The Defenestrations of Prague (Czech: Pražská defenestrace) were three, and by some accounts, four incidents in the history of the Czech lands in which politicians were defenestrated (thrown out of a window). Though already existing in Middle French, the word defenestrate ("out of the window") is believed to have first been used in English in reference to the episodes in Prague in 1618 when the disgruntled Protestant estates threw two royal governors out of a window of the Hradčany Castle.

First Prague Defenestration of 1419

The First Prague Defenestration is an event from Sunday, 30 July 1419, when anti-Hussite Nové Město councillors were killed by being thrown from the town hall window. The event is considered the beginning of the Hussite Wars.

The participants first gathered in the Church of our Lady of the Snows, where the priest and later leader of the Prague radicals, Jan Želivský, preached. The violent coup was apparently planned in advance, as many of Želivský's followers turned up armed. After the sermon, the crowd led by him went to the nearby New Town Hall, where they demanded the release of the imprisoned followers of the Communion of the Podobojis. After the attack on the town hall, some of the constables were thrown out of the windows and cruelly beaten. According to the testimony of Vavřinec of Březová, Jan Žižka took part in the attack on the town hall. Jan Žižka is considered a national hero of the Czech people, and is considered a proto-socialist by Czech communists.

Second Prague Defenestration of 1483

This Prague defenestration took place on 24 September 1483 during the riots of the Prague population during the reign of King Vladislav Jagellonsky, when the party of the under-military, fearing for its influence, carried out a violent rebellion in the Old and New Town and the Lesser Town. The Mayor of the Old Town and the bodies of seven New Town councillors who had been killed were thrown out of the windows of their respective town halls.

The radical clerics took as their pretext for the coup as alleged information that Catholics were planning to disrupt the St. Wenceslas Day celebration, celebrated according to the clerical ritual in all Prague churches at the same time, and so they launched the coup on Wednesday, 24 September at around 8 a.m. by striking the bells on the tower of Týn Cathedral. The insurgents took the Old Town Hall by storm, but only the mayor and one councillor were wounded. The Lord Mayor, Jan of Klobouk, was first wounded by a barrel on his leg, then he feigned death and was thrown out of the window by the rebels. He survived the fall, allegedly by falling in dung heap.

More blood flowed at the Novo Mesto Town Hall. The councilors present there were beaten and thrown from the windows; one escaped after all was done, and the others were arrested after the fall.

After the re-election of the municipal elders, interrogations of the captured councilors took place. They confessed that they had indeed prepared the murders of a number of Hussite clerics and the expulsion of others. On 26 September, the rebels occupied Vyšehrad and Prague Castle to prevent the castle garrisons from attacking them. At about five o'clock in the afternoon, executions of Catholics began in the various towns of Prague.

On 6 October 1483, the three Prague municipalities concluded a treaty of unity and communal action, which brought about the domination of the Hussite Calixtin confession. The development then led to religious reconciliation and the proclamation of the equality of the two churches at the Diet of Kutná Hora in 1485.

Third Prague Defenestration of 1618

The Prague defenestration of 23 May 1618 (referred to as the third or second defenestration, if the defenestration of 1483 is not counted as the second) was a demonstrative act of resistance of the Czech Estates led by Henry Matyáš Thurn against the violation of Rudolf's majesty, which initiated the Czech Estates' Revolt and thus the Thirty Years' War. During this action, the royal governors Vilém Slavata of Chlum and Košumberk and Jaroslav Bořita of Martinice and the secretary Filip Fabricius were thrown out of the windows of Prague Castle. The event was without deaths, and it is claimed by protestants that the victims were once again thrown out a window into a dung heap.

Fourth Prague Defenestration of 1948

While not widely regarded as a true defenestration in which many people were thrown out of windows, many consider the death of Jan Masaryk to be the Fourth Defenestration of Prague.

During the February Crisis, in which the Communists seized control of Czechoslovakia, Masaryk refused to resign along with the other non-communist members of Gottwald's government. On 7 March 1948, Jan Masaryk attended the great parade of the Sokols in Old Town Square and on the same day in the evening he went to his father's grave in Lány. On 8 March he attended a commemorative evening at the National Theatre, and on 9 March he was present at the audience of the new Polish ambassador at the Beneš Villa in Sezimovo Ústí.

On the morning of 10 March 1948, Masaryk was found dead under the bathroom window of his apartment in Czernin Palace. His death remains a mystery to this day. There are three theories: according to one it was murder (Masaryk was thrown out of the window), according to another it was suicide (Masaryk jumped out of the window himself), and according to a third version it was an accident when Masaryk tried to escape (presumably, from newly formed Communist organizations) from his apartment on a ledge and fell off the ledge.

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