Insurrection 151stating instead that ‘neither in the Collegium nor anywhere else was
there any talk of throwing anyone out of the window’.^36 The sixth man,
Fruewein, who was also not present on the day, testified that ‘regarding
the defenestration, he did not know where it was discussed. He was not
there. Had he been asked, he would not have advised it.’^37 That is the
sum total of the relevant information contained in these trial records.
Five of these six rebels predictably said as little as possible at their
trials, seeking to play down their own knowledge and involvement.
The exception, Fruewein, provided much more information, particu-
larly about the events in Prague in the days immediately before the
defenestration, including two statements which he attributed to Thurn,
and which Gindely used to support his conspiracy claim.^38 In the first,
Thurn had said to some of the other leading figures on the day before
the defenestration that ‘it would be necessary to make a demonstration
against the breaches of the Letter of Majesty’. In view of what actually
happened it is easy to conclude that he was hinting at a planned assas-
sination, but his hearers are far more likely to have thought in terms
of the demonstrations which were carried out in 1609 and 1611, when
the Protestant members of the Estates effectively seized power, albeit
temporarily, setting up directorates and recruiting troops with Thurn
at their head. From this their reported concern that such an action
might ‘sow the seeds of a major war’ is a logical response. Gindely
also utilised Fruewein’s report that later on the same day Thurn said to
him privately, ‘we will have to throw a few people out of the window’,
although he did not add, as the trial record immediately does, that ‘he,
Fruewein, took this as a joke’. As noted in Chapter 5, talk of throwing
people out of the window occurred regularly at times of political stress
in Bohemia, and without the benefit of hindsight there would be lit-
tle reason to believe that Thurn necessarily meant it any more seriously
than Fruewein took it.^39
As his last pieces of evidence for a conspiracy Gindely cited two let-
ters written by Schlick after the defeat of the revolt, together with a
short testimony by Wilhelm Lobkowitz, from which he drew the con-
clusion that the planned defenestration ‘was discussed and agreed with
numerous people long beforehand’, rather contradicting his main con-
tention that it was decided by only three men and not until the previous
day.^40 Schlick escaped from Prague, but he only got as far as Upper
Lusatia, which by then was occupied by Saxony, and the elector eventu-
ally had him returned to stand trial. While in his perilous refuge Schlick
made efforts to ingratiate himself with Prince Karl Liechtenstein, who
had been appointed governor of Bohemia, initially hoping to secure his