The Hussite Wars (1419 to c. 1434) were a series of conflicts fought in Bohemia (modern-day Czech Republic) between followers of the reformer Jan Hus and Catholic loyalists toward the end of the Bohemian Reformation (c. 1380 to c. 1436). Although the Catholics won, the Hussites were granted the freedom of religion they had fought for.

The wars were a direct response to the execution of Jan Hus (l. 1369-1415) in 1415 and that of his friend and colleague Jerome of Prague (l. 1379-1416) a year later after they had been condemned as heretics by the Catholic Church. The Bohemian Reformation, the first systematic attempt by Catholic clergy to reform the corruption and abuses of the medieval Church, had been underway since c. 1380 but became more radicalized after 1416, leading to the beginning of social unrest in 1419 when the Hussite Jan Želivský (l. 1380-1422) led a procession through the city that resulted in the First Defenestration of Prague on 30 July and the deaths of seven town council members.

Hus and Jerome were elevated to martyrs (later to saints), and Hus’ followers were deeply devoted to his cause, but they were not a unified coalition. All that united them was their common enemy of the Catholic Church and the Catholic forces under the king of the Holy Roman Empire, Sigismund of Hungary (l. 1368-1437) who had been given permission by the pope to lead the crusade against Bohemian heresy. As soon as the Hussite general Jan Žižka (l. c. 1360-1424) defeated Sigismund in an engagement – as he did every time they met in battle – the Hussite factions would turn on each other.

Žižka, a brilliant tactician, made use of firearms and wagon forts in both defense and offense, continually surprising his opponents with the maneuverability of his mobile fortifications. The Hussite Wars are commonly referenced for Žižka’s tactics and the early use of firearms in European military conflicts.

Žižka died of the plague in 1424 and was replaced by the general Prokop the Bold (also given as Prokop the Great, l. c. 1380-1434), also an effective military leader. He had no more success in unifying the Hussites after engagements than Žižka had, however, and at the Battle of Lipany in 1434 moderate Hussites sided with the Catholics against the more radical faction. The moderates (Utraquists) and Catholics defeated the radicals (Taborites), ending the conflict. Afterwards, the Utraquists were granted freedom of religion at the Council of Basel in 1346, ending both the Hussite Wars and the Bohemian Reformation, although issues concerning religion would continue to cause conflict afterwards.

Hussite Wars WHE

Hussite Wagenburg

In the 15th century, during the Hussite Wars, the Hussites developed tactics of using the tabors, called vozová hradba in Czech or Wagenburg by the Germans, as mobile fortifications. It was first used in the Battle of Nekmíř. When the Hussite army faced a numerically superior opponent, the Bohemians usually formed a square of the armed wagons, joined them with iron chains, and defended the resulting fortification against charges of the enemy. Such a camp was easy to establish and practically invulnerable to enemy cavalry. The etymology of the word tabor may come from the Hussite fortress and modern day Czech town of Tábor, which itself is a name derived from biblical Jezreel mountain Tabor (in Hebrew תבור).

The crew of each wagon consisted of 18 to 21 soldiers: 4 to 8 crossbowmen, 2 handgunners, 6 to 8 soldiers equipped with pikes or flails, 2 shield carriers, and 2 drivers. The wagons would normally form a square, and inside the square would usually be the cavalry. There were two principal stages of the battle using the wagon fort: defensive and counterattack. The defensive part would be a pounding of the enemy with artillery. The Hussite artillery was a primitive form of a howitzer, called in Czech a houfnice, from which the English word howitzer comes. Furthermore, they called their guns the Czech word píšťala (hand cannon), in that they were shaped like a pipe or a fife, from which the word pistol is possibly derived. When the enemy approached near enough, crossbowmen and hand-gunners emerge from the wagons and inflict more casualties at close range. There would even be stones stored in a pouch inside the wagons for throwing should the soldiers run out of ammunition. After this huge barrage, the enemy would be demoralized. The armies of the anti-Hussite crusaders were usually heavily armored knights. Hussite tactics were to disable the knights’ horses so that the dismounted (and ponderous) knights would be easier targets. Once the commander saw fit, the second stage of battle would begin. Men with swords, flails, and polearms would spring out and attack the weary enemy. Alongside this infantry, cavalry would leave the square and strike. The enemy would be eliminated, or very nearly so.

The wagon fort was later used by the crusading anti-Hussite armies at the Battle of Tachov (1427). Anti-Hussite German forces, unfamiliar with this type of strategy, were defeated. The Hussite wagon fort strategy failed at the Battle of Lipany (1434), where the Utraquist faction of Hussites defeated the Taborite faction. On a hill within a wagon fort, they were drawn into charging out prematurely, when their enemy pretended to retreat. The Utraquists would be reconciled with the Catholic Church afterward. Thus, the wagon fort’s impact on Czech history ended. The first victory against the wagon fort at the Battle of Tachov showed that the best ways to defeat it were to prevent it from being erected in the first place or to get the men inside to charge out prematurely after a feint. Such solutions meant the fortification lost its prime advantage. The importance of the wagon fort in Czech history diminished, but the Czechs would continue to use the wagon forts in later conflicts. After the Hussite Wars, foreign powers such as the Hungarians and Poles who had confronted the destructive forces of Hussites, hired thousands of Czech mercenaries (such as into the Black Army of Hungary). Hungarian general John Hunyadi studied the Hussites’ tactics, he applied its featuring elements in his army during the Hungarian–Ottoman Wars, including the use of war wagons as a mobile fortress called szekérvár in Hungarian. At the Battle of Varna in 1444, it is said that 600 Bohemian handgunners (men armed with early shoulder arms) defended a wagon fortification. The Germans would also use wagons for fortification. They used much cheaper materials than the Hussites, and different wagons for infantry and artillery. The Russians also used a type of movable fortress, called a guliai-gorod in the 16th century.

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