196 The Origins of the Thirty Years War and the Revolt in Bohemia, 1618
among the Protestant princes of the Empire a campaign against the
Bohemians could be presented as a legal Imperial enforcement action
against rebels, rather than as Catholic suppression of a Protestant-led
secession. In this the key figure was the elector of Saxony, who, it
was hoped, could be persuaded not only to participate on his own
account, but also to rally significant support from the Upper and Lower
Saxon Circles. As has been noted, Johann Georg was not only strongly
inclined towards legitimacy in the Empire, but also increasingly hos-
tile to the Bohemian revolt as a result of its Calvinist and Palatine
leadership. An Imperial diplomat reported at this time that the court
preacher, in his writings and sermons, ‘paints the Calvinists and rebel-
lious Bohemians very black’, while the Dresden court itself was firmly
of the opinion that the revolt had nothing to do with religion, but was
a purely political matter.^31 Thus the elector might well have remained
neutral, but to prevail upon him to do more required some positive
inducement.
With the ink scarcely dry on the Munich compact an envoy from
Ferdinand appeared in Dresden to suggest to the elector that were he
to provide assistance against the Bohemians the emperor would in turn
be ready to agree to an extension of Saxony’s territory, and a further
embassy in February 1620 made specific the offer of ‘recompense’ for
his participation. Johann Georg was quick to follow this up, and at the
beginning of March his own emissary informed Ferdinand that should
he join in the action he would require full repayment of his expenses,
which were to be guaranteed by the pledging to him of Upper and Lower
Lusatia. Over and above this he was looking to acquire a suitable prin-
cipality, which its present owner would forfeit as a consequence of his
support for the Bohemians, a thinly disguised reference to Christian of
Anhalt. Ferdinand’s reply, accepting these conditions but maintaining
equal discretion about the identity of the territory in mind, reached the
elector soon afterwards, and the deal was done.
The question of secularised church properties which had prompted
the Union ultimatum to Maximilian and the Catholic estates in Novem-
ber 1619 was also central for the north-German Protestant princes,
including the elector of Saxony, as there were many such properties in
their territories. They feared that the Catholic side might use any out-
break of hostilities as an opportunity to seize by force what they had
not been able to regain through the courts, so that guarantees were
essential if any of them were to be persuaded to join in the action
against the Bohemians. Even the ecclesiastical electors realised this, tem-
pering their response when the ultimatum was discussed at a Catholic