If it was the 1618 one (that's the one you can see from the courtyard), they wrestled him out the window and then beat his hands with their scabbards as he hung on to the sill for dear life. Fortunately he landed in a pile of horse manure and suffered only minor injuries.
FWIW, the horse manure story was probably invented as a reaction to the Catholic explanation that they were saved by divine providence. The whole event is so steeped in religious propaganda from both sides that I don't think we can conclusively say what happened except that both did in fact survive.
Very true. What gets even weirder (I'm kind of a 30 years war nerd) was how dynastic concerns always ended up confusing the confessional tensions, so that you had German protestant houses fighting for the Emperor to improve their position vs. the Palatinate, and Catholic France allying with Calvinist Sweden to expand both of their influence in northern Germany.
But then weirdly the Ottoman Sultan was kind of low-key supporting the Habsburgs because his more immediate concern was Bethlen Gabor and if Vienna didn't have to worry about the Ottomans it would have a greater force-in-readiness to deter Bethlen. It's just such a fascinating time with so much of the modern world being laid down by people who were only thinking about immediate concerns.
Wedgewood and Wilson (Wilson's 30 years war book is absolutely amazing, if you haven't read it) agree, though they both spend an entire chapter warning you that Schiller is excellent literature and absolutely irresponsible history.
