Matthias’s Reign, Ferdinand’s Succession 125that the church was illegal, but as in Braunau this remained unenforced.
The disputes were then taken up, along with other complaints about
infringements of their religious liberties, by the Bohemian Protestants
at the general assembly of the Estates of the Habsburg lands in Prague
in 1615, where they declared themselves ready to defend their rights
against whosoever should threaten them.^20 At that point their resolve
was not put to the test, as Matthias and Khlesl were seeking conciliation
in the Empire rather than a further confrontation in Bohemia, but the
issue continued to smoulder until Catholic hard-liners in the Bohemian
administration gained a freer hand a couple of years later.
Ferdinand’s succession in Bohemia
In December 1611, shortly before his election as emperor, the 54-year-
old Matthias had married his cousin, the 26-year-old Anna of Tyrol,
but within a couple of years it was clear that no heir and successor
was likely to result from the marriage, and indeed Anna died in 1618,
three months before her husband. Hence the succession question which
had vexed Rudolf throughout his last decade was quickly back on the
Habsburg agenda, and it had not become any easier, as there were few
potentially suitable candidates.
Emperor Ferdinand I had three sons, all of whom in turn had sons,
so that, excluding those who did not live to manhood, he had a total
of eleven grandsons. Three of these, including Rudolf, had already died
leaving no surviving legitimate children, but seven were still living, as
well as Matthias. However the latter’s brothers Maximilian and Albrecht,
as well as his cousin Karl of Burgau, were all only three years or less
younger than the emperor himself, so that they might survive him only
briefly or perhaps not at all, and none had legitimate children. That
left Ferdinand of Styria, then in his mid-thirties, and his three younger
brothers, two of whom were already bishops and the third an officer of
the priestly German Order of Knights.
Ferdinand was the obvious candidate, particularly as he already had
three sons to provide for the future succession, but he was also the
most divisive. His bold youthful recatholicisation of his Inner Austrian
provinces had marked him down as an arch-enemy for the Protes-
tants, as had his accompanying curtailment of the rights and privileges
of the Estates, and there was nothing to suggest that age and experi-
ence had mellowed his approach. Bohemia, Hungary, and Upper and
Lower Austria had all recently been engaged in protracted struggles with
Rudolf over religious and political freedoms, and the tensions were still