Legend · České Budějovice
Šimon Plachý, town clerk
On 31 January 1611 well-fortified České Budějovice surrendered without a fight. It was enough for a coachman to stop a carriage on the drawbridge of the Prague Gate so that it could not be closed. Town clerk Šimon Plachý of Třebnice, who was officially overseeing the opening of the gate, was shot that morning.
At the end of January 1611 the army of Passau bishop Leopold V of Habsburg invaded Bohemia. One of the first targets was České Budějovice.
The town was well fortified. Anyone who wanted to take it by force had to reckon with walls, gates and the resistance of the burghers. The Passau troops therefore did not first come as an army before the gate. A group of their officers came, posing as imperial commissioners.
The town let them in.
They spent the night in Budějovice and early on the morning of 31 January were to continue their journey. Because of their departure the Prague Gate was to be opened earlier than usual.
At the gate that morning was also Šimon Plachý of Třebnice, České Budějovice town clerk. He had served the town since 1604 and that morning officially oversaw the opening of the Prague Gate.
He was to see that the departure of the supposed imperial commissioners proceeded as it should.
The gate was opened and the carriage drove onto the drawbridge. The coachman stopped it so that the gate could not be closed again.
At that moment Passau soldiers hidden outside the walls rushed forward. The town had no time to prepare. What looked like an ordinary morning departure turned in an instant into an invasion.
Soldiers poured toward the Prague Gate. In the confusion shots were fired and several people were killed.
Among them Šimon Plachý.
Thus the Passau troops took České Budějovice by guile. A well-fortified town fell without a direct assault, in the moment when a gate stayed open.
What followed
The Passau troops occupied the town. The occupation of České Budějovice lasted about five months and the town suffered considerable material damage. Inhabitants had to maintain the Passau garrison.
In March 1611 commander Lorenzo Rameé had nine of his own officers executed without trial at the Budějovice town hall.
What remained of him
In memory of Šimon Plachý memorial plaques were made at the Prague Gate. The original plaque recalled his death during the Passau entry. The original plaques are today kept in the South Bohemian Museum, and at the site of the former Prague Gate there is a reconstructed memorial.
Šimon’s son Jiří Ostermann Plachý later became a Jesuit and became known in the defence of Prague against the Swedes in 1648.
How it really was
Passau troops occupied České Budějovice by guile on 31 January 1611 through the prematurely opened Prague Gate; town clerk Šimon Plachý of Třebnice was shot during the entry.
This chapter is the most accurate on facts in the whole collection. A historical audit found not a single thing to correct in it.
The army of Passau bishop Leopold V of Habsburg invaded Bohemia in January 1611 and occupied České Budějovice by guile early on the morning of 31 January 1611. A group of Passau officers posing as imperial commissioners spent the night in the town, and because of their early departure the Prague Gate was opened prematurely.
Šimon Plachý of Třebnice is an attested person. After university studies he married into a Budějovice patrician family and in 1604 entered the town’s service as Czech clerk. He really did officially oversee the opening of the gate. When the carriage drove onto the drawbridge the coachman stopped so that the gate could not be closed, and Passau soldiers hidden outside the walls rushed in. Plachý was shot that day.
Nine officers of his own army were executed without trial by commander Lorenzo Rameé at the Budějovice town hall on the night of 18 March 1611.
The memorial plaques are attested. The memorial apparently arose soon after Plachý’s death; in 1663 his son enlarged it. The original inscription plaque was rediscovered in 1976; in 1995 the original arrangement was reconstructed on the site of the former gate. The originals are kept in the South Bohemian Museum.
And that son, Jiří Ostermann Plachý, became a Jesuit and in 1648 was among the defenders of Prague against the Swedes. A father who died at a gate so that his town would not fall had a son who thirty-seven years later did the same in Prague.
Where to follow the legend
Site of the former Prague Gate, at the northern end of the historic core of České Budějovice. A memorial to Šimon Plachý is still there. The original plaques are in the South Bohemian Museum.
Where we know it from
- Encyklopedie Českých Budějovic, hesla Plachý z Třebnice Šimon, vpád Pasovských 1611, Pražská brána
- PLETZER, Karel. Památník českobudějovického písaře Simeona Plachého z Třebnice (1611). Zprávy muzeí Jihočeského kraje, 1961
- ČAPEK, František Josef. Pasovští na Budějovicku v roce 1611. Výběr z prací členů Historického klubu při Jihočeském muzeu, 1981
- KOVÁŘ, Daniel. Příběhy budějovických pomníků. České Budějovice, 2000