Occasionally, while traveling to other lands, I come across a new word which engages my imagination. The word “fenster” captured mine. By definition: as a noun, fenster means “window” (derived from German); as an infinitive, to fenster means “to be thrown from a window.”

A few years ago, we visited the city of Prague, as well as numerous castles in the Czech Republic. A castle is a wonder to observe, but observing many castles becomes tiresome. All qualify as dark, dank and dreary, with few windows. The most important of those were in the towers. Looking out a tower window, or fenster, surveyed much landscape, and served as a look out for marauding armies, but the tower window also accommodated another practical purpose. Captured traitors, foes or other undesirables were dispatched quickly by a practice, familiarly known as “fenstering”; i.e. to be thrown out the window. If high enough, the fall from a castle tower resulted in a predictable result.

Importantly, the fenstering process commenced with appropriate window shopping, and with modernity the practice expanded beyond its humble origin. Any high structure would suffice. Frequently, authorities “fenstered” undesirables by tossing them off a bridge, perhaps with hands and legs bound — to reduce splashing, of course. One famous fensteree, St John Nepomuk, a Catholic priest, had been fenstered off the Charles Bridge into the Vltava river (Moldova, under Soviet rule) by order of King Wenceslaus IV — certainly not the “Good King Wenceslaus” of Christmas carol fame. Nepomuk’s indiscretion: he was the confessor of the Queen of Bohemia and refused to break the “seal of confession.” King Wenceslaus IV insisted on knowing his wife’s sins, and St John Nepomuk declined to snitch. He earned sainthood, as a fenstered martyr. The Charles Bridge today sports a plaque identifying the exact spot of the dastardly fenster of March 20,1393. In modern 1393, kings no longer had to say “off with his head;” as “fenster the bloke” worked fine.

A fenster factoid: St John Nepomuk became the first martyr to uphold the Seal of Confession, and remains the patron saint against calumny (false statements) and a protector from floods and drowning.