Abstract » Lisá
Prague 2009
Apocalypticism, Millenarianism, and Prophecy: Eschatological Expectations between East-Central and Western Europe, 1560-1670
Martina LISÁ
The Perception of Prophecies in Bohemian Emigré Circles: The Case of Pirna
The emigration from the Bohemian Lands, which began as a result of the Battle of White Mountain and the consequential Recatholicisation actions, represents a complex phenomenon of the early modern history. For those emigrants the term “Exulanten” (in English religious exiles) was already in this time established. The exiles have chosen their places of refuge based upon the concrete confessional situation, but in general almost close to the Bohemian border. And so, particularly the so called New Utraquists and Lutherans went to Saxonia, where the majority of the exiles found their asylum. Places like Annaberg, Freiberg, Marienberg, but most of all Dresden, Zittau and Pirna were important host communities.
Václav Nosidlo of Geblice, a well standing burgher from the north Bohemian town Litoměřice, an intellectual and last but not least, an exile, had left his homeland for religious reasons in 1626 and lived in a Saxon exile for the rest of his life. He spent the first 13 years of his exile in the Saxonian town Pirna, which was one of the most important centres of the Bohemian exiles in the time of the Thirty Years’ War. He shared the fate of many, but as one of few, he had left an important, previously marginally used source: the chronicle surveying events from 1626 until 1639. In this work Nosidlo had recorded events from his time and areal horizon - i.e. particularly from Bohemia and Saxonia - which are heavily dictated by the strongly confessionalisationing cadence of a non-Catholic living in exile. For this reason this text provides interesting insight into the exile mentality and that not only through the way he described the events, but also by the way he chose his themes. The fixation of the prodigies and portents - of the belief in the “miracles”, including supernatural apparitions and prophetic visions - takes a very important and broad part of the chronicle.
This lecture would like to present this interesting source in addition to a cursory overview of the situation of the Bohemian Exiles in Pirna. As an introduction the exile community of Pirna as well as the author of the chronicle will be presented. The analysis of form and content of the chronicle will follow. The main part focuses on the prophets, who are mentioned in this source. The reception of the prophecies will be put in context of contemporary mentality while relating to pamphlets, broadsheets and other prints, which circulated in large dissemination in the circles of Bohemian exiles and which are mentioned in other ego documents of this period.
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