Read Prague in Black and Gold: Scenes from the Life of a European City Online
Authors: Peter Demetz
Prague in Black and Gold: Scenes from the Life of a European City (13 page)
Anežka, patroness of Bohemia, was canonized in 1990, but neither profane nor sacred history has much to say about her alleged sister Blažena, who, far from Prague, established her own Christian community. One Blažena, or rather Guglielma Boema, appeared with her son in Milan in 1270 and settled there in different neighborhoods until she was given a home in the nearby Cistercian abbey of Chiaravalle. She called herself a widowed daughter of the king of Bohemia, and many people admired her piety, humility, and exemplary other virtues, stayed close to her, and, after she died on August 24, 1292 (only a few months after her sister Anežka), revered her as a saint; the Chiaravalle abbey built an altar and a chapel above her grave, and her followers declared her to be the female incarnation of the Holy Spirit.
The church was uneasy about the Milan “Guglielmites,” and the Inquisition established only a few decades before to investigate allegations of heresy and improper doctrine or practice—especially in cities—scrutinized the Chiaravalle abbey. It was satisfied with public acts of recantation and contrition, at least at first, but Andrea Saramita, the convent’s business agent, pushed Guglielma’s cause and convinced a Milan priest to go with him to Bohemia to notify the royal family of her demise (in vain, because Bohemia was in political chaos); by 1300, the Milan Inquisition had opened formal proceedings against the “Guglielmites,” citing Saramita and two women of Milan’s Umiliati lay community (the “Humble Ones”) for heresy—Maifreda da Pirovene (who was to be Guglielma’s spiritual heir and the next incarnation of the Holy Spirit) and Giacobba dei Bassani. (František Palacký, father of Czech historiography, brought back to Prague from a research trip to Italian archives in the 1830s some Latin excerpts of the trial and published them in 1838.) Saramita, probably
under torture, ultimately declared that Guglielma herself had believed she incarnated the Holy Spirit; her corpse was disinterred and burned; and Saramita, Maifreda, and Giocobba were sent to the stake. Guglielma/Blažena may have been the first Czech heretic (at least
post exhumationem),
but there is little evidence that she was remembered by anybody in her nation, proud of its Hussite martyrs and the fires in which they died. In Italy, historians and feminists now continue their research.
under torture, ultimately declared that Guglielma herself had believed she incarnated the Holy Spirit; her corpse was disinterred and burned; and Saramita, Maifreda, and Giocobba were sent to the stake. Guglielma/Blažena may have been the first Czech heretic (at least
post exhumationem),
but there is little evidence that she was remembered by anybody in her nation, proud of its Hussite martyrs and the fires in which they died. In Italy, historians and feminists now continue their research.
The first-born daughter of King Otakar II, Kunhuta, born in 1265 and named after her mother, was possibly more docile than Anežka or Blažena. When she was eleven years old, she entered the cloister of the Poor Clares but was removed almost immediately because her father engaged her to a son of Rudolf of Hapsburg as part of his tactical arrangements in 1276; as soon as these arrangements were null and void and Otakar took the field against Rudolf, Kunhuta returned to her great-aunt Anežka but not for long, because her brother Václav II married her off to a Polish duke, with whom she had three children. By 1302, she was divorced and finally entered the Benedictine cloister of St. George to serve God and the arts. She was appointed abbess almost immediately, greatly expanded the cloister’s endowment, supported the importation of fine illuminated manuscripts from the scriptoria of Salzburg, Passau, and Bologna, and attracted excellent Czech artists to compose and illuminate manuscripts for her use and that of the sisters. The Dominican priest Kolda of Koldice, of noble Czech birth and a member of the Inquisition, dedicated to her his allegory of the knight-errant (Christ) who succeeds in freeing his love (the soul of man) from captivity; and Beneš, an outstanding artist, illuminated a passion of Christ for Kunhuta that is a work of rare beauty. These earlyfourteenth-century manuscripts were written in Latin, but Kunhuta is perhaps better remembered because of a prayer in Old Czech which signals a new strength in Czech writing, its richness of sacred, lyrical, dramatic, and epic forms fully emerging during the last years of her life (she died in 1321).
Inserted into a Latin breviary belonging to a lay sister, Má
a, the Old Czech prayer was written in the hand of a scribe still active after 1310, and it is now assumed that “Kunhuta’s Prayer,” as the text is called by antiquarians and philologists, was written before the turn of the century to be recited or sung during mass before the Eucharist was celebrated. It is a singular text because the spiritual lyric written in Czech, which was late in joining the liturgical languages of Old Church Slavonic and Latin, here suddenly emerges in a highly formalized structure, with references, terms, and images suggesting a sophisticated way of speaking about communion.
“Kunhuta’s Prayer” clearly shows that mystical thoughts about the presence of Christ in bread and wine were not absent in the mind of whoever composed it. The text of the prayer welcomes the coming of the all-powerful king and creator, gives thanks for what he has done for mankind, praises the wondrous change
(prom
na)
of Christ’s flesh and blood into bread and wine, and expresses the belief that Christ is completely present in each single piece of the “living and joyous bread.”
a, the Old Czech prayer was written in the hand of a scribe still active after 1310, and it is now assumed that “Kunhuta’s Prayer,” as the text is called by antiquarians and philologists, was written before the turn of the century to be recited or sung during mass before the Eucharist was celebrated. It is a singular text because the spiritual lyric written in Czech, which was late in joining the liturgical languages of Old Church Slavonic and Latin, here suddenly emerges in a highly formalized structure, with references, terms, and images suggesting a sophisticated way of speaking about communion.“Kunhuta’s Prayer” clearly shows that mystical thoughts about the presence of Christ in bread and wine were not absent in the mind of whoever composed it. The text of the prayer welcomes the coming of the all-powerful king and creator, gives thanks for what he has done for mankind, praises the wondrous change
(prom
na)of Christ’s flesh and blood into bread and wine, and expresses the belief that Christ is completely present in each single piece of the “living and joyous bread.”
The formal analysis of “Kunhuta’s Prayer” has been much refined, especially by the Czech linguist Pavel Trost, who places the text close to the hymn “Lauda Sion Salvatorem” (“Praise, O Zion, Thy Redeemer
”
) ascribed to Thomas Aquinas. The mystical core of its argument centers on the One God and the multitudes partaking in communion
sub utraque specie
(receiving both the bread and the wine), as St. Thomas asserts in his hymn (stanza 7). The prayer suggests that God is all-one in all places; even if the bread is broken into small parts, God is present in all of them, just as we see many rays emanating from one sun (stanza 15); the living bread is given completely and entirely, to the first, second, third, fourth, thousandth, even the last who partakes of the Eucharist:
”
) ascribed to Thomas Aquinas. The mystical core of its argument centers on the One God and the multitudes partaking in communion
sub utraque specie
(receiving both the bread and the wine), as St. Thomas asserts in his hymn (stanza 7). The prayer suggests that God is all-one in all places; even if the bread is broken into small parts, God is present in all of them, just as we see many rays emanating from one sun (stanza 15); the living bread is given completely and entirely, to the first, second, third, fourth, thousandth, even the last who partakes of the Eucharist:
God hides in the shape of bread
you hide your divine light there
entirely you dwell in the host
entirely in the heavens you dwell.
These poetic thoughts of a mystical Czech scribe in Prague were not surpassed for a long time.
During the thirteenth century, when European life was affected by the great struggle between the Guelf (pro-pope) and Ghibelline (proemperor) factions in Italy and in imperial politics, the P
emyslid court attracted a number of highly qualified refugees from the Ghibelline camp who were allied with the Hohenstaufen emperor. These refugees, well informed about the changing situation in Italy and elsewhere, found protection in Bohemia’s church (surprisingly enough) and came to serve Otakar II and his son in diplomatic missions and perhaps in his chancellery. Henricus de Isernia, the most outstanding among them, must have convinced his Bohemian contemporaries of his excellent erudition; and when Václav II, Otakar’s son, needed a loyal expert to codify a corpus of ordinances pertaining to silver mining, a new industry that had become
essential to Bohemia’s economy, he invited another Italian, Gozzi di Orvieto, who seems to have been quietly effective in his job.
emyslid court attracted a number of highly qualified refugees from the Ghibelline camp who were allied with the Hohenstaufen emperor. These refugees, well informed about the changing situation in Italy and elsewhere, found protection in Bohemia’s church (surprisingly enough) and came to serve Otakar II and his son in diplomatic missions and perhaps in his chancellery. Henricus de Isernia, the most outstanding among them, must have convinced his Bohemian contemporaries of his excellent erudition; and when Václav II, Otakar’s son, needed a loyal expert to codify a corpus of ordinances pertaining to silver mining, a new industry that had becomeessential to Bohemia’s economy, he invited another Italian, Gozzi di Orvieto, who seems to have been quietly effective in his job.
Henricus de Isernia belonged to the southern Italian partisans of the Hohenstaufen imperial interests and, after the fifteen-year-old Conradin Hohenstaufen was put to death in 1268, faced the wrath of the triumphant Charles of Anjou, who ruthlessly persecuted the Italian Ghibellines, Henricus lost his lands near Naples, had to run for his life, and was advised by Neapolitan friends to go across the Alps to Saxony and Prague to mobilize resistance against the French. After staying a while at the court of the Wettin family in Meissen, Henricus by 1270 went to Prague and tried to find a place for himself and to advocate intervention against the French. Historians agree about his considerable rhetorical and literary talents, but they differ about his sincerity and about whether or not he was actually appointed by the king to an important position; for a hundred years now the experts have tossed the question back and forth as to whether he was really one person or two, the second being a less colorful scribe and notary, Henricus Italicus (Jind
ich Vlašský) by name. One eminent Czech historian believed that Henricus de Isernia was, basically, a windy Neapolitan who tried to insinuate himself everywhere, practicing an elegant rhetorical art far too exquisite for his own good; the German historian Jörg K. Hoensch, in an informed book about Otakar II, recently suggested that Henricus actually was Otakar’s right-hand man in his administrative reform of the realm. At any rate, Henricus’s first protector was Bishop Bruno of Schauenburg, Otakar’s most loyal adviser, and although Henricus complained about being kicked out of the Strahov monastery, he probably moved to the Vyšehrad, where he established a private school of rhetoric, and then back across the river to Prague Castle again; he never lacked intimate knowledge of what was going on politically.
ich Vlašský) by name. One eminent Czech historian believed that Henricus de Isernia was, basically, a windy Neapolitan who tried to insinuate himself everywhere, practicing an elegant rhetorical art far too exquisite for his own good; the German historian Jörg K. Hoensch, in an informed book about Otakar II, recently suggested that Henricus actually was Otakar’s right-hand man in his administrative reform of the realm. At any rate, Henricus’s first protector was Bishop Bruno of Schauenburg, Otakar’s most loyal adviser, and although Henricus complained about being kicked out of the Strahov monastery, he probably moved to the Vyšehrad, where he established a private school of rhetoric, and then back across the river to Prague Castle again; he never lacked intimate knowledge of what was going on politically.Henricus’s many elaborate Latin letters and poems, whether penned as stylistic exercises for his tutorials or as official documents, should be read with appropriate caution. He
was
involved: on one war expedition he rode out with the king and a few bishops and a German poet; in the army camp he joined in a discussion about the Ghibelline-Guelf problem or, in more appropriately metaphorical terms, the question whether the pope was the sun, the emperor the moon, or vice versa. He liked to show off his art of composition: to Princess Kunhuta, the later abbess, he wrote a passionate letter about the beauties of Sicily and southern Italy (alas, she was five years old, and the letter was really addressed to her fiancé, whom he was asking to intervene there), spoke of Otakar as “king of
kings,” and, when Otakar found himself politically isolated, issued a kind of Slavic manifesto appealing to the Poles to give military support to Otakar and speaking of the close relationship between the P
emyslid family and the ancient Polish dynasty of the Piasts, “the consonance of languages,” and the need to band together against the German enemy, who, if he defeated Prague, would almost certainly “force Polish freedom into a stern yoke and present the Polish nation with innumerable iniquities.” This early appeal to Slavic solidarity, a Czech historian remarks, written in the best
fioritura
style which Henricus had learned at the University of Naples, sounds so convincing that we easily forget that Henricus began his political career in the north trying to enlist German help against the French (and that Otakar himself tried to mobilize at least four German princes against Rudolf of Hapsburg). Yet it seems that his elegant writing style was very much admired by literate people in Prague, and there is evidence to suggest that Magister Bohuslav, the notary in charge of the queen’s office, happily imitated his style and included a few of his pieces in his own collection of formulas to be used in diplomatic correspondence. It is a poetic thought that Henricus de Isernia, whose name disappears from the Prague scene after 1278, may have died loyally with King Otakar on the battlefield, while the other Henricus (Italicus) went on serving Otakar’s son in an official function for years to come.
was
involved: on one war expedition he rode out with the king and a few bishops and a German poet; in the army camp he joined in a discussion about the Ghibelline-Guelf problem or, in more appropriately metaphorical terms, the question whether the pope was the sun, the emperor the moon, or vice versa. He liked to show off his art of composition: to Princess Kunhuta, the later abbess, he wrote a passionate letter about the beauties of Sicily and southern Italy (alas, she was five years old, and the letter was really addressed to her fiancé, whom he was asking to intervene there), spoke of Otakar as “king of
kings,” and, when Otakar found himself politically isolated, issued a kind of Slavic manifesto appealing to the Poles to give military support to Otakar and speaking of the close relationship between the P
emyslid family and the ancient Polish dynasty of the Piasts, “the consonance of languages,” and the need to band together against the German enemy, who, if he defeated Prague, would almost certainly “force Polish freedom into a stern yoke and present the Polish nation with innumerable iniquities.” This early appeal to Slavic solidarity, a Czech historian remarks, written in the bestfioritura
style which Henricus had learned at the University of Naples, sounds so convincing that we easily forget that Henricus began his political career in the north trying to enlist German help against the French (and that Otakar himself tried to mobilize at least four German princes against Rudolf of Hapsburg). Yet it seems that his elegant writing style was very much admired by literate people in Prague, and there is evidence to suggest that Magister Bohuslav, the notary in charge of the queen’s office, happily imitated his style and included a few of his pieces in his own collection of formulas to be used in diplomatic correspondence. It is a poetic thought that Henricus de Isernia, whose name disappears from the Prague scene after 1278, may have died loyally with King Otakar on the battlefield, while the other Henricus (Italicus) went on serving Otakar’s son in an official function for years to come.
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