrival. According to Mladoňovic, he sang the prayer, but only once the stake was lit. According to Richental, Hus began to scream horribly, and quickly burned. The laconically realistic description offered by Richental likely did not correspond with Mladoňovic’s notion of the martyr in the flames. Nor does Richental’s detail of the smell of burning flesh that spread around the site of the execution appear in Mladoňovic’s version, let alone the anecdotal explanation that it was likely the stench of a decomposing mule that had earlier been buried there by a cardinal. Equally distinctive is another detail, about which the two accounts differ. On two occasions, Ulrich explicitly states that Hus was fully dressed, and with the regret of a cloth merchant he describes the quality of Hus’s clothing. According to Mladoňovic, Hus’s clothing was immediately thrown into the fire by the bailiffs at the wearer’s death. Another