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Václav Koranda the Younger and the Compactata

Publication at Faculty of Arts |
2016

Abstract

This paper deals with how the Compactata were understood by Václav Koranda the Younger, a university master and administrator of the Utraquist Church from 1471 to 1489. Just like Jan Rokycana and Martin Lupáč, Koranda was convinced of the irreversible validity of the Compactata.

He placed emphasis on the content of the Compactata letters: in them the Bohemians and Moravians were declared to be faithful Christians, they were allowed the chalice and the disparagement of Hussite doctrinal practice was banned. Koranda leaned toward a radical interpre- tation of the Compactata as establishing religious freedom for Utraquists, but at the same time he denied the same kind of freedom to Catholics, which was in fact contrary to the spirit of the Compactata.

It is clear that in the Poděbradian and Jagiellonian periods Utraquism was represented not only by the symbol of the chalice, but the Compactata themselves became an independent symbol, a contract between the Hussites and the Church, which to a certain extent recog- nized the Four Articles, through which the Hussites defi ned themselves against the Catholic Church. Koranda's entry on the Compactata from the beginning of the 1480s is edited in the appendix.