“Defenestration”—from the Latin de (from) and fenestra (window)—means throwing someone out of a window. While this might seem an oddly specific term to need its own word, in Prague, defenestration became a surprisingly common political statement that shaped European history. The Czech capital experienced three major defenestrations, two of which ignited conflicts that reshaped the continent.
The First Defenestration (1419)
The first defenestration of Prague occurred on July 30, 1419, during a period of intense religious conflict. Jan Hus, a Czech reformer who predated Martin Luther by a century, had been burned at the stake in 1415 despite receiving safe conduct to the Council of Constance. His followers, known as Hussites, were outraged.
On that summer day, Hussite priest Jan Želivský led a procession through Prague demanding the release of imprisoned Hussite preachers. The crowd grew increasingly agitated, and when stones were thrown at them from the New Town Hall, the mob stormed the building.
What happened next set a precedent for Prague’s unique approach to political conflict resolution: the protesters seized the judge, the burgomaster, and several town councilors and threw them out of the windows onto the street below. Whether they died from the fall or were killed by the crowd waiting below is debated by historians. Some accounts suggest they were finished off with pikes and swords.
King Wenceslaus IV, upon hearing the news, reportedly suffered a stroke and died two weeks later. The power vacuum and religious tensions led to the Hussite Wars, a series of conflicts lasting from 1419 to 1434 that devastated Bohemia and influenced the later Protestant Reformation.
The Second Defenestration (1618)
The second and most famous defenestration occurred on May 23, 1618, an event that literally launched the Thirty Years’ War, one of the most destructive conflicts in European history.
The context was complex: the Holy Roman Empire was a patchwork of Catholic and Protestant territories. Emperor Matthias had promised religious tolerance to Bohemian Protestants, but his designated heir, Archduke Ferdinand of Styria, was a devout Catholic known for suppressing Protestantism in his own lands.
Bohemian Protestant nobles, fearing Ferdinand would revoke their religious freedoms, confronted two of his Catholic regents—Jaroslav Bořita of Martinice and Vilém Slavata—along with their secretary Filip Fabricius, at Prague Castle on May 23, 1618.
After a heated argument about Protestant rights, the assembled nobles voted to defenestrate the regents. The officials were seized and thrown from a window of the Bohemian Chancellery, a fall of approximately 70 feet (21 meters).
Remarkably, all three men survived. Catholics claimed this was divine intervention, with angels or the Virgin Mary cushioning their fall. Protestants had a more mundane explanation: the men had landed in a large pile of manure and refuse that had accumulated below the window.
Martinice and Slavata crawled away, found a ladder, and escaped. Fabricius followed them. The Catholic narrative of miraculous survival strengthened support for Ferdinand and helped mobilize Catholic forces.
The Thirty Years’ War
The defenestration of 1618 triggered the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648), one of the bloodiest conflicts in European history. What began as a religious dispute between Protestant and Catholic states in the Holy Roman Empire escalated into a general European war involving most of the continent’s major powers.
The war devastated Central Europe, particularly German-speaking lands. An estimated 8 million people died, including approximately 20% of the population in the German states. Some regions lost up to 50% of their population to violence, famine, and disease.
The conflict fundamentally reshaped European politics and established principles of sovereignty that influenced international relations for centuries. The Peace of Westphalia (1648) that ended the war established the modern concept of nation-states and religious tolerance in the Empire.
The Third Defenestration (1948)
Prague’s third notable defenestration occurred during the 20th century under very different circumstances. On March 10, 1948, Foreign Minister Jan Masaryk was found dead in the courtyard of the Foreign Ministry, having apparently fallen from a bathroom window.
The death occurred just weeks after the Communist Party seized power in Czechoslovakia. Masaryk, son of the republic’s founder Tomáš Masaryk, was the only non-Communist remaining in the government. His death was officially ruled a suicide.
However, many suspected murder. Masaryk had been under pressure to resign and had expressed concerns about threats to his life. The circumstances—particularly the position of his body and the window’s location—raised suspicions that he had been pushed or thrown.
Forensic evidence examined after the fall of Communism in 1989 suggested murder was more likely than suicide. In 2003, a police investigation concluded Masaryk had likely been murdered, though the case was officially closed without naming suspects.
Why Windows?
Why did Praguers repeatedly choose defenestration as their method of political protest? Several factors may explain this peculiarity:
First, Prague Castle and government buildings were often located in elevated positions, making windows a readily available “exit” for unwanted officials. Second, defenestration was dramatic and public, serving as powerful political theater that sent an unmistakable message. Third, it had precedent—once established as a form of protest, the act became part of Prague’s political vocabulary.
The symbolic nature of the act mattered too: throwing someone out physically represented throwing them out politically. It was a literal rejection of authority that the crowd could participate in or witness.
Cultural Legacy
The defenestrations of Prague, particularly the 1618 event, have become iconic moments in European history. They represent dramatic turning points where accumulated tensions exploded into violence that reshaped the continent.
The incidents gave the English language the word “defenestration,” which has entered common usage not just for its literal meaning but as shorthand for sudden and dramatic removal from power. Modern journalists might describe a CEO’s firing as a “corporate defenestration” or a politician’s ousting as a “political defenestration.”
In Prague itself, the defenestrations are memorialized in tours, museums, and historical markers. The window from which the 1618 defenestration occurred is still pointed out to tourists visiting Prague Castle.
Historical Significance
The defenestrations of Prague demonstrate how single, dramatic acts can catalyze massive historical changes. The 1419 defenestration helped launch the Hussite Wars and contributed to the eventual Protestant Reformation. The 1618 defenestration sparked the Thirty Years’ War, which killed millions and established modern international relations principles. The 1948 death of Masaryk symbolized Communist tyranny and the end of Czechoslovak democracy.
These events remind us that history often turns on moments of passion and violence, where accumulated grievances find expression in dramatic gestures. They also show how historical events can establish patterns—once defenestration became part of Prague’s political repertoire, it was remembered and, centuries later, repeated.
In this way, the defenestrations of Prague represent something larger: the ways societies develop unique political vocabularies and how historical memory influences political action. They stand as peculiar, violent, and oddly fascinating examples of how the past shapes the future—sometimes by throwing it out the window.