The Conflict over Confession and Power at the University of Prague in the 1450s – 60s 169 I but no masters of divinity or law.6 Some conservative Hussites also returned to Prague, which had an effect on the behavior of the masters during the legates’ stay in the city. The scholars held side meetings with the envoys, hosting them in the Carolinum. At the request of the land diet, Jan Příbram and Jan Rokycana drew up an opinion on the Compactata. The former interpreted it in a completely conciliatory spirit which the diet did not share. Around January 13, 1434, before the departure of the council legates from Bohemia, a group of six conservative masters re-unified with the Church—they subscribed to the wording of the Compactata that had been proposed by the Council of Basel. Among them were the rector Křišťan of Prachatice7 and the dean Buzek of Kdyně, who as representatives of the university also spoke on its behalf.8 In this way, the university came out very much in favor of the Catholic Church and took a step towards reconciliation with it. This was also in its interest, since the suspension of its activities in 1417/8, pronounced by the Council of Constance and the Pope Martin V, undermined it from an international point of view. However, the efforts of unification with the Roman Church were not permanent: a quarter-century later, conflict arose among the university masters, leading to the university’s profile as a confessional institution that subscribed to the Hussite tradition. We will be interested in how and why the conflict occurred, and what its consequences were for the university. In this chapter, therefore, we will trace the conditions of personnel at the university from the mid-fifteenth century onwards, and aim to evaluate the conflict between its members. The Situation of Personnel at the University from 1430–58 After the conclusion of the revolutionary period and civil war, the university had to organize its internal conditions and return to its regular teaching activities. As an institution, it paid for its involvement in the revolution with many losses—both material and human. After the end of the Hussite wars, the university resumed its activities in a reduced form, with only one from four faculties, the Faculty of Arts, renewing its operations. The faculty was revived as a complete institution with a functional body of lecturers, along with traditional teaching and college structures. The other faculties either languished (such as the Faculty of Medicine), held only sporadic lectures in their respective fields (theology), or disappeared altogether (law).9 The awarding of university degrees was also renewed. As early as 1430, four new masters were graduated (Jan Rokycana, 6 Michal Svatoš, “The Utraquist University (1419–1556),” in A History of Charles University, vol. 1, 1348–1802, eds. František Kavka and Josef Petráň (Prague, 2001), 189. 7 On him, see most recently Dana Stehlíková, “Christian of Prachatice’s Latin Herbarium and Its Adaptations in Old Czech Literature,” in Books of Knowledge in Late Medieval Europe: Circulation and Reception of Popular Texts, eds. Pavlína Cermanová and Václav Žůrek, Utrecht studies in medieval literacy, 52 (Turnhout, 2021), 275–97. 8 See the notarial instrument dated as late as January 28, 1434, in Cheb, published in Urkundliche Beiträge zur Geschichte des Hussitenkrieges, vol. 2, Von den Jahren 1429–1436, ed. František Palacký (Prague, 1873), no. 900, 401–2. The masters listed are Křišťan of Prachatice, Buzek of Kdyně, Prokop of Plzeň, Jan of Příbram, Jan Papoušek of Soběslav, and Petr of Sepekov. Cf. František Šmahel, Die Basler Kompaktaten mit den Hussiten (1436). Untersuchung und Edition, MGH Studien und Texte, 65 (Wiesbaden, 2019), 52–53. 9 Svatoš, “The Utraquist University”, 187–97.
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