Bohemia is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech lands in the present-day Czech Republic. In a broader meaning, Bohemia sometimes refers to the entire Czech territory, including Moravia and Czech Silesia, especially in a historical context, such as the Lands of the Bohemian Crown ruled by Bohemian kings.
Appearance[]
Season One[]
Dirty Laundry[]
The Archduke Ferdinand of Bohemia and his sister the Archduchess Cecelia visit the court of France after an accident occurs between ships from France and Bohemia. Henry introduces Kenna to the Archduke, and Henry has a romantic romp with Cecilia in his chambers which results in her accidental fall from his window to her death. Henry is then forced to work with his Queen in order to not only cover up her death, but find a way to tell her brother without putting blame on himself.
History[]
Bohemia was a kingdom in the Holy Roman Empire and subsequently a province in the Habsburgs’ Austrian Empire. It was bounded on the south by Upper and Lower Austria, on the west by Bavaria, on the north by Saxony and Lusatia, on the northeast by Silesia, and on the east by Moravia. From 1918 to 1939 and from 1945 to 1992 it was part of Czechoslovakia, and since 1993 it has formed much of the Czech Republic.
Bohemia under the Habsburgs[]
After the death of King Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia in the Battle of Mohács in 1526, Archduke Ferdinand of Austria became the new King of Bohemia and the country became a constituent state of the Habsburg Monarchy.
After Emperor Ferdinand II began oppressing the rights of Protestants in Bohemia, the resulting Bohemian Revolt led to outbreak of the Thirty Years' War in 1618. Elector Frederick V of the Electorate of the Palatinate, a Protestant, was elected by the Bohemian nobility to replace Ferdinand on the Bohemian throne, and was known as the Winter King. Frederick's wife, the popular Elizabeth Stuart and subsequently Elizabeth of Bohemia, known as the Winter Queen or Queen of Hearts, was the daughter of King James I of England. However, after Frederick's defeat in the Battle of White Mountain in 1620, 27 Bohemian estates leaders together with Jan Jesenius, rector of the Charles University of Prague were executed on the Prague's Old Town Square on 21 June 1621 and the rest were exiled from the country; their lands were then given to Catholic loyalists (mostly of Bavarian and Saxon origin), this ended the pro-reformation movement in Bohemia and also ended the role of Prague as ruling city of the Holy Roman Empire.
