15.6.1085 Vratislav II became King of Bohemia

The coronation of Vratislav II as King of Bohemia was a splendid one. It took place in St. Vitus Cathedral.Thecrown was put on the new ruler by Archbishop Egilbert, the ceremonial act was also witnessed by the chronicler Kosmas.

The coronation of Vratislav and his wife Svatava of Poland took place on 15 June 1085. Vratislav was dressed in royal insignia and Svatava in royal robes. Archbishop Egilbert of Trier anointed Wratislaw as king and put the crown on him during the festive mass. The coronation took place in St. Vitus Basilica at Prague Castle. "To Wroclaw, King of Bohemia and Poland, noble and peaceful, crowned by God"Life, health, victory," cried the clergy and all the courtiers three times.

The chronicler Kosmas took part in the ceremony. "Egilbert, archbishop of Trier, obeying the emperor's orders, arrived at the capital of Prague and on the 15th of the year. On 15 June, during the holy mass, he anointed Vratislav, wearing royal insignia, and placed the crown and his wife Svatava on his head," the chronicler described the coronation.

"The appearance of the royal crown of 1085 is brought closer to us by Vratislav's denarii. The motif of the crowned ruler occupied their obverse side until the end of his reign. The golden crown consisted of a headdress, four camaras in the shape of crosses or lilies, pendants under the temples and a temple rim with a cross. It imitated the Roman-German imperial crown of Otto the Great from the 10th century. The crown depicted on Vratislav's head in the 12th century rotunda in Znojmo is also close to this concept. Here the camaras are in the shape of lilies and the mitre is part of it," Vratislav Vaníček explains in his book Vratislav II / The First Czech King.

The new insignia also included a scepter, a ceremonial cloak was undoubtedly used and the spear of St. Moritz was carried in front of the ruler. Royal coronations brought a new quality not only from a purely prestigious point of view, but also from the point of view of state-forming symbolism. The royal rank of the Přemyslids marked a breakthrough in the traditional princely ideology in which the monarch physically represented the realruler of the country - the eternal and immortal Prince Wenceslas, who was the master of the dynasty and the state.

"By his choice and manner of installation on the old stone throne standing in the middle of Prague Castle, PrinceHe was bound to "all Bohemia", that is, more and more to the early medieval nobility, who began to appropriate the saint's cult. With their royal promotions, the Přemyslids were relieved of the heavy burden of the past," write Jaroslav Pánek and Oldřich Tůma in their book History of the Czech Lands.

The first royal coronation of the "new" style took place on 6 February 1228 in St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague. During the lifetime of his father Přemysl, his son and soon to be independent ruler Václav I was crowned.

Source:
Vratislav Vaníček: Vratislav II./ The First Czech King
Jan Bauer: Revolutionary Events in Czech History
Jaroslav Pánek, Oldřich Tůma: History of the Czech Lands
https://encyklopedie.praha2.cz/