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Updated: June 2, 2025
Ottocar was very loath; but could not help himself. Ottocar quitted Prag with a resplendent retinue, to come into the Danube country, and do homage to "my domestic" that once was. He bargained that the sad ceremony should be at least private; on an Island in the Danube, between the two retinues or armies; and in a tent, so that only official select persons might see it.
After his election as King of Germany, which had long been neglected under the government of sham emperors, increased the burden of his duties the more seriously he took them, and the more difficult the Bohemian king Ottocar, especially, rendered it for him to maintain the crown he had won, the more eagerly he strove, particularly after the victory of Marchfield had secured his sovereignty, to increase the power of his house.
His next care was to maintain the internal peace of those countries by salutary regulations; and he gained the affection of the nobles by confirming their privileges and permitting them to rebuild the fortresses which Ottocar had demolished. To superintend the execution of these regulations he fixed his residence at Vienna, where he was joined by his Queen and family.
The account we have says that many took the cross, such was the effect of his words, more likely of the man and what he was and had been in the sight of them all throughout his long life. To the court of King Ottocar of Bohemia there came in the year 1205 a brilliant embassy from far-off Denmark to ask the hand of his daughter Dragomir for King Valdemar, the young ruler of that country.
And when she heard that Ottocar had actually done fealty to Rhodolph, and had surrendered to him valuable provinces of the kingdom, no bridle could be put upon her woman's tongue. She almost stung her husband to madness with taunts and reproaches.
Ottocar, however, after seeing his army discomfited and himself left alone, still would not submit to our conquering standards, but, fighting with the strength and spirit of a giant, defended himself with wonderful courage, until he was unhorsed and mortally wounded by some of our soldiers.
The Misnian princes, however, having received a compensation from Ottocar, withheld their pretensions, and Rudolph purchased the acquiescence of Agnes and her husband by a sum of money and a small cession of territory.
He first attacked the petty adherents of Ottocar, the Margrave of Baden, and the counts of Freiburg, Montfort, and Neuburg, and, having compelled them to do homage and to restore the fiefs which they had appropriated during the preceding troubles, he prepared to turn his whole force against the King of Bohemia, with a solicitude which the power and talents of his formidable rival naturally inspired.
It is related in the Rhymed Chronicle of Ottocar, how he had been kept alive for a whole year by the skill of his physicians, but that they told him at last, as he sat playing at draughts, that death was upon him, and that he could live but five days.
To oppose this threatened invasion, Ottocar assembled a considerable army, sent a reënforcement to Henry of Bavaria, augmented the garrison of Klosterneuburg, a fortress deemed impregnable, fortified Vienna, and despatched a considerable party of his army toward Teppel to secure his frontier; but resigning himself to supineness and careless security, he passed that time, which should have been employed in repressing the discontented by his presence and rousing the courage of his troops, in hunting and courtly diversions.
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