Wenceslaus III of Bohemia
King of Hungary, Bohemia and Poland

Wenceslaus III of Bohemia (Czech: Václav III., Hungarian: Vencel, Polish: Wacław, Croatian: Vjenceslav, Slovak: Václav; 6 October 1289 – 4 August 1306) was King of Hungary and Croatia from 1301 to 1305, and King of Bohemia and Poland from 1305. He was the son of Wenceslaus II of Bohemia (later also crowned King of Poland), and Judith of Habsburg.
While still a child, Wenceslaus was betrothed to Elizabeth, the only daughter of Andrew III of Hungary. After Andrew's death in early 1301, most Hungarian lords and prelates elected Wenceslaus as king, although Pope Boniface VIII supported a rival claimant, Charles I of Hungary of the royal House of Anjou (Kingdom of Naples).
Wenceslaus was crowned king of Hungary on 27 August 1301. He signed his charters under the name Ladislaus in Hungary. His rule was only nominal because a dozen powerful lords held sway over large territories in the kingdom. His father realised that Wenceslaus's position could not be strengthened and took him back from Hungary to Bohemia in August 1304. Wenceslaus succeeded his father in Bohemia and Poland on 21 June 1305. He abandoned his claim to Hungary in favour of Otto III, Duke of Bavaria on 9 October.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Wenceslaus III of Bohemia” as king of Hungary, Bohemia and Poland. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as king of Hungary, Bohemia and Poland. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q54040. VIAF identifies the subject as 13508679. The Library of Congress control number is n2008064242. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1289, 1306, 1301 and 1305.
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This entry incorporates text from “Wenceslaus III of Bohemia” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.