1409
Council of Pisa Elects a Third Pope
Attempting to end the Western Schism with its rival popes in Rome and Avignon, the cardinals at Pisa elected Alexander V. Neither existing pope resigned. Christendom now had three vicars of Christ excommunicating one another simultaneously. The council that was supposed to heal the Church had tripled the disease. Alexander V died within a year under suspicious circumstances, succeeded by the notorious antipope John XXIII.
Ayutthaya Expands into Malay Peninsula
The Siamese kingdom of Ayutthaya extended its political influence southward along the Malay Peninsula, demanding tribute from the thriving port cities of Nakhon Si Thammarat and Pattani. Its control of overland trade routes linking the Indian Ocean to the South China Sea gave Ayutthaya commercial leverage over Southeast Asian maritime commerce that rivaled the rising Malacca Sultanate at the narrowest point of the strait.
University of Leipzig Founded
German students and professors withdrew from the University of Prague after a dispute over voting rights, stemming partly from Czech national assertion during the Hussite controversies, and founded a new university at Leipzig. It would become one of Central Europe's leading institutions, training generations of Lutherans in the next century.