Wenceslaus, Holy Roman Emperor

Born on February 26, 1361, Wenceslaus (sometimes known as "the Drunkard") of the house of Luxembourg succeeded his father Charles IV as Holy Roman Emperor and king of Bohemia in 1378.

Accused of devoting far more attention to his Bohemian than to his German duties, and of weakness in agreeing with Charles VI of France to end their support of rival Popes, he was deposed as Emperor in August 1400 by the princes of the German states in favour of Rupert III, Count Palatine of the Rhine: Wenceslaus refused for a decade to renounce the Imperial crown.

As King Wenceslaus IV of Bohemia until his death in 1419, he came into repeated conflict with the nobility and sought to protect the religious reformer Jan Hus and his followers against the demands of the established Church for their suppression as heretics. After Hus's execution in Constance (1415), Wenceslaus's reign ended with the first stirrings of the Hussite Wars[?] which would follow his death.

Preceded by: Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor

List of German Kings and Emperors

Succeeded by: Ruprecht III Wittelsbach