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XVII 
THE CRUSADES 
AGAINST THE HUSSITES 
 The Hussite wars, which lasted throughout much of the third and fourth decades
of the fifteenth century, had many aspects, but primarily they were the violent
expressions of a great revolution, one of the first in the chain of European
revolutions which produced decisive changes in the structural character of
European societies. This first great upheaval also had the aspect of a civil
war in which 
 The series of Hussite wars, one important aspect of the Hussite revolution,
is probably the greatest event in Czech history and has therefore been an
object of a vast literature in Czech historiography. It has also been treated
to some extent in other languages, especially in German, in French, and,
more recently, also in English. In Czech the first modern substantial treatment
came from the pen of the greatest of 19th-century Czech historians, Frantisek
Palacky, in vol. II, parts 1—3, of his History of Bohemia (in several
Czech editions and a German one in 1851); it is still valuable. This is even
more true of Palacky's basic source publications, such as Urkundliche Beitrage
zur Geschichte des Hussitenkrieges (2 vols., Prague, 1873; repr. Osnabrück,
1966), giving letters and documents in German and Latin, and Archiv cesky,
especially the early volumes published by Palacky between 1840 and 1872,
containing only Czech material. Of later Czech publications the most important
are the fourth volume of V. V. Tomek's huge Dëjepis mesta Prahy [History
of the city of Prague] (2 vols., Prague, 1899), in fact more a Bohemian than
merely a Prague history; as well as the same author's Jan Zizka ka (Prague,
1879; also in German translation); some of the large literature specifically
on Zizka will be mentioned in the footnotes. In the 20th century the main
publications in Czech are O. Frankenberger, Nase velkd armada [Our great
army], relating only to the events of the Hussite Wars (3 vols., Prague,
1921); J. PekaI, Ziz ka ajeho doba [Zizka and his time], a work that goes
beyond the personality of Zizka and touches upon the whole Hussite Revolution
(4 vols., Prague, 1927—1933); R. Urbanek, Lipany a konec polnich vojsk
[Lipany and the end of the field armies] (Prague, 1934); a number of works
by Jos. Macek, especially Husitske revolucni hnuti [The Hussite revolutionary
movement] (Prague, 1952; translated into many languages, including English),
Tábor v husitském revolucnim hnuti (2 vols., Prague, 1955—1956),
and Prokop Veliky [Prokop the Great] (Prague, 1953); and finally F. M. Bartos,
Husitska revoluce [Hussite revolution] (2 vols., Ceské dejiny, part
II, vols. 7 and 8; Prague, 1965—1966). 
 In other languages the most important contributions on the Hussite wars
in the 19th century were in German. For the crusades, and especially for
the role of emperor Sigismund, the first (to some extent still valuable)
is J. Aschbach, Geschichte Kaiser Sigmunds, vol. IV (Hamburg, 1845). Far
more valuable, and still highly valued by Czech historiography, is F. v.
Bezold, König Sigmund und die Reichskriege gegen die Hussiten (3 vols.,
Munich, 1872, 
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