Abstract
How is it possible that one Old Town butcher took part in the election of a new Bohemian monarch after the death of King Louis II? The presented text searches for an answer to this question in the election of the Czech monarch in the 15th and first half of the 16th century and in the extraordinary power the Prague guilds held at the time, the butchers' guild in particular. Zikmund (Ziga) Vanícek (after 1460-1533) was an Old Town burgher, butcher, later a meat entrepreneur and real estate owner; he became the head of the wealthy and politically powerful Old Town butchers' guild in 1499, the base of his strong position on the Old Town Prague City Council, after 1518 on the council of united Greater Prague, defending the political and economic status of the burgher estate against attacks by the nobility. A skilled spokesman for the Prague guilds, Ziga played an important role in both city and provincial politics. In 1524, as a representative of the Utraquist guilds, he managed to reverse the Lutheran attempt to take control of
Prague. In 1526, he became one of the three Prague representatives in the estate college, which elected Ferdinand I to the Bohemian throne.