Abstract

This image depicts the events of May 23, 1618, the date on which a group of about 200 representatives of the Protestant Bohemian estates protested against restrictions on their religious freedom by storming the Bohemian Chancellery at Prague Castle and throwing two regents and their secretary out the window. A similar incident had occurred in Bohemia in 1419, at the beginning of the Hussite Wars. One crucial difference, however, was that in 1618 all three victims survived and were able to escape. The defenestration marked the beginning of the Bohemian Protestant revolt against the Catholic Habsburg monarchy. Today it is also considered the catalyst of the Thirty Years War.

Defenestration of Prague on May 23, 1618 (1629)

  • Mathias Merian

Source

Source: Matthäus Merian the Elder, The Defenestration of Prague, colored copperplate engraving, 1629. In Theatrum Europaeum oder Ausfuehrliche und Wahrhaftige Beschreibung aller jeder denckwürdiger Geschichten...Beschrieben durch M.Joannem Philippum Abelinium, Bd.1, Verlag Matthaeum Merian, Frankfurt a.Main, 1629. Liechtenstein Castle Wilfersdorf, Austria, https://www.europeana.eu/item/489/LIE000033

Liechtenstein Castle Wilfersdorf, Austria