Jan Hus
Priest and university master of Prague who went to the Council of Constance under King Sigismund’s safe-conduct to answer for his teaching. The council condemned him as a heretic, and he was burned on 6 July 1415.
The safe-conduct that Sigismund issued for him in October 1414 calls Hus a master of arts and bachelor of theology from the kingdom of Bohemia, travelling to the general council (Peter of Mladoňovice, Relatio pp. 237–238). At Constance he was imprisoned, examined and pressed to recant. He refused, writing on 1 July 1415 that he could not abjure articles he had never taught, and that he would gladly abjure before the whole world any falsehood or error he had spoken (Hus, Letters Final Declaration, pp. 275–276).
The council’s sentence treats him as a disciple of John Wycliffe, condemns thirty articles from his books, and hands him to the secular power (Council of Constance, session 15). He was burned the same day; his companion Peter of Mladoňovice wrote the account of his death (Peter of Mladoňovice, Relatio pp. 320–323). In 1999 John Paul II expressed deep regret for it (John Paul II, Address on John Hus (1999)). See the Council of Constance and the Burning of Jan Hus.
In the timeline
- 1414 to 1418, firm dateThe Council of Constance and the Burning of Jan Hus
A general council ends the papal schism, declares that even a pope must obey it, and orders councils to meet at fixed intervals. It also tries the Czech preacher Jan Hus, who had come under the king’s safe-conduct, and hands him over to be burned on 6 July 1415.
- 1419 to 1436, firm dateThe Hussites and the Compacts of Basel
After the burning of Jan Hus, Praguers and Taborites defend the lay chalice in arms. A crusade proclaimed by Martin V fails before Prague in 1420, the city states its demands in Four Articles, and in 1436 legates of the Council of Basel concede the chalice at Jihlava.