Defenestration of Prague

Two Catholic chancellors and their scribe were bustled to a third-storey window of the royal castle and pushed out onto the surrounding castle grounds. A number of random pistol shots followed as the injured regents lay some 50 feet below. This violent Protestant assault is considered as the spark that ignited the war that was to last thirty years. Angry nobles, led by Jindřich Matyáš Thurn, stormed into the regents' offices around mid-afternoon on 23 May 1618 and confronted the two senior representatives of the Habsburg Holy Roman Emperor - Vilém Slavata z Chlumu a Košumberka and Jaroslav Bořita z Martinic. Filip Fabricius was the unfortunate secretary who shared their fate.