AGNESE di BOEMIA, blessed. — B. at Prague in 1208 and d. there on 2 March 1282. Daughter of Ottocaro I, king of Bohemia, and of Costanza of Hungary, a relative of s. Elisabetta, she received, according to the custom of the time, an appropriate education in the monastery of Trebnitz (Silesia) and then in that of Doxan (Bohemia). Asked in marriage by Federico II, emperor of Germany, who had been widowed, she refused to consent, having previously vowed herself to Christ; and, to defend her refusal, she had recourse to the intervention of Pope Gregorio IX, who sent one of his legates expressly for this purpose. Once free, she devoted herself to charitable works and founded a hospital for the poor, entrusting it to the Fratelli della Croce (a military order whose followers wore a cross and a red star on their habit, approved by Gregorio IX in 1237 and confirmed by Niccolò IV in 1282), and two convents, one for the Franciscans and the other for the Poor Clares. Into the latter s. Chiara of Assisi sent five of her religious. A. took the veil there in 1235, according to others in 1236, and was later elected abbess there.
Wishing to establish the full spirit of poverty, of which the monastery of S. Damiano in Assisi, where s. Chiara was abbess, was an example, A. renounced the revenues of the hospital she had founded and preferred to live on alms; but this restriction was approved only under Innocent IV. Her sanctity was crowned by the gift of miracles; among other things, she foretold the victory of her brother Venceslao over the duke of Austria. The four letters of s. Chiara to A. that have come down to us attest the founder’s affection for A., whom she called «half of her soul», and to whom she sent several poor gifts as mementos. Pio IX confirmed her cult on 3 Dec. 1874. The feast is on 2 March.