The European and Anatolian revolts that had…

The Shans share power in Upper Burma by 1440 with the now-diminished Burmese kingdom of Ava.

At the birth of Albert’s posthumous son, Ladislas, the infant is placed under the guardianship of Frederick III, King of Germany, elected King of Hungary in 1439 by a faction of nobles.

In the ensuing brief civil war, Wladyslaw, greatly aided by Hunyadi, secures the Hungarian throne, assuming it in 1440 as King Uladislas I, contending with stiff opposition from Slovakian Hussites led by John Jiskra of Brandýs, who have taken control of Slovakia.

Frederick I, elector of Brandenburg from 1417 and founder of the Brandenburg line of Hohenzollern, had in 1425 handed over the control of Brandenburg to his eldest son, John the Alchemist, returned to Franconia, and devoted the rest of his life to imperial affairs, having himself spent less than six years in Brandenburg.

Active in the negotiations with the Hussites as a champion of religious moderation, he had helped bring about the pacts of Prague (1433) and Iglau (1436), and takes part in the election of Frederick III as German king in 1440.

At his death on September 20 of this year, he leaves his sons firmly in control.

Albert’s twenty-four year-old-cousin, Frederick V, Duke of Inner Austria (Styria, Carniola, and Carinthia), who inherits from his predecessor the leadership of the Habsburg family, covets Ladislas’ inheritance and assumes control of the infant without legal designation as regent.

Vagarshapat (modern Echmiadzin), originating in the seventh century BCE as the town of Vardkesavan, lies on the plain of the Aras River, twelve miles (twenty kilometers) west of Yerevan in west-central Armenia.

It had been renamed Vagarshapat about CE 140, when the Parthian king Vologases III made it his capital.

Upon the conversion of Armenia to Christianity about 300, Vagarshapat had become the residence of the Armenian patriarch.

In 344 the town ceased to be the Armenian capital, and in 453 the patriarchal seat was removed elsewhere, but in 1441 Kirakos, the supreme catholicos, or primate, of the Armenian Catholic Church, brings back the seat to Vagarshapat, which hereafter will remain the home of the “catholicos of all Armenians.”

The Turks, masters of Albania, allow conquered clan chiefs to maintain their positions and property, but they must pay tribute, send their sons to the Turkish court as hostages, and provide the Ottoman army with auxiliary troops.

The other cantons expel Zurich from the Swiss confederation and declare war in 1440.

Zurich retaliates by making an alliance with Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor of the house of Habsburg.

Defeated at Pfäffikon, Zürich is forced to withdraw its economic proscriptions.

Antonio Vivarini, who operates a successful family workshop of painters in Venice, uses the vitreous, enameled colors of Venetian glass in his early Madonnas, like the one painted around 1440 for the Oratorio dei Filippini in Padua.

The figures in this and other early works by Antonio, symbols of divine splendor, show no attempt at naturalness.

He initially trained with Andrea da Murano, and his works show the influence of Gentile da Fabriano.

The earliest known date of a picture of his, an altarpiece in the Accademia, is 1440.

Nicholas of Cusa, a German polymath, had in 1432 attended the Council of Basel, where he had published De concordantia catholica ("On Catholic Concordance"), in support of conciliarism.

He had later broken with the conciliar party, however, and become a staunch supporter of the pope; in 1437 he had been a member of a papal legation to Constantinople.

In his first (and most important) theological work, De docta ignorantia (“On Learned Ignorance”), written in 1440, Nicholas argues that knowledge is learned ignorance, that wisdom lies in the recognition that the human mind is incapable of grasping the infinity of God, in whom all opposites are combined.

He also writes on astronomy, physics, and mathematics, demonstrating, in all his thought, a continuity with contemporary speculation in the Neoplatonic tradition and a bold and original synthesizing intellect.

The Praguerie Revolt and its Suppression (1440)

In 1440, tensions arising from the centralizing policies and growing royal authority of King Charles VII erupted into open rebellion in an event known as the Praguerie. Named after a recent revolt in Prague, Bohemia—then closely linked to France through the House of Luxembourg—the Praguerie represented a coordinated aristocratic challenge to royal authority. The uprising was actively supported by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, who, despite his reconciliation with Charles VII in the 1435 Treaty of Arras, reversed course in 1439 due to Charles's centralizing reforms, aligning himself once more against the French king.

Central to the rebellion was the ambitious Charles I, Duke of Bourbon, who sought to undermine royal control along with prominent nobles including Jean, Duke of Alençon, and mercenary captains such as Antoine de Chabannes. The rebels secured the symbolic leadership of the sixteen-year-old Dauphin Louis, proposing to replace his father as king and establish a regency controlled by the nobles.

Responding swiftly, Arthur de Richemont, Constable of France, led royal troops into Poitou, historically a contested region associated with previous conflicts against royal minister Georges de la Trémoille. Within two months, Richemont decisively subdued much of the region, deploying the new royal artillery effectively to breach noble strongholds and quickly restoring order.

Efforts by the Dauphin and Alençon to incite broader uprisings in Auvergne failed, isolating the revolt. Although royal forces could not entirely prevent mercenary bands from pillaging parts of Poitou and ...