Vilém Slavata of Chlum and Košumberk

Born on 1 December 1572 in Čestín Kostel Died on 19 January 1652 in Vienna (or, according to another source, in Jindřichův Hradec)

A scion of a family professing its loyalty to the Protestant Czech Brethren. Converted to Catholicism under the influence of Jesuit schools and of his “second mother”, Kateřina of Montfort (the wife of Adam of Hradec, whose daughter Lucie Otilie he married). He held many outstanding public offices, including the office of the Prague imperial governor Due to his disrespect for the Emperor Rudolf II that as a governor of Prague he became one of the victims of the famous 1618 defenestration. After recovering from the wounds he emigrated to Passau in Bavaria where he moved a substantial part of the furniture of the castles of Jindřichův Hradec and Telč. Following the defeat of the rebellion of the estates in 1622 he returned to his estate, but rejected to use the opportunity and buy cheaply the confiscated estates of the defeated noblemen. He only bought back the original family estate in Košumberk. He actively cooperated in the replacement of the old Provincial Constitution by the Renewed Order of the Province of 1627. He was rewarded for his services by being promoted to a count, and by receiving the highest imperial awards, allowing him and his descendants to sit in the parliament right next to dukes.
Slavata secured for Telč the re-establishment of all town privileges and the granting of a new town emblem and seal in 1650.

(BERINGER, JANOUŠEK: The Town and the Estates, Telč 1891, pp. 21-29 TIRAY: Moravian Geography: The District of Telč, Brno 1913, pp. 112-114)

Vilém Slavata