Charles IV (German: Karl IV.; Czech: Karel IV.; Latin: Carolus IV; also known as Charles of Luxembourg German: Karl von Luxemburg; Czech: Karel Lucemburský; Latin: Carolus Luxemburgensis; Luxembourgish: Karel vu Lëtzebuerg; born Wenceslaus German: Wenzel; Czech: Václav; 14 May 1316 – 29 November 1378) was Holy Roman Emperor from 1355 until his death in 1378. He was elected King of Germany (King of the Romans) in 1346 and became King of Bohemia (as Charles I) that same year. He was a member of the House of Luxembourg from his father's side and the Bohemian House of Přemyslid from his mother's side; he emphasized the latter due to his lifelong affinity for the Bohemian side of his inheritance, and also because his direct ancestors in the Přemyslid line included two saints.
He was the eldest son and heir of John of Bohemia, King of Bohemia and Count of Luxembourg, who died at the Battle of Crécy on 26 August 1346. His mother, Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, was the sister of Wenceslaus III, King of Bohemia and Poland, the last of the male Přemyslid rulers of Bohemia. Charles inherited the County of Luxembourg from his father and was elected king of the Kingdom of Bohemia. On 2 September 1347, Charles was crowned King of Bohemia.
On 11 July 1346, the prince-electors chose him as King of the Romans (rex Romanorum) in opposition to Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor. Charles was crowned on 26 November 1346 in Bonn. After his opponent died, he was re-elected in 1349 and crowned King of the Romans. In 1355, he was crowned King of Italy and Holy Roman Emperor. With his coronation as King of Burgundy at Arles in 1365, he became the crowned ruler of all the kingdoms of the Holy Roman Empire. Having played a key part in the political and cultural history of the Kingdom of Bohemia, he remains a popular historical figure in the Czech lands.
The Golden Bull of 1356 marked a structural change in the politics of the Holy Roman Empire. Several aspects of his legacy remain contentious, however. The image of Charles as a wise, pious, peace-loving king (partly constructed by Charles himself) has proved influential until this day, supported by several artistic or scholarly projects produced during Charles's reign or afterwards.
Charles was born to John of Bohemia of the Luxembourg dynasty and Queen Elizabeth of Bohemia of the Bohemian Přemyslid dynasty in Prague. His maternal grandfather was the Bohemian King Wenceslaus II. He chose the name Charles at his confirmation in honor of his grand uncle, King Charles IV of France, at whose court he resided for seven years.
Charles received French education and was literate and fluent in five languages: Latin, Czech, German, French, and Italian.
In 1331, Charles gained some experience of warfare with his father in Italy. At the beginning of 1333, he went to Lucca, Tuscany, to consolidate his rule there. To strengthen the city's defences, Charles founded the nearby fortress and the town of Montecarlo ("Mount Charles").
From 1333, he administered the lands of the Bohemian Crown due to his father's frequent absence and deteriorating eyesight. In 1334, Charles was named Margrave of Moravia, the traditional title of heirs to the throne. Two years later, he assumed the government of Tyrol on behalf of his brother, John Henry, and was soon actively involved in a struggle for the possession of that county.
On 11 July 1346, in consequence of an alliance between his father and Pope Clement VI, a relentless enemy of the emperor Louis IV, Charles was elected Roman king in opposition to Louis by some of the prince-electors at Rhens. Having previously promised to be subservient to Clement, he made extensive concessions to the pope in 1347. Confirming the papacy in the possession of vast territories, he promised to annul the acts of Louis against Clement, to take no part in Italian affairs, and to defend and protect the church.
Charles IV was in a very weak position in Germany. Because of the terms of his election, he was derisively referred to as a "Priests' King" (Pfaffenkönig). Many bishops and nearly all of the Imperial cities remained loyal to Louis the Bavarian. Worse still, Charles backed the wrong side in the Hundred Years' War and lost his father and many of his best knights at the Battle of Crécy in August 1346, where he escaped from the field wounded.
Civil war in Germany was prevented, however, when Louis IV died on 11 October 1347, after suffering a stroke during a bear hunt. In January 1349, partisans from the House of Wittelsbach attempted to have Günther von Schwarzburg elected king, but he attracted few supporters and was defeated by Charles at the siege of Eltville in May. After this, Charles's claim to the Imperial throne faced no direct threat.
Charles initially worked to secure his power base. Bohemia had remained untouched by the plague. Prague became his capital, and he rebuilt the city on the model of Paris, establishing the New Town (Nové Město). In 1348, he founded the university of Prague, which was the first university in Central Europe and later named after him. The university trained administrators and lawyers, and Prague soon emerged as the intellectual and cultural center of Central Europe.
Having exploited the difficulties of his opponents, Charles was again elected in Frankfurt on 17 June 1349 and re-crowned at Aachen on 25 July 1349. He was soon the undisputed ruler of the Empire. Gifts or promises had won the support of the Rhenish and Swabian towns; a marriage alliance secured the friendship of the Habsburgs; and an alliance with Rudolf II of Bavaria, Count Palatine of the Rhine, was obtained when Charles, who had become a widower in 1348, married Rudolph's daughter Anna.
In 1350, the king was visited at Prague by the Roman tribune Cola di Rienzo, who urged him to go to Italy, where the poet Petrarch and the citizens of Florence also implored his presence. Turning a deaf ear to these entreaties, Charles kept Cola in prison for a year and then handed him as a prisoner to Clement at Avignon.
Outside Prague, Charles attempted to expand the Bohemian crown lands, using his imperial authority to acquire fiefs in Silesia, the Upper Palatinate, and Franconia. The latter regions comprised "New Bohemia", a string of possessions intended to link Bohemia with the Luxemburg territories in the Rhineland. The Bohemian estates, however, were not willing to support Charles in these ventures. When Charles sought to codify Bohemian law in the Maiestas Carolina of 1355, he met with sharp resistance. After that point, Charles found it expedient to scale back his efforts at centralization.
In 1354, Charles crossed the Alps without an army, received the Lombard crown in St. Ambrose Basilica, Milan, on 6 January 1355, and was crowned emperor at Rome by a cardinal on April 5 of the same year. His sole object appears to have been to obtain the Imperial crown in peace, in accordance with a promise previously made to Pope Clement. He only remained in the city for a few hours, in spite of the expressed wishes of the Roman people. Having virtually abandoned all the Imperial rights in Italy, the emperor re-crossed the Alps, pursued by the scornful words of Petrarch, but laden with considerable wealth. On his return, Charles was occupied with the administration of the Empire, then just recovering from the Black Death, and in 1356, he promulgated the famous Golden Bull to regulate the election of the king.
Having given Moravia to one brother, John Henry, and erected the county of Luxembourg into a duchy for another, Wenceslaus, he was unremitting in his efforts to secure other territories as compensation and to strengthen the Bohemian monarchy. To this end he purchased part of the Upper Palatinate in 1353, and in 1367 annexed Lower Lusatia to Bohemia and bought numerous estates in various parts of Germany. On the death of Meinhard, Duke of Upper Bavaria and Count of Tyrol, in 1363, Upper Bavaria was claimed by the sons of the emperor Louis IV, and Tyrol by Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria. Both claims were admitted by Charles on the understanding that if these families died out both territories should pass to the House of Luxembourg. At about the same time, he was promised the succession to the Margravate of Brandenburg, which he actually obtained for his son Wenceslaus in 1373.